Buhari Sends N895.84bn Supplementary Appropriation Bill to Senate

•Extra expenditure to cover COVlD-19 vaccine programme, procurement of military equipment

Deji Elumoye and Juliet Akoje

President Muhammadu Buhari has transmitted a 2021 Supplementary Appropriation Bill of N895.842 billion to the Senate for passage into law.

The Federal Executive Council (FEC) at its virtual meeting last Wednesday in Abuja had approved the supplementary appropriation bill for onward transmission to the National Assembly for approval.

The bill was transmitted via a letter dated 15th June 2021, and addressed to the President of the Senate, Dr. Ahmad Lawan.

Buhari, in the letter which was read yesterday at plenary said the amount captured in the bill was proposed to fund the COVID-19 vaccine programme.

He added that part of the supplementary budget would be used to also fund health-related expenditures for the treatment of additional 50,000 patients under Nigeria Comprehensive AIDS Programme in states and to procure additional equipment to tackle security challenges nationwide.

According to the president, the supplementary budget will be funded through facilities sourced from the World Bank and available new facilities.

Buhari said the supplementary budget was promoted by the need to make provision for procurement and administration of COVlD-19 vaccines.

“The availability of COVlD-19 vaccines and the procurement terms were still uncertain as at the time of finalising the 2021 budget. Hence, there was no provision in the 2021 Appropriation Act for the procurement and administration of COVID-19 vaccines.

“However, the Federal Ministry of Health and the National Primary Healthcare Development Agency (NPHCDA) has now developed a COVID-19 vaccine programme for the country. Under the vaccine programme, 70% of eligible Nigerians are to be vaccinated between 2021 and 2022.

“In addition, our security and law enforcement agencies urgently need to procure additional equipment and other resources in response to the prevalent security challenges across the country.

“The Ministry of Defence has carefully scrutinised these procurement needs, which the military authorities claim to represent the minimum requirements to secure our country and address current external and internal security challenges,” he added.

Part of the funds required will also be used to meet the federal government’s commitment to treat additional 50,000 patients under the Nigeria Comprehensive AIDS Programme in States (NCAPS), due to the reduction in the amount provisioned in 2021 Appropriation Bill by the National Assembly.

“In order to address the urgent problem of oxygen availability in the country and avoid the potential loss of lives, provision was made for the procurement and installation of new oxygen plants nationwide and repairs of oxygen plants in FCT hospitals.

“It is also necessary to provide additional funds for public service wage adjustment to cater for sundry wage-related issues in the health and other sectors, which if not resolved can add to the prevalent sense of instability in the polity,” Buhari stated.

Of the N895,842,465,917 proposed, N45.63 billion is for the COVlD-19 vaccine programme, which will be sourced from existing World Bank loans and other grants totalling US$113.22 million.

Buhari said: “The balance of N37.93 billion required for COVlD-19 vaccines, salaries and other health-related expenditures totalling N41.69 billion and the N48.20 billion recurrent components of defence/security expenditure will be funded by drawing N135 billion from some Special Reserve/Levy Accounts, which will be captured as revenues to the Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN).

“We propose to fund the balance of N722.40 billion for capital expenditure on defence/security and capital supplementation from new borrowings, in the absence of any supplementary revenue sources.

“Understandably, needs currently abound in many other sectors. However, we have limited the supplementary budget proposal to just these critical and emerging areas of need due to our severe fiscal constraints.

“All other needs would be deferred to the 2022 budget, which we plan to present in September of this year.”