Enugu Assembly Passes Amended Appropriation Bill

L-R: The Publisher of Orient Daily and Magazine, Mr Godwin Ezeemo; his wife, Mrs Nneka Ezeemo, an unidentified doctor working in Toronto Hospital, Onitsha and the Chief Medical Director of Toronto Hospital, Dr Emeka Eze, during the Publishers’ visit to sympathise with victims of Onitsha tanker accident at Toronto Hospital, Onitsha, recently.

The Enugu State House
of Assembly has passed an amended appropriation bill of N9.88 billion to accommodate the provision of critical infrastructure not captured in the original budget.
The bill is aimed at deemphasising areas that the state cannot afford to implement immediately in favour of areas that require immediate attention.
Opening debate on the bill after its first and second readings last  Tuesday, the House Leader, Chief Ikechukwu Ezeugwu (PDP-Udenu), appealed that House Standing Order 64 (3) be suspended to enable members to give accelerated hearing to the bill.
“Colleagues, you will recall that the Executive arm of government in Enugu State recently held a stakeholders’ meeting where it was agreed that there will be changes to enable government move with the trend and re-order our priority.
“It is in line with the above that the budget revision became necessary to affect only 31 projects in the capital budget.  “Of the 31, eight are new projects that will have serious impact on the welfare of the people of Enugu State.
“Allocations to the remaining projects were adjusted to accommodate the construction of two kilometre road (Express to T-Junction), at N1.2 billion and the 3.6km Nike Lake road (PENOKS to T-Junction) at N1.7 billion.
“Others are the five kilometre Airport Roundabout-Orie Emene-Eke Obinagu Road at N400.5 million, the two kilometre Otutu-Odoru road at N200 million, the 1.5km 9th Mile/Nsukka and 9th Mile/Onitsha road bye-pass at one billion naira.
“Also to be covered in the revised appropriation are the construction of 10.8km Opi-Nsukka road at N2.6 billion, installation of street lights along the road at N500 million and the rehabilitation of Nsukka urban roads at N500 million,” he said.
The leader said that allocations to 20 of the affected projects were revised downward while three projects had their allocations beefed up because they were under budgeted.
He listed the three projects to include the purchase of vehicles revised from N458 million to N1.43 billion and the construction of the 36km Imilike-Ezimo-Obollo-afor ring road, revised from N100 million to N600 million.
Ezeugwu said that the construction of the Enugu-Onitsha-Ama Brewery bye-pass was also revised from N390 million to N700 million with all revisions totalling N9.87 billion.
He said the revision was only an internal re-allocation of resources in the existing capital budget to include eight new critical infrastructure not in the budget of N96.74 billion.
Supporting the revision, the Deputy Speaker, Chief Donatus Uzoagbado, (PDP-Oji River), said that the revision was done in good faith to raise the standard of living of the people.
Other lawmakers who supported the bill include, Mr Chinedu Nwamba (PDP-Nsukka East), Mr Kelvin Ukuta (PDP-Uzouwani) and Mr Sunday Ude-Okoye (PDP-Awgu North).
The assembly also screened and approved the nominations of Mrs Jane Ene, Mr Chris Ogbonna and Chief Collins Okenyi as members of the state Independent Electoral Commission.
Ruling, the Speaker, Chief Edward Ubosi, commended the lawmakers for their robust contributions to the passage of the bill which would enable the state government to carry out its duties.