But for the efforts of the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, the request by the executive for virement of N135 billion from the 2017 budget to execute certain priority projects would not have been approved by the Senate.
The request for virement was met with opposition by the legislators who described it as unconstitutional.
But following the plea by Saraki, the request was passed to the next stage which required the consideration of the Senate Committee on Appropriation.
Saraki said the virement should be passed to give the required support the Executive arm of government needed.
His words: “Before virement could be considered, senate should have seen a more significant level of implementation, but this is in line with Senate’s commitment to give support to the executive as much as possible within the law.”
He gave the assurance that he would be mindful of the fears of his colleagues in the process of considering the request.
The Deputy President of the Senate, Ike Ekweremadu, argued against the virement, saying that the executive arm of government should have sent a supplementary budget instead.
Said he: “Virement is unconstitutional. We must uphold the constitution. When reforming the budget, we should take note of this.
“You can only spend money either through normal budget or through supplementary budget.
“This executive seems not to be interested in the process of budget. They prefer virement. The Appropriation Act is a law. We cannot just approve virement and it is not even in our constitution.
“We need to tell the executive that they can ask for a supplementary budget and not for virement. If the executive wants money in the future, they should come through a supplementary budget.”
Chairman of the Appropriation Committee, Danjuma Goje, who spoke in the same vein, said the Senate should make sure that the government did not continue the trend of implementing selected priority project and deviating from the approved budget.
Recall that Vice President Yemi Osinbajo in his capacity as the Acting President when Buhari was away on medical vacation sent the request for virement to the Senate on July 18.
The request was for a virement of N135 billion to fund certain priority projects of the executive.
