Senate Approves Revised 2022-2024 Medium Term Expenditure Framework

The Nigerian Senate has approved the 2022-2024 Medium Term Expenditure Framework and Fiscal Strategy Paper.

The approval was made on Wednesday during the plenary presided over by the Senate President Ahmed Lawal.

Buhari had earlier presented a revised 2022-2024 Medium Term Expenditure (MTEF) and Fiscal Strategy Paper (FSP) to the upper legislative chamber for approval.

The MTEF and the FSP was first passed by the Senate on September 22 with the approval of expenditure of N13.98trn for 2022.

But the revised MTEF sent by the President showed that the appropriation for the 2022 budget was increased to N16.45trn.

The revised 2022-2024 Medium Term Fiscal Framework Committee led by Senator Olamilekan Adeola, (APC, Lagos West) recommended the approval of the sum.

The committee recommended that “the aggregate expenditure of N16.39trn be approved, that the retained revenue of N10.3trn be approved, that the fiscal deficit of N635.5bn be approved.”

Lawal praised the Ministry of Finance Budget and National Planning for insisting that the Ministries Department and Agencies present their revenue profile as a prerequisite for the 2022 budget proposal the MTEF.

“We need to be very mindful that we need to reduce the borrowing, but that means we have to improve on the revenue that we receive.

“I believe that the additional revenues that have not been captured like the TETFUND and Bank of Industry and so on were before left out of the Federal Budget. Now we can see everything and we need to see more,” said Lawal.

Lawal said the findings of the committee suggests that many MDAs have been syphoning funds belonging to the government treasury.

“We need to push further because what this means is a revelation that many of these MDAs have been cornering funds that ordinarily should have gone to the treasury, but for many years, they have been taking the funds unfairly and illegally,” he added.

He said the committee on MTEF was thorough in its effort to scrutinise the revised framework submitted by the President.