Enugu Assembly passes 2014 budget

The Enugu State House of Assembly on Tuesday passed the state's 2014 appropriation bill of N93.7 billion.

The House increased the budget by N478 million from the N93.287 billion proposed by the executive.

The budget, which has a recurrent size of N39.4 billion and a capital allocation of N53,9 billion when it was presented on Dec. 10, 2013, had the capital size increased with N478 million to bring the capital expenditure to N54.4 billion.

Presenting the report of the Assembly Committee on Finance and Appropriation during plenary, the Chairman, Mr Johnbull Nwagu (PDP-Udi North), said the committee made eight amendments which produced the increment in the capital expenditure.

He said that the committee recommended that N15 million be budgeted for the extension of the Assembly complex fence and erection of iron barriers, with N13 million voted for the purchase of a generator for the complex.

'The sum of N3 million is added to the Ministry of Human Development and Poverty Reduction for the training of 250 unemployed youths from the 17 local government areas in auto-mechanics at the cost of N200,000 for 14 persons per local government.

'The committee recommended that N6 million be given to the Ministry of Agriculture to purchase operational vehicles for effective supervision of its projects.

'The committee recommended that N14 million be allocated to the Ministry of Works for Rural Access and Mobility Project, projects in seven communities, while N50 million is allocated to the ministry of environment for climate change mitigation which was omitted in the original budget.

'The sum of N30 million is allocated to the Ministry of Environment to provide public toilets while the N273 million omitted in the capital budget of Ministry of Water Resources is also recommended, among others,' he explained.

Nwagu urged his colleagues to join hands with the governor to actualise the laudable goals of ensuring the completion of on-going development projects to achieve the four-point agenda of the government before the expiration of its tenure.

He called for the adoption of a policy for all the Assembly committees to submit a quarterly report of their over-sight functions for effective monitoring of the implementation of the budget.

In his remarks the Speaker, Mr Eugene Odo, commended the members for their robust contributions and described the amendments as `quite reasonable'.

He enjoined the Assembly committees to monitor and follow up with the ministries, departments and agencies to ensure faithful implementation of the budget. NAN