Moshood Adebayo
Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, has signed the N873.532 billion budget, into law, promising that his administration will utilise it for the betterment of residents through programmes and policies that will impact positively on the people.
He also assured that the delay of the budget notwithstanding, Lagosians will enjoy dividends of democracy.
The signing into law by the governor, yesterday ended many months of controversies between the executive and legislative arms in the state.
The immediate past governor, Akinwunmi Ambode, had submitted N852.317 billion to the House of Assembly on February 5, while the legislative house on April 29 passed the bill after increasing it by N21.215 billion.
The approval came more than 80 days after Ambode had presented the bill following months of face-off between the executive and the legislators.
However, since then, there has been controversies on the bill with both arms of government passing buck on each other why it has not been signed into law.
Sanwo-Olu said: “The appropriation bill touches the lives of all residents of the state. We will quickly get to work. There were expenses incurred by the immediate past administration because the former governor has the right to spend certain percentage of the budget before it is signed into law.
“The signing today (yesterday) will help us to disaggregate to the respective ministries, agencies and departments. So, we will need to push on both the revenue and expenditure parts of the budget. This is to ensure residents feel the impact of the budget.
“We will push on the capital revenue side, especially on our revenue and see what are the creative means of financing that we can bring onboard within the law, to ensure citizens feel the benefit of democratic government.”
Sanwo-Olu commended the Eight Assembly “for being effective in their duties” and noted that even though the year was far gone “we will ensure we quickly deploy the all machinery of government in other to achieve full utilisation and performance of the budget.
“We will ensure all the lines you have laid will be fully adhere to, to ensure the citizens enjoy the benefit of government. As observed, the budget is a 55 to 45 percent, if we are lucky and push on our revenue side, it is not unlikely that before the end of the year, we will not sit to look at the budget again.”
Sanwo-Olu signed the appropriation law along with three others; namely the Neighbourhood Watch Law 2019, Lagos State House of Assembly Service Commission Law 2019, and Domestic Staff Service Provider Registration Law 2019
The law on domestic staff, the governor noted, will help government to have profile of whoever is employed by residents to work as domestic staff in their houses
House of Assembly Commission is centred on enhancing the House to work efficiently and give the legislative house free space to operate.
“It will assist them to implement the full autonomy stipulated by law,” the governor said.
Chairman, House Committee on Appropriation, Gbolahan Yishau, who represented Speaker Mudashiru Obasa, was silent on controversies which surrounded the bill.
However, he said the budget will consolidate on the gains of democracy in the state, adding that 55 percent of it was allocated to capital expenditure, while 45 was allocated to recurrent expenditure.
“Some of the issues contained in the bill include pension and salaries issues. But by and large, the budget will consolidate on the gains of democracy. We, as lawmakers, have done our best to ensure the passage of the appropriation bill,” he said.