Senate to pass N895bn supplementary budget Wednesday

The Senate will Wednesday consider and pass the Federal Government’s N895.842billion supplementary budget, it was learnt on Tuesday.

Senate President Ahmad Lawan, gave this indication during plenary after the Senate Committee on Appropriation laid its report on the Supplementary Appropriation Bill, 2021.

The consideration of the request from the Executive by the Senate is an indication that the supplementary budget would be passed tomorrow.

The Appropriations Committee Chairman, Senator Jibrin Barau, had last week pleaded with the upper chamber to allow the Joint Committees of the Senate and House of Representatives come up with a harmonised report on the supplementary bill to facilitate its eventual presentation today.

Senator Barau in keeping with his request for time extension finally laid the report on the Supplementary Appropriation Bill, 2021, before the upper chamber during plenary on Tuesday.

President Buhari had about two weeks ago transmitted a Supplementary Appropriation Bill for N895.842, 465,917 billion to the National Assembly for consideration and approval.

He explained that the proposed amount would be used to fund the COVID-19 vaccine programme; fund health related expenditures for treatment of additional 50,000 patients under the Nigeria Comprehensive AIDS Program in states; and procure additional equipment captured in this year’s capital expenditure on Defence and Security to tackle prevalent security challenges across the country.