NIGERIA: Does the Legislature have the right to alter budgetary estimates prepared by the executive arm of government? Femi Aborisade

 EXCERPTS

Politicians, legislators and lawyers are divided on this issue. Though the Nigerian experience so far shows that the National Assembly has the power to alter the money bills submitted by the Executive, it would appear that the Executive has sufficiently succeeded in demonizing the National Assembly (even on matters in which the Executive is equally guilty) that members of the legislature appear subdued to concede that the National Assembly lies in either passing or rejecting budgetary estimates submitted by the Executive, without making changes.

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From the foregoing, the idea that the legislature has no discretion but to either pass or reject the money bill (including the Annual Budget) does not have any support in the legal framework governing the budgetary process. Such an idea is a pro-executive arm politics, not law.

Femi Aborisade, Esq. is a Labor Law & Human Rights Activist.

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12:44 a.m. [GMT]

Does National Assembly have power to alter a money bill presented by the Executive (2)