Tope Oshin
The Senator representing Ekiti South, Mrs Biodun Olujimi has stated that the 2016 budget proposal submitted by President Muhammadu Buhari lacks element of change.
Speaking on the 2016 budget consideration at the senate, the lawmaker noted that the government needed to go back to make adjustments on the budget.
“I believe Nigeria needs a better budget, there is a need for change and the change is not in this budget yet. We will run with this budget but there are so much more to be done.
“This budget has a serious deficiency. There is need for introspection, for solid economic team to look at this budget to cushion the effect on our people.
“Our people need palliative on effect of the oncoming depreciation,” she said.
She added that Nigerians were suffering from financial problems, in which the budget will multiply the present existing problems.
“Meanwhile most of the blames that are being heaped on this side are really on the other side because the people who created the chaos are already on the other side.
“Right now, we have a deficit of 11 dollars on every barrel of oil we sell and in the budget we have a deficit of 2.2 trillion naira. That 11 dollar deficit will take that deficit to 2.5 trillion naira or 2.6 trillion naira that is not the serious problem, the problem is if we need to borrow to manage this 2.6 trillion naira, it means we will be borrowing 500 million naira every day of this year. Every day of this year, this government will look for 500 million naira to borrow.
“To crown it all, there is nothing in this budget that suggests repayment for this debt. Every other thing in the budget is quiet, it is only expenditure, nothing has been set aside to ensure that we pay back our loan.
“What it means is that we are likely to begin to beg for people to help us with our debt which we must never get back to. A country that borrows and does not plan to pay back has not done enough work at all and what we will be doing by this is that we will be giving the people with one hand and we will be taking from them from both hands because the people we borrow from will ask for their money back.
“If they borrow 500 million naira a day and cannot pay it in one year, it rolls over to the next year and in four years you find we are in deficit of almost 6 trillion naira, which we must never get to,” she said.
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