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| Senate President, Bukola Saraki |
There
are indications that the details of the 2016 budget and the trial of
Senate President Bukola Saraki for an alleged false declaration of
assets may pit the federal legislature and the executive against each
other.
President Mohammadu Buhari, just back from an official visit to the
United States, returns to his desk today to deal with some perceived
discrepancies between a budget he sent to the National Assembly and what
the lawmakers sent back to him. He is also awaiting details of the
budget which he sought from the lawmakers before he traveled outside the
country last week.
There are already grey areas that may cause outright rejection of the
figures, even before the details are provided. For instance, budget
analysts are asking: where were the figures that were said to have been
padded into the budget over which the president said heads would roll?
Were they padded back into the budget, into subheads where federal
lawmakers will draw personal and political benefits?
Analysts specifically pointed out the additional N40 billion posted
for special intervention/constituency projects. Buhari had assigned N60
billion to this, but when the fresh figure came from the National
Assembly, it had risen to the previous N100 billion.
The votes for the constituency projects are meant to finance projects
influenced by the legislators in the budget for their constituencies
and it has always been alleged that they supervise its execution. It was
also a source of friction in the eight years of former President
Olusegun Obasanjo, but in the last administration, it had a smooth sail
as part of measures by the executive then to get the cooperation of the
National Assembly members for the speedy passage of the budget, as well
as to allegedly cause the lawmakers to overlook some aspects of the
document by lawmakers.
Already, the lawmakers have promised to produce details of the budget
for the president by next week. National Assembly sources said the week
“promises to be interesting” in the relationship between the
legislature and the presidency, “except the president plays the
political card and turns a blind eye for the sake of Nigerians that the
budget is meant for.”
There are those who believe that the Executive arm of government is
spoiling for a fight after being roundly criticised by the legislators
for padding the budget. “It embarrassed the Executive arm and made them
look as corrupt as the preceding administration, but the legislators did
not spill all the beans, if the battle starts, it could get messy and
we may have to wait a few more weeks than envisaged for the budget bill
to become law,” a source, not wanting to be named, concluded.
The situation over the budget is coming just as senators in support
of Saraki are angry and disappointed that all efforts they have made to
see to the smooth running of the current administration, through the
quick screening of ministers and passage of the budget are not being
reciprocated by the presidency.
They cite what they describe as insistence to try Saraki for an
offence similar to one for which a chieftain of the ruling All
Progressives Congress (APC) got less than a slap on the wrist, alleging
“pure persecution.”
It was learnt that an unspoken agreement was reached that if the
contending forces in the Upper House of the National Assembly resolved
their differences, as they did last week, and the budget was passed, the
travails of the number three citizen would gradually wind down .
Many were actually shocked when the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT)
insisted that the trial would go ahead, and the president told a world
audience he would critically review the passed budget sent to him before
assenting to it.
It was, however, learnt that those who may have spoken on behalf of
the presidency did so, “either out of deception or did not have the
confidence of the country’s number one citizen,” according to a
presidency source.
To show their anger, a staunch supporter of Saraki went public,
accusing the presidency’s chief technocrat of orchestrating the Senate
President’s problem.
Chairman of Senate Committee on Navy, Isa Misau alleged last week
that some principal characters in the current administration, including a
chief figure in the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the
Federation, were interfering in the trial of Saraki. He claimed that the
same forces were frustrating political resolution of Saraki’s CCT
travails.
His words: “Several efforts have been made and are still being made.
However, there are challenges. Despite President Buhari’s commendable
position not to interfere, there are some hardliners within this
government who are still fueling this matter and are, as a matter of
fact, interfering with the trial.
I reliably gathered that some of our elders in the Senate once went
to meet a top presidency official in order to find solutions to this
problem. They were surprised by some of his utterances and they reported
back to some senators that he vowed that this matter would not be
resolved until Saraki goes down for spiting the party leadership.”
He confirmed that senators of the APC recently decided to close ranks
to ensure that there was unity of purpose but said the meeting had
nothing to do with the travails of Saraki.
Yesterday, another source in the know, explained that the Senate
president was resisting an outright trial in the CCT because it was
obvious “to him and his group” that he would be destroyed politically,
because of certain forces at play.
Another backer of the Senate president said yesterday: “They are not
considering any compromise. He has saved them on many occasions, what
has he not done, they don’t see all those ones as anything, except they
achieve their aim to get him off the place. The ones that are more
difficult, like the passing of ministers, so many other things, they are
not looking at all those things, they have made up their minds.”
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PLEASE BE POLITE