By Paul Effiong, Abuja
National Assembly Joint Committee on Finance has directed Ministries, Department and Agencies, MDAs, who failed to honour its invitation for the 2025 budget defence to do so in next 48 hours or risk zero budget for operations.
The Chairmen of the senate and House of Representatives Committee on Finance, Sen Sani Musa and Hon James Falake issued the directive yesterday at National Assembly, Abuja.
According to the joint Committee, President Bola Tinubu while presenting the 2025 budget to the National Assembly, mandated all ministers and heads of agencies to appear to defend their respective budgets before the National Assembly with every sense of responsibility.
Lawmakers in the committee unanimously observed that members of the National Assembly had to cut short their Christmas holidays to attend to the national assignment of budget Defence.
“But to our dismay a lot of agencies have refused to honor our invitations to appear before us, for us to scrutinise their performances in 2024 and look at their 2025 projection, if it is justifiable.
“The all these agencies have refused to honour the joint committee’s invitation. So by virtue of the constitutional powers that have been given to the joint committees on finance of both the Senate and the House of Representatives, we are given the chief executives of these agencies 48 hours within which to appear before this joint committee.
“Failure to do that the committee will not hesitate to recommend to the Appropriation Committee to withhold any appropriation to these agencies.
“If these agencies are self funded, we will also request both the Minister of Finance and the Accountant General of the Federation to withhold their funding”, he said.
The agencies are, Nigerian Ports Authority ,NPA, the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency ,NIMASA, Federal Inland Revenue Service ,FIRS, Nigerian Postal Service ,NPS, and the Nigerian Railway Corporation ,NRC,
Others are, Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority ,NCAA, Standard Organisation of Nigeria ,SON, Tertiary Education Trust Fund, Oil and Gas Free Zones Authority and the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control ,NAFDAC.
The Nigerian Copyright Commission, National Insurance Commission, National Pensions Commission, National Space and Research Development Agency and the Nigerian Meteorological Agency are also included.
Also included are Nigerian Agricultural Insurance Corporations, Airspace Management Authority, Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board, Nigerian Liquified Natural Gas Limited, Transmission Company of Nigeria, Bank of Industry ,BIO, Nigerian College of Aviation Technology, Zaira.
