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Despite efforts to check the ugly trend, it is sad that budget padding by Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) has become a recurring feature of our annual budgets. Also, constituency projects have been affected by the same scourge. Unfortunately, the fraudulent act seems to have become the norm in our budgeting system.
The issue of budget padding came to the fore recently when the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, Sadiya Umar Farouq, told a Joint Committee of the National Assembly on Appropriation that she had no knowledge of the reported N206 billion inserted into her ministry’s 2023 budget proposal. She also disclosed that she had written a letter to the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, on the issue. Also, the Minister of Defence, Maj-Gen Bashir Magashi (retd), and that of Health, Dr. Osagie Ehanire, made similar complaints when they appeared before the Senate Committee on Appropriation. Both point in the direction of the Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning for allegedly padding their respective ministries’ Budget proposals without their consent.
This prompted the Committee on Appropriation to query the Finance Minister on the matter as it affected other MDAs. In her defence, the Finance Minister acknowledged that the total amount involved was N424billion alleged to have been inserted into the 2023 budget proposals of ministries of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, Defence and that of Health. However, she denied the allegations of budget padding, asserting that it was due to “coding errors” that escaped detection across the ministries involved. As regards the N206billion padding of the Humanitarian Ministry’s budget, Mrs. Zainab explained that the World Bank was the funding source of the said amount meant for National Social Safety Project-Scale Up domiciled in the Humanitarian Ministry’s Headquarters.
She added that the opportunity to correct the errors was available for all the MDAs but they failed to utilise it. However, the Senate Committee on Appropriation believed her explanation and exonerated her of any infraction. Nonetheless, budget padding is still one issue that the Buhari administration has not been able to resolve in spite of his promise to deal with corruption. We condemn the reported budget padding by the MDAs and others. The government cannot realise its budget goals when the budget is padded. It is not yet late for the administration to curb the menace before more harm is done. In fact, the war against corruption must be waged in all fronts beginning with the budgeting system. It is ironical that a government that champions the anti-corruption war has MDAs that continually pad their budgets. This is the time to deal with these budget scandals and sanction the erring officials. In 2017, for instance, the audit report of the MDAs by the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation (AuGF) revealed a huge corruption in virtually all the MDAs that began with the budget processes and implementation. It has become a perennial occurrence, with top government officials as the chief culprits.
Recently, the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Offences Commission(ICPC) revealed that a total of N400 billion was inserted into the N13.59trilion 2021/2022 Federal budget. Of this amount, N300billion was reportedly paddled into the budget by the various MDAs as duplicated projects. In the 2022 Appropriation Bill, N100billion was inserted into the N17trillion estimate for the financial year. The ICPC said it listed all the MDAs involved and sent same to the National Assembly for appropriate action. So far, nothing has been done against the guilty MDAs, except a threat to withhold their budget allocations if the act persists.
Last year, former Accountant -General of the Federation, Ahmed Idris, was relieved of his post for allegedly misappropriating billions of naira. His predecessor was reportedly sacked by President MuhammaduBuhari for alleged embezzlement of security funds totaling N2.5billion concealed under several MDAs budget proposals. Recently, the Chartered Institute of Forensic and Investigative Professionals of Nigeria said 75 percent of the nation’s revenue is lost to through fraudulent increase in the budget estimates.
Until the culture of accountability is put in place at relevant levels of governance, the financial sleaze will continue. That is why brilliant budget ideas are never translated into actual implementation that will ensure growth and development of laudable programmes articulated in the budget framework. Certainly, budget padding promotes the culture of corruption that should not be allowed to continue. Besides, it makes budget monitoring, implementation and performance unattainable. That is probably why Nigeria’s budget hardly achieves 50 per cent performance goal. Given the level of corruption in the public sector, it is high time the culprits were prosecuted and severely punished to serve as a deterrent to others. For the nation’s budget to achieve its objectives, there is need for transparency and accountability.
