President Bola Tinubu has signed the N28.7 trillion 2024 budget into law during a brief ceremony at the Presidential Villa in Abuja on Monday.
The signing marks the culmination of legislative deliberations that saw an increase of N1.2 trillion from the initially proposed budget figure.
The Senate had increased the budget by pushing the total budget to N28.7 trillion.
The Senate President Senator Godswill Akpabio, Speaker of the House of Representatives Hon Tajudeen Abbas, Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy Wale Edun, Minister of Budget and Economic Planning Atiku Abubakar, National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu, and Chief of Staff Femi Gbajabiamila were among those present during the budget signing.
The breakdown of the approved budget showed that the sum of N1.743 trillion is for statutory transfers and N8.271 trillion is for debt servicing.
The sum of N8.769 trillion is for recurrent (non-debt) expenditure, while N9.995 trillion is for capital expenditure for the year ending December 31, 2024.
The N9.179 trillion fiscal deficit for the year under review is to be financed through asset sales and privatization (N298,486,421,740); multilateral and bilateral project-N7,828,529,477,860.
The Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) got the sum of N263.044 billion; the North East Development Commission (NEDC) got N131.836 billion; and the Basic Healthcare Provision Fund (BHPF) got N131.522 billion.
The National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure got the sum of N131.522 billion; the Public Complaint Commission got N14.460 billion; and the National Human Rights Commission got N5 billion, respectively.
A breakdown of the National Assembly budget showed that the sum of N78.624 billion is for the House of Representatives, while N49.145 billion is for the Senate.
Also, the sum of N36.727 billion is for the NASS Office; N30.807 billion for General Services; N20.388 billion for Legislative Aides; N15.189 billion for Service Wide Vote; and N15 billion for the National Assembly Hospital Project.
The sum of N12.326 is for the National Assembly Service Commission (NASC); N12.123 billion for the National Assembly Library Complex (take-off grant); and N10 billion for the ongoing construction of NASC headquarters.
Also, the sum of N9.008 billion was approved for the National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies (NILDS) and N4.500 billion for the completion of the ongoing NILDS building.
The sum of N4 billion was also approved for the National Assembly Recreation Centre, while N4 billion was approved for the design, construction, furnishing, and equipping of the NASS Budget and Research Office.
The sum of N3 billion was also approved for the procurement of books for the NASS Library, while N3 billion was approved for the Senate Car Park and N3 billion for the House of Representatives Car Park.
The sum of N3 billion was approved for the upgrade of the NASS key infrastructure, and N3 billion was approved for the design, construction, furnishing, and equipping of the NASS ultramodern printing press, among others.
From the total sum of N50.451 trillion approved for recurrent (non-debt) expenditure, the Ministry of Defense got the highest allocation of N1.308 trillion.
This was followed by the Ministry of Police Affairs with N869.121 billion, the Ministry of Education with N857.134 billion, and the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare with N667.577 billion.
Also, the Ministry of Interior got N362.552 billion, the Ministry of Youth got N201.467 billion, and the National Security Adviser (NSA) got N199.763 billion.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs got N140.456 billion, while the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security got N110.248 billion.
