The crack in the Senate may soon widen as senators predominantly from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and some from the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) have kicked against plans by President Muhammadu Buhari to borrow more funds to tackle insecurity and combat COVID-19 pandemic.
The senators, who expressed their displeasure in separate chats with Daily Sun, said President Buhari was yet to account for the $1 billion he withdrew from the Excess Crude Account (ECA) to tackle insecurity.
They said until a satisfactory explanation is offered on how the funds were spent, the National Assembly must not consider any fresh loans from the Executive.
Already, the House of Representatives is investigating the expenditure of security funds by the service chiefs.
Despite the growing uprising by aggrieved lawmakers, Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, is determined to approve fresh loans for President Buhari.
Senate, since inception in 2019, has approved over $28 billion with more requests before Clifford Ordia-led committee on Local and Foreign Debts.
Defending the humongous loans so far acquired by President Buhari-led Federal Government last week, Lawan said: in the absence of revenue for the government, “the only option is to borrow, and to borrow, responsibly. Before we borrow, we have to identify those essential infrastructure that we need to provide for our economy to grow. The job of the National Assembly is to look at the request and check whether those projects are identified as essential projects for funding with the loan. We have to ensure the fair distribution of the projects because Nigeria is so large but we have to touch every part.
“Since we don’t have a better option, we have to accept the request. Before we approved the loans, our committee on foreign and domestic debts went to see the areas covered in the loans. We have also started oversight functions to ensure judicious utilisation of the loans in the overall interest of Nigerians.”
According to the supplementary budget sent to the National Assembly, N895 billion is being sort.
Lawan promised Nigerians that the National Assembly will give speedy approval to the N895 billion supplementary budget announced by the Federal Executive Council (FEC) last Wednesday.
Daily Sun has reliably gathered that the Federal Government, through the Minister of Finance, Zainab Ahmed, was initially reluctant in approving a supplementary budget and a fresh loan to fund military operations in the country.
In one of her recent appearances before the Senate Army committee, Ahmed said the Federal Government had given all the necessary funds required to the military to prosecute insurgency and banditry, insisting that there were no more funds to approve.
She said Army alone got N1,008.84 trillion as budget releases between January 2019 and the first quarter of 2021. Ahmed gave the breakdown of how her Ministry disbursed N1,008.84 trillion to the Army in the past two years as follows: N129.69 billion (Capital Expenditure); N39.76 billion (Overhead Cost); N681.79 (Personnel Cost); and N157.6 billion (Special Releases).
Lawan, it was gathered, not satisfied with finance minister’s purported opposition to a supplementary budget, personally met with President Buhari, and insisted that more funds must be approved.
However, senators who commented on the development, but pleaded not to be quoted, said Lawan did not consult lawmakers before he tabled the matter before Buhari.
One of the senators said: “In the past, at least until 2019, our Senate president will usually talk to us and get our views. Things are different now. Only a handful of senators are informed and the rest of us are just ignored.”
He said the new loan requests may likely be passed by Lawan, even if lawmakers are opposed to it. He said it will not be the first time Lawan will be going against the popular wish of senators as long as President Buhari is satisfied with the action.
He said it is questionable for the leader of the Senate to be pushing for a supplementary budget and a fresh loan, when funds can be vired from other subheads of the budget to fund Military operation.
He warned that if senators do nothing to challenge the plans to borrow more funds, Nigerians may rise up against them in the coming months.
Senate spokesman, Bashiru Ajibola, was yet to respond to a message sent to him for a reaction as at the time of filing in this report.
