Details of the National Assembly’s N139.5 billion allocations in the 2018 national budget will not be kept secret from the public, Senate President, Senator Olusola Saraki has pledged.
However, this will only be done after the National Assembly resumes from recess and receives details from officials of the NASS management.
Responding to enquiries from The Nation, Special Adviser (Media and Publicity) to the Senate President, Mr. Yusuph Olaniyonu said the Senate President is keen on releasing details of this year’s NASS budget, stressing that the move would be a further confirmation of his pledge to ensure a ‘new order’.
“It did not take anybody’s prompting for the 2017 details to be released and that was the first to be done in a decade,” Olaniyonu said.
The NASS will resume from their short recess on Tuesday.
He added: “The bureaucracy that is working on the details will submit it for final approval before it is released.
“The release of details of 2017 NASS budget was not happenstance; it was a deliberate effort to create a new order and sustain it.
“So, if you care to wait, the details will be released in due course and not because anybody asked for it.”
Until last year when broad aspects of its 2017 allocation were made public, the legislative arm’s multi-billion annual budgetary allocations had always been shrouded in secret.
The secrecy surrounding its budget has always given rise to speculations and allegations of waste.
However, in spite of several federal legislators’ reservations last year, Senate President released a broad outline of NASS’ budgetary allocations.