The Nigerian Senate has asked President Muhammadu Buhari to present the 2021 budget to the National Assembly before the end of September this year.
President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, made this call in his remarks after referring President Muhammadu Buhari’s 2021 – 2023 Medium Term Expenditure Framework and Fiscal Strategy Paper request to the Senate Committees on Finance; and National Planning for further legislative work.
According to Lawan, the September deadline for the presentation of the 2021 budget is to ensure a speedy passage of the budget as was the case with the 2020 budget.
He also mandated the Senate Committees on Finance and National Planning to relate with all relevant revenue-generating agencies in the country to smoothen the passage of the MTEF.
“The request of Mr. President C-in-C is referred to the two committees, Senate Committees on Finance; Budget and National Planning, with Finance as the lead Committee.
“This Senate is giving the Committee four weeks within which to work very closely with the Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning, and particularly engagement with the revenue generating agencies where we are expecting them to meet their targets.
“We need to ensure that they have all the support that they require from the National Assembly, particularly the Senate to meet their targets.
“Meanwhile, the executive should continue to work on the preparations for the 2021 budget, and by this we are also equally committed to ensuring that we receive the budget estimates at the end of September and that we are able to consider the budget and get it passed before the end of December to repeat what we did for budget 2020,” Lawan said.
