BEVERLY HILLS, May 22, (THEWILL) – Senate President Bukola Saraki has declared that the N125 billion earmarked for the National Assembly in the 2017 budget is totally insignificant, when compared to the entire budget for the year emphasising that the national assembly budget is actually not enough for what has to be done.
He insisted that the lawmakers have taken the most difficult decision by opening the budget of the national assembly, which he said was only three percent of the country’s total spending for 2017, saying Nigerians should focus on revenue leakages.
“That is not being fair, because the money is not going to the senator, it is the cost of running an arm of government. It is not the senator,” Saraki told Channels TV.
“In as much as we would take our criticism, we owe a responsibility to get across the right message; that is what it cost to run the legislative arm of government.
“You don’t take the overhead of the executive and say this is how much it cost to have a President, or a Vice-President, or a Minister, let’s be fair.
“It is three percent of the entire budget, if you factor that against other areas of government, it is totally insignificant, as regards an arm of government.
“It sounds nice or I think if you are playing to the gallery, we can do that, but I think serious minded leaders must address what are the major issues; yes, we should cut cost, but no matter how much cost you cut, apart from retrenchment, you cannot reduce that cost by a certain percent.
“If you truly want to cut cost, just like when you run a company, you can cut all the cost but at the end of the day, you will have to go through issues of retrenchment, which we know is not an action we are likely to take.”
