BEVERLY HILLS, February 10, (THEWILL) – The Presidency on Tuesday explained that the controversial N3.219bn proposed for the State House Clinic in the 2016 Budget was meant for the completion of on-going projects as well as procurement of drugs and other medical equipment.
This was as the Permanent Secretary of the State House, Jala A. Arabi defended the N18.1bn budget proposed for the Presidential Villa in the 2016 N6.07trn national budget. The figure was a significant increase from the N6.5bn budgeted for the 2015 fiscal year.
Speaking when he appeared before both chambers of the National Assembly to defend the budget proposal, Arabi disclosed that the N1,718,689.03 generated by the State House in 2015 fiscal year had been remitted into the government coffers.
He told the Senator Tijani Kaura-led Senate Committee on Federal Character and Inter-governmental Affairs as well as the Hon. Nasir Sani Zango-Daura’s Reps Committee on Special Duties that the budget was “prepared in line with the provisions of the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2007 and with due regard to the concept of Zero-Based Budgeting principle which seeks to justify infrastructural development across board.”
The Permanent Secretary went on to put the recurrent expenditure of the State House at N4,273,166.00 while proposing N12,266,713,072 for capital projects.
