President Muhammadu Buhari, on Monday, signed the 2019 Appropriation Bill of N8.92 trillion into law.
The budget was originally N8.83 trillion but was increased to the current amount by the National Assembly.
It is based on estimated crude oil production of 2.3 million barrels per day and the crude oil price of $60 per barrel.
Present at the signing of the appropriation bill were the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara; Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha; Chief of Staff to the President, Malam Abba Kyari, and the Ministers of Finance, Zainab Ahmed.
Present too were the Minister of Budget and National Planning, Udoma Udo Udoma; Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed and the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Appropriations, Sen. Danjuma Goje.
The Senior Special Assistant, SSA, to the President on National Assembly Matters, Ita Enang, and his counterpart for the House of Representatives, Umar El-Yakub also witnessed the event.
Udo Udoma is expected to give the breakdown of the budget on Tuesday.
The increase in the budget by N86 billon, the Chairman, House Committee on Appropriation, Mustapha Dawaki, had explained, resulted from the need to include the severance pay for legislators and their aides.
His words: “There is a slight increase in budget deficit because of severance of lawmakers, legislative aides. There is also a need to provide more funds for security organizations.
“This is because there are so many outstanding items not captured in the proposal. For instance, there was a Senate resolution for special intervention of N10 billion in Zamfara due to the crisis that occurred there.
“Also not captured but equally critical was the severance benefits of outgoing legislators and their aides.”
