The Senate has disagreed with the Federal Government’s proposed benchmark of $75 per barrel for the 2013 Budget, raising it up to $78 per barrel, 2kobo less than the position of the House of Representatives on the oil benchmark.

Considering the report of its committee on the Medium Term Expenditure (2013 – 2015), yesterday before its final passage, the Senate also rejected the structures of Subsidy Reinvestment Programme (SURE-P)of the Federal Government at state, senatorial and local government levels, on the note that as there were a total deviation from the initial goals of the programme.

The Senate’s Joint Committee on Finance and National Planning on the Medium Term Expenditure Framework for 2013 to 2015 had in its report presented by the Chairman of the committee, Sen. Ahmed

Makarfi, said the committee recommended that $75 per barrel should be adopted for the MTEF and FSP while a higher benchmark would beadopted for the 2013 budget.

The joint committee had also recommended the rejection of the structures of SURE-P and that details of the programmes’ projects be attached to the budget for clarity.

Both chambers of the National Assembly rejected the oil benchmark of $75 per barrel proposed by the Federal Government, on the basis that an increase would provide more money for the funding of the budget deficit and make funds available for certain sectors in dire need of funding.

But the executive had warned that an increased benchmark for oil price would be dangerous for the economy given the volatile nature of the global oil prices.

The committee on the issue of foreign and local debts, raised alarm over the rate of borrowing by the Federal Government, as the debts had continued to grow, putting the nation at the risk of returning to the days of huge debt burden.

According to Makarfi, the projected fiscal deficit for the period  2013-2015 as contained in the MTEF document, stood at N1.937trillion, N900.8billion and N738.4billion, respectively.

His words: “The total level of pending implied a deficit of 2.85 per cent, 2.17 per cent, 1.60 per cent and 1.11per cent of GDP in 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015, respectively as against 6.60 per cent of GDP in 2010.

“While high level of foreign borrowing could return Nigeria to where we came from, that is, high level of foreign debts, high level of domestic borrowing can push up interest rate and crowd out private sector from the credit market,” Makarfi said.

According to his analysis, if Nigeria goes ahead to procure the proposed $80billion loan, by 2015, external debt could be as high as $15billion.

While the Senators, in their contributions, agreed with the committee’s report, President of the Senate, David Mark, noted that it was the desire of the Senate to ensure speedy development of the country through the process of budgeting but enjoined his colleagues to reserve their elaborate debates for the 2013 budget consideration slated to commence, today.

Nneka Amaechi-Nnadi