Hon. Jibril Abdulmumin, House
of Representatives Committee on Finance, on Sunday reacted to reports that the
National Assembly altered provisions for major national projects and programmes
in the 2016 budget.
A presidency source had
disclosed that in protest, President Muhammadu Buhari may this week return the
revised document sent to the executive by the legislature.
Reacting, Abdulmumin in a
series of tweet defended the National Assembly, saying what he and his
colleagues did was in the best interest of the country.
“Lagos-Calabar Railway line was
NEVER captured in the budget that was sent by the Executive. How then could it
have been removed by NASS? I actually find it shocking that even some National
Dailies made the removal their headlines. A little research would have helped.
All they, and those spreading the false information needed to have done is
check the initial document sent by the Executive. NASS has a responsibility and
here it did the right thing. What NASS did with the N54billion; We added N39.7b
to the Lagos-Kano Rail project. This will help complete the project once and
for all. The crux of the matter as it is, is that while the NASS believes in
the bottom up agenda for development- focus on rural areas & communities.
The Executive seems to favour a top-down approach.’’