From Fred Itua, Abuja
Former leader of the Senate, Mohammed Ali Ndume, has hailed President Muhammadu Buhari’s 2022 budget proposal to the National Assembly. He specifically hailed the increased spending on security and infrastructure.
The Borno South senator, however, faulted plans by the Buhari administration to excessively borrow to fund the budget next year.
Ndume said the government could save more money by cutting cost and reducing annual overhead. He added that loopholes in the various ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), could be blocked.
He said: “The proposal to finance the budget by borrowing more is worrisome. The government should cut down personnel and recurrent costs; increase our revenues and plug all leakages.
“The Presidential Economic Advisory Committee and finance experts should be actively involved in the debt management and re-evaluation of our debt profile.
“In this year only N1.759 trillion had been expended for capital as of August 2021, while N2.87 trillion was spent on debt service, and N2.57 trillion on personnel cost, including pensions.
“This performance even though it represents improvement on previous year’s performance cannot trigger effective and visible economic recovery.
“The president should pay more attention to the effective, transparent, and accountable implementation of the budget by the MDAs when passed so that the impact will be visible to Nigerians.