Sunday Ani

Lagos State House of Assembly yesterday approved the request by the Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu to re-order over N9 billion from the 2019 budget size.

The governor had earlier sought the approval of the Assembly to re-order N93,742,530 from the 2019 budget size on the grounds that there was shortfall in revenue.

In a letter read on the floor of the House, the governor decried lack of new revenue sources for the remaining months of the year, and requested the 2019 budget which stands at N873.532 billion be re-ordered.

He noted in the letter that budgetary provisions for the recurrent and capital expenditures of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) are not likely to be utilised before the end of the year, hence the sum of N34.050 billion could be re-ordered. A breakdown of the re-ordering according to the governor showed that budget for the recurrent is N24 billion, while that of the current is N10.05 billion.

Sanwo-Olu equally stated in the letter that the budget had been partially implemented by the last administration before its tenure ended on May 29, 2019.

He maintained that the current administration is committed to fulfilling its electoral promises to the citizens, particularly in area of provision of road infrastructure, promising that as soon as the rain gives way to the dry season, work would commence on new projects, while ongoing ones would be completed as well.

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Speaker Mudashiru Obasa had earlier referred the governor’s request to the joint committees on Finance and Budget and Economic Planning.

Presenting the report of the joint committee, Co-chairman, Gbolahan Yishawu, stated that the 2019 budget size stood at 71 percent performance as at August.

He said the recurrent performance was 80 percent while the capital performance stood at 46 percent.

In a motion moved by Tunde Braimoh, the House approved the capital budget of N74,824,648,162 and recurrent budget of N18,918,059,368 to be re-ordered respectively.

Urging members to consider the request for approval, Obasa said: “Since it is a unanimous decision, let’s pass the re-order so that the governor and his team will continue to do the good work for Lagos residents.”

Braimoh also said: “We need to expeditiously consider the governor’s request. The committee has done justice, so let’s approve it so that the people of Lagos can feel our impact.”