•Lawmakers raise request to N214bn
Stories from Fred Itua, Abuja
Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu said yesterday that President Muhammadu Buhari’s request for virement was unconstitutional.
This is even as the Senate jerked up the virement request of N180 billion by N34 billion, thereby bringing the total to N214 billion.
He said virement in its entirety is unconstitutional. He spoke when the Upper Chamber was considering the report of its Committee on Appropriations on the virement of funds appropriated for special investment (recurrent) and special intervention (capital) for funding of critical recurrent and capital items in the 2016 Appropriation Bill.
Ekweremadu cited Section 81(4) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended), noting that this portion of the law allows the President to submit a supplementary appropriation to the National Assembly in case of shortfall in the budget.
According to him, Appropriation Act and Supplementary Act are provided for in the Constitution, but virement has no place in the nation’s highest law book.
Ekweremadu implored the Senate and indeed all those piloting the affairs of the state to correct this anomaly and stick only to constitutional provisions.
“I want to call the attention of this Senate to Section 81 subsection 4 just for our guidance and for the future. Section 81 (4) of the Constitution says, “In respect of any financial year, it is found that the amount appropriated by the appropriation Act for any purpose is insufficient or the need has arisen for expenditure for a purpose for which no amount has been appropriated by the Act, a supplementary estimate showing the sums required shall be laid before each House of the National Assembly and the needs of any such expenditure shall be included in a supplementary appropriation bill.
However, Senator Abdullahi Adamu, drew the attention of the Senate to the fact that Section 24 of the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) provides for virement, stressing that FRA is also part of the laws by which with the country is governed.
Senator Adamu said, “nobody in his senses will doubt or contest the very clear provisions of the Constitution with respect to budgetary appropriations.
However, there is Section 24 in the FRA which provides for virement. While we accept the intervention, we don’t want to create the impression to have meant a wrong thing in totality because there is a fiscal responsibilty act which is recognised by the constitution”.
Reacting to the constitutional question raised by Ekweremadu, Senate President Bukola Saraki, appreciated the clarification, saying that what the Senate was doing was to help the executive in tackling the economic problem in the country.
His words: “I think your observation as far as the Constitution is concerned is well noted. I think we are all fully aware of that and that is why I continue to thank my colleagues so much in the way we have been addressing the issue of the economy and we are not looking at it from whichever party we belong.”
Meanwhile, just like the House of Representatives did last Thursday, the Senate passed the virement, jerking it up from N180 billion to N214 billion.
The House had increased the virement to N208 billion for purported additional shortfalls discovered during the meeting of National Assembly Joint Appropriations Committee with heads of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the government.
Crisis looms in Senate over police recruitment
There is an imminent crisis in the Senate over the Federal Government’s plan to recruit 10,000 personnel.
Some Senators want the exercise done on local governments basis, while others prefer states.
The anger in the Upper Chamber was not unconnected to the recent approval given by President Muhammadu Buhari that the recruitment be done on local government basis, contrary to the Federal Character principle enshrined in the 1999 Constitution.
Chairman of the Senate Committee on Police Affairs, Senator Abu Ibrahim, had last month prevailed on the Chairman of Police Service Commission (PSC), retired Inspector General of Police (IGP) Mike Okiro, to stop the statutory state quota arrangement in the recruitment.
The exercise was suspended in early September, 2016, following sharp disagreements over the formula to adopt in carrying out the recruitment.
The Senate committee wanted the recruitment to be based on nine persons per local government, but the PSC insisted on equality of states as a criterion.
Ibrahim had explained that his committee’s position was informed by the need to ensure that more policemen are recruited from states with higher population and pointed out that the policy of community policing would be better enhanced if the personnel are recruited from the most rural areas in local councils.
Before the suspension of the recruitment, the Senate committee had in a letter, asked the PSC to suspend the exercise over alleged irregularity.
Senator Ibrahim, said the clash between the Senate and the PSC had been resolved by the Presidency. “We have resolved the issue and the recruitment would be done on local government basis. Very soon, the exercise would resume,” he had said.
He said the personnel would form the foundation for the commencement of community policing in the country.
“Nine personnel would be recruited per local government area. The policemen would be used to form a unit for community policing in all the 774 local government areas of the country,” he added.
But the committee’s position has angered some lawmakers, who have vowed to fight the move.