Expert Wants Template Review To Quicken Budget Passage

A financial analyst, Mr Emmanuel Eze, has called on the executive to review its budgetary template to hasten the submission of yearly appropriation bill to the National Assembly.
Eze, Chief Executive Officer, Perfecta Investment Company, Lagos made the suggestion while speaking with newsmen in Lagos, yesterday.
According to him, the submission of yearly appropriation bill to the National Assembly by December is too late.
“It is possible to submit the appropriation bill by October to enable the National Assembly debate on it and pass it to the President for assent.
“Since the executive arm has details of previous budget and it is an annual exercise, factoring in the new measures should not be a big deal.
“A country’s budget is too important to be submitted late and passed into law not early enough,” he said.
Our source reports that successive governments have submitted the country’s yearly budget to the National Assembly in late November or mid December.
The 2017 appropriation bill was submitted to the National Assembly on Dec. 14, 2016 while the assembly passed the budget to the President for assent on May 11, 2017.
Eze called on the executive to check the bureaucratic bottlenecks, especially in the Ministry of Budget and Planning, to ensure accelerated preparation of the fiscal document.
According to him, there should be a centralised operation to fast-track the processes, regardless of the agency or unit involved.
He also said the processes of budget could not have been submitted and assented to early in other climes while in Nigeria it was difficult.