The Federal Government on Thursday assured that it would submit the 2018 Appropriation Bill to the National Assembly this October as earlier promised.
The Minister of Budget and National Planning, Udoma Udoma, gave the assurance at the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa in Abuja after a retreat on the implementation of the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan and the 2018 Budget Preparation Process, with the theme “Building Synergy For Effective Economic Recovery and Growth Plan Implementation.”
The minister said the government would soon send the 2018-2020 Medium Term Expenditure Framework Fiscal Strategy Paper approved by the Federal Executive Council on Wednesday, to the National Assembly.
“The National Assembly is on break nearer the time they will resume in September, but ours is to follow the Fiscal Responsibility Act which has some timelines and we are trying to keep strictly by those timelines.
“So, the budget will get to the National Assembly by October, that was our commitment. We will go all out to make that happen, we made a commitment that we will do that on our part and we intend to deliver on that commitment. This is a government that delivers on its promises,” he said.
The minister explained that the retreat was about linking the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan with the budget.
“Basically, we have to keep on reviewing at every stage, so this is review where we are, what needs to be done and what steps we need to take in areas that we need to fast track. We need review what we are doing at the stage of implement. So, this was the purpose of the meeting,” he said.
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