Abia Assembly Rejects 2012 Budget Details

Abia State House of Assembly has rejected the 2012 budget breakdown by the executive, describing the figures as “inconsistent, and full of errors”.

The break down was presented by the state Commissioner for Finance, Mr Nicholas Eleri, during the plenary of the assembly in Umuahia.

Governor Theodore Orji had said during the presentation of the N122.390 billion on Dec.19 that the commissioner for finance would later present the breakdown to the assembly.

When the assembly began deliberations on Wednesday, the Deputy Leader, Mr Princewill Onyegbu, announced in the order paper that Eleri would present the 2012 budget breakdown.

However, Eleri after being admitted, read out figures allocated to the ministries of Health, Agriculture and Housing.

He also read figures estimated for projects but some members objected to the figures on the ground that they were false.

Mr Chukwuemeka Osoagbaka, representing Ikwuano constituency, was the first to draw the attention of the House to the inconsistency of the figures read by the commissioner and described them as typographical errors.

“Mr Commissioner if we add the amount you read out as estimate for Health, Housing and Agriculture, one might certainly get confused mid-way and we will request that you further clarify to us on how this calculation was done,’’ he said.

The Speaker, Mr Udeh Okochukwu, told the commissioner that he disagreed with the claims that the errors noticed in the calculations were not deliberate and directed the commissioner to “put his house in order” before the presentation.

He said that the lawmakers would not accept any shoddy job on the budget, considering that it was central to the delivery of democracy dividends to the people.