2016 Budget: Executive Misleading Nigerians On ‘Removal’ Of Calabar-Lagos Rail Project – Reps

The House of Representatives has denied reports that the National Assembly expunged from the 2016 budget details sent to the Executive last Thursday, the vital Calabar – Lagos rail line project. Our correspondent yesterday reported that the purported removal and ‘mutilations’ of some major items contained in the 2016 Appropriation Bill by the National Assembly may have delayed its signing into lawby President Muhammadu Buhari, at least, by a week. We also reported that following the emergency Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting held on Friday, it was discovered that aside the removal of the Calabar – Lagos rail line project from the budget details, the National Assembly purportedly reduced allocation to the completion of Idu-Kaduna rail project by N8.7b; slashed allocations for the completion of all major road projects across the country; proposed new roads for which studies have not been conducted; dropped proposals for the purchase of essential drugs for major health campaigns like Polio and AIDS; cancelled or reduced allocations for diversification projects under Agriculture and Water Resources; and diverted funds for rural health facilities and boreholes for which provisions had been made elsewhere. But Chairman of the House Committee on Appropriation, Hon Abdulmumin Jibrin, on Sunday took to his verified Twitter handle @AbdulAbmJto dismiss the reports as false. Hon. Jibrin, whose committee worked extra weeks in conjunction with its Senate counterpart led by Senator Danjuma Goje, to get the 2016 budgetdetails ready so they could correct all the inconsistencies, errors, omissions and padding in the document submitted to the National Assembly by the president in December last year, accused the Executive of misleading the nation. According to the lawmaker representing Bebeji/Kiru federal constituency of Kano State, the Calabar – Lagos rail line project was never captured in the 2016 budget sent to the National Assembly. In a series of tweets, in which he addressed the renewed controversy on the 2016 budget, Mr. Jibrin expressed shock that false information was being spread when a proper check could have easily revealed that the project was not included in the 2016 budget in the first place.