The danger of budget-padding reared its monstrous head again when a forthright comment of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Babachir Lawal, on the non-implementation of constituency projects, earned him a reprimand from senators last week. He was summoned for speaking the truth –that the N60 billion constituency projects in the 2016 budget may not be funded as oil revenue has not reasonably improved.
Appearing before the Senate Joint Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions, Finance and Appropriation, Lawal stood his ground when asked to verify the media statement credited to him. “The statement is correct. That is my statement; we cannot guarantee the implementation of constituency projects in the 2016 budget,” he told the inquisitive senators.
The two chambers of the National Assembly smuggled a total of N100 billion into the budget for the so-called constituency projects of the lawmakers; but it was reduced to N60 billion after a protracted standoff, and negotiation between the executive and legislature. It took a fence-mending meeting brokered by a former Senate President, Ken Nnamani, and ex-Speaker of the House of Representatives, Aminu Masari, before President Muhammadu Buhari could assent to the Appropriation Bill of N6.06 trillion in May.
Oil revenue has dropped by about 50 per cent, which the SGF attributed to the activities of militants in the Niger Delta, who constantly breach national oil infrastructure. Also, oil prices have nosedived in the international market. It smirks of insensitivity of the lawmakers that their interests are not moderated by shortfalls in public revenue. Even the Federal Government has been borrowing monthly since 2014 to augment its salary and pension obligations.
But, all along, the direct impact of some constituency projects such as mini-stadia on the generality of the people has been questioned, just as the sinking of boreholes in rural communities across the country, building of town halls, vocational centres, construction of rural roads, and purchasing of grinding machines. Certainly, they fall outside the remit of the Federal Government.
The concept of special projects is nothing but another short-cut to treasury pillaging. Between 2004 and 2014, the parliament provided about N900 billion for constituency projects, according to Mohammed Ndume, the then chairman, Senate Committee on Millennium Development Goals. According to him, “The National Assembly usually budgeted N100 billion for constituency projects every year since 2004 for the six geopolitical zones….” But much of this fund is frittered away through dubious or badly executed projects. Lawmakers had been accused in the past of being the contractors that executed the projects using fronts – a shadowy process that breeds corruption. In a federal political entity that Nigeria is, Abuja cannot directly take over the responsibility of executing rural projects that states and local governments ought to provide. As the projects are not well planned, there is also no programme for their maintenance. They hardly survive the tenure of the legislators that attract them to the various constituencies.
Why the national budget should not be encumbered with constituency projects is better appreciated when we consider the fact that 2,399 of such projects were abandoned in 2013 alone, according to the then Minister of Special Duties, Aminu Turaki. These have become monuments of waste, which should not be replicated annually. The immediate former chairman, House of Representatives Appropriation Committee, Abdulmumin Jibrin, forced to resign on Tuesday following the disquiet that trailed padding of the 2016 budget provides further evidence. As he shot back at the Speaker, Yakubu Dogara, asking him to resign too, he alleged that four principal officers of the House took a decision that “wasteful projects” running into billions of naira be allocated to their constituencies. Besides, a recent startling media revelation that N2.5 billion was inexplicably funnelled to the bank account of one lawmaker in the Seventh Parliament from the N60 billion that was padded in the budget in one particular year, should provoke public outrage over this perverse culture of brazen looting of national treasury by public officers. These allegations demand EFCC proper investigation.
Every president, from Olusegun Obasanjo in 1999 to Buhari, has had to contend with this budgetary mess, which often leads the legislators to mischievously flaunt their power of impeachment. Clearly, this is an abuse of power.
Their proclivity to distort the budget stems from their pursuit of self-interest and ignorance of their responsibility as espoused in the 1999 Constitution. This explains why the Minister of Works, Power and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, at a forum in Abuja in June, drew their attention to the Exclusive Legislative List that contains their duties. He said, “I say this because we must avoid the risk of crowded projects where legislators at the national level are made to implement constituency projects that involve primary health care centres, which are for the local governments.” He’s right.
The power of appropriation as enshrined in Section 81 of the Constitution does not confer on the National Assembly the power to insert benefits – financial or projects for lawmakers. Lobbying is an essential part of the legislative process, used to foster harmony in the relationship between the executive and legislative arms of government. Legislators, therefore, should leverage this nuance to attract whatever project they want executed in their various constituencies from the Ministries, Departments and Agencies, rather than engaging in this yearly distortion of the budget with constituency projects.
As this budgetary provision has been abused since inception, the lawmakers’ logic that the scheme is development-driven or people-oriented is a red-herring that should not be associated with the national budget anymore.
