Fakoyejo OlalekanPresident Muhammadu Buhari has signed the 2023 budget. The budget was increased to N21.83 trillion, from N20.51 trillion.
The 2023 Appropriation Bill had been submitted to the National Assembly with N20.51 trillion, but it was raised by N1.32 trillion by the House of Representatives and the Senate.
Buhari signed the bill into law on Tuesday to continue with the fiscal year for budget implementation, which falls between January to December.
What you need to know
This comes after the President requested approval from the National Assembly to extend the fiscal year of 2022 budget beyond the 12 months period.
Recall that in December 2021, the National Assembly had approved N17.12 trillion for the 2022 fiscal year.
However, due to the N819.54 billion supplementary budget sent to the Senate by President Buhari to fix the infrastructure destroyed by floods in Nigeria last year, the budget circle was extended to March 2023.
This means the 2022 budget will run from January 2022 to March 2023, to enable adequate implementation of the N819.54 billion supplementary budget that was approved late December last year.
Debt servicing increased
But the 2023 budget has a fiscal year that falls between January to December. Part of the budget allocates N6.6 trillion to debt service this year, up from the N6.31 trillion that came with the N20.51 trillion budget sent to the lawmakers by Buhari.
Also, capital expenditure was increased to N5.9 trillion from N5.35 trillion, but recurrent expenditure maintained N8.27 trillion, as Buhari vows to complete critical infrastructure projects nationwide before his tenure ends on May 29, 2023.
Speaking at the signing of the budget, Buhari said: “We have examined the changes made by the National Assembly to the 2023 Executive Budget proposal.”
“I have also noted that the National Assembly introduced new projects into the 2023 budget proposal for which it has appropriated N770.72 billion. The National Assembly also increased the provisions made by Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) by N58.55 billion,” Buhari added.
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