President Goodluck Jonathan has on Friday morning, handed the document containing the 2014 budget to the Minister of Finance and co-ordinating Minister of the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, and the Director of Budget Office, Dr. Bright Okogu, for implementation.
According to his spokesman, Reuben Abati, the president signed the 2014 budget ― passed by the National Assembly on 9th April ― on Wednesday, but since Dr. Okonjo-Iweala was absent at the event, the president arranged a formal handover session to present the document to her.
The President did this shortly before jetting out of the country to Pretoria, South Africa where he is expected to take part in a high-level discussion with other African Heads of State and Government on issues relating to terrorism in Africa.
He is also expected to use the opportunity to attend President Jacob Zuma’s second term inauguration.
Earlier in the week, Senate had passed a total of N4.695 trillion, which is N52.2bn higher than the N4.642trn submitted by President Goodluck Jonathan.
As passed by the Senate, the 2014 budget include statutory transfers (N408,687,801,891), debt service (N712,000,000,000), recurrent expenditure (N2,454,887,566,702), and capital expenditure (N1,119,614,631,407) and aggregate expenditure of N4,695,190,000,000.
