Budget 2024: Akpabio Urges Tinubu To Sack Any Appointee Who Shuns N’Assembly Summons

Senate President Godswill Akpabio has urged President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to fire any head of government agency that fails to honour the invitations of the National Assembly committees.

Akpabio stated this Thursday at the opening of a public hearing on the 2024-2026 Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and Fiscal Strategy Paper (FSP) at the Senate.

In the MTEF/FSP, the federal government pegged the price of crude oil at $73.96; exchange rate at N700/$; oil production at 1.78 million barrels per day; debt service of N8.25 trillion; inflation at 21 per cent and GDP growth at 3.76 per cent.

The aggregate expenditure is estimated at N26.01 trillion for the 2024 budget, which includes statutory transfers of N1.3 trillion, non debt recurrent expenditure of N10.26 trillion, debt service estimated at N8.25 trillion, as well as N7.78 trillion being provided for personnel and pension cost.

The public hearing was organised by the Senate Joint Committees on Finance; Appropriations; National Planning and Economic Affairs; and Local and Foreign Debt to dissect the fiscal document with the chief executives of government-owned agencies with a view to increase the national revenue base.

The approved MTEF/FSP will set out the parameters upon which the next year’s budget will be prepared.

Akpabio said the interactive session on the MTEF/FSP was a very important session and any serious presidential appointee that wanted President Tinubu to succeed must be present.

Akpabio said due to the importance of the session, he shelved his appointment to appear at the grand rally of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Owerri, Imo State held Thursday.

He said any invited head of agency that failed to appear to discuss the economic blueprint of the federal government did not fit to run such an agency and should be sacked.

The Senate President said, “Any serious appointee or any head of any agency that is interested in the success of President Bola Tinubu’s administration ought to be here.

“Chairman should give me the list of all the heads of agencies that you invited who have failed to show up in this session.

“This is the beginning of their failure in their various offices. Therefore, I am happy to see the chairman of FIRS, he is here. I have also seen the DG NIMASA and others.

“Any head of agency that sends representation here is not a serious person and therefore the President must take a second look at such a person’s appointment, it is not a threat but the truth.

“I shelved even my appointment to appear in Owerri today for our final rally of my party and all other schedules that I have, to make sure that I appear so that we can strategise on how we can succeed.”