Contrary to speculation that Friday’s emergency Federal Executive Council meeting would witness a cabinet re-shuffle, the meeting was centred on the 2014 budget matter.
President Goodluck Jonathan led the discourse on the medium term fiscal framework for 2014-2016 and how to avoid the hiccups as in the case of the implementation of the 2013 budget.
Minister of Information, Labaran Maku, who spoke afterwards said the meeting was called “because of the urgency to ensure that we deal with all the issues and get it over with.
“What we have done today is something that could hardly be done on a normal council day.
“We also took a critical look into the revenue we expect, the expenditure for these years, the overall fiscal objectives of the government to grow the economy between this period.
“It is an elaborate policy paper that was brought to us, we have been debating it to see that the budget between now and 2016 we realise the objective of further growing the GDP, stabilizing the economic environment which has ensured that Nigeria remains the fastest growing economy in the region as well as the destination of the influx of foreign investment.
Maku explained that “What we want is to ensure that the budget for the next two years will consolidate what the President has achieved in the first two years by growing the GDP, stabilizing the economy, creating a conducive atmosphere to grow businesses while attending to the nation’s most important and basic infrastructural needs to ensure that we keep our eyes on the ball and to ensure that what we do in the next two to three years will further consolidate on the transformation agenda of the President.”
He noted that “the framework is still a work in progress” adding that details of the document, including the figures, were still being debated and will not be made public until work is concluded.
The Minister disclosed that the budget will be ready as soon as possible for early commencement of work on it by the National Assembly members.
“The early passage of the budget will also improve execution. Last year it was October, so, this year we are hoping to keep the momentum of early passage of the budget. At least submission to the NASS should be early so that by January, we should have the budget passed” he added.
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