2016 Budget: Presidency Moves To Douse Tension …As Buhari Writes NASS

Worried by the controversy dogging the 2016 Budget at the National Assemble, there were indications at the weekend that President Muhammadu Buhari is set to decontaminate the odium of the situation.
Our sources inside Aso Rock Presidential Villa said that, “some tacit clarifications might be made tomorrow” (today).
It was gathered that the clarifications are contained in an official letter written by the President to the leadership of the National Assembly on adjustments in the budget.
The letter is expected to be read by the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, and Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, at plenary tomorrow.
The source disclosed that the difference spotted by the Senate “does not really affect the substance of the budget to the extent that there is a serious breach”.
Meanwhile, a  former National Chairman of the All Progressives  Congress (APC), and  one-time governor of Osun State, while commenting on the 2016 Budget controversy during an interview, lampooned the Senate leadership for what he described as an act of indiscipline.
The APC chieftain said his party was mindful of the consequences of allowing wrong people to be at the helm of affairs which was the reason the party wanted disciplined individuals to lead the Senate.
“Nigeria’s budget is a huge document and one wonders how such a document could be missing in the Senate. The development is a fallout of indiscipline that brought the current leadership of the Senate into the position and, as you know, that was not the choice of our party”, Akande stated.
But in a reaction, the Senate told Akande that he got it wrong.  The Senate said it was regrettable that a man of  the former party leader’s  status would  respond to mere speculation without cross-checking his facts or, worse still, eager to latch on to any opportunity to bring to disrepute the leadership of the Senate because he failed to get his choice candidates elected.
In a statement by its spokesman, Senator Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi, the Senate urged Akande to check his records properly so that he could see that “at no time did the Senate say the 2016  Budget was missing”.
Rather, Abdullahi noted, the legislative house had insisted in several   official statements and press interviews by its principal officers that the budget was not missing but   that two different versions are now available.
He explained that the statement by Akande was another expression of the frustration that the former governor of Osun State suffers for not being able to impose his men on the Senate as   leaders.
Sources said at the weekend, that President Muhammadu Buhari has officially written to the President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki, requesting the formal withdrawal of the proposed 2016 budget for adjustment.
Buhari’s request may likely put to rest the controversy over the missing original budget document presented to the joint session of the National Assembly on December 22, 2015.
The Presidency had after presenting the 2016 budget discovered that some of the figures proposed were incredibly high.
Buhari’s letter of withdrawal was addressed to Saraki and Dogara, the source said.
The report revealed that the old budget contained major omissions like absence of allocation for the second Niger Bridge while a large sum was allocated for line items which have now been reviewed.