Though the thief has finally confessed, even if it was a joke, there are some jokes that are too expensive to consider talk less of exhibiting them. The joke of the missing 2016 N6.08 trillion budget is one which has not only ridiculed us but also exposed our stupidity and dubiousness before the international communities.
Where on earth has it been joked before that the National Budget presented by the President to the parliament, congress or the National Assembly disappeared? But wait a minute, why the prank in the first place? Was it because of the disclosure that the government copied former President Jonathan Goodluck’s 2015 budget? Or to inflate it just as reported by an online portal that supplementary N3.9 billion has been added to the original budget submitted to the National Assembly for endorsement? But why now Mr. Integrity?
This little joke has no doubt led credence to the argument in some quarters that you have reached your prime and therefore not the solution to our problem. Even you the tough-talking 8th National Assembly; with all your garagara, so you dey collabo! Please if you cannot be exceptional when compared to your predecessors do not constitutes encumbrance to our aspirations either. For how long shall this joke (mediocrity and subversion) from people who we entrusted with the responsibility to lead us continue?
If Baba is not found liable and adequately punished, for where! Then I am at liberty to conclude that the so called fight against corruption is not only feckless but ingeniously contrived to distract us from the obvious cluelessness starring at us. While the drama lasted, I waited with bated breath for the NASS to repudiate it until Thursday, last week when the Senate President dropped the bolt from the blue that the 2016 Appropriation Bill before the Senate was a different version of the original copy presented to the National Assembly by President Buhari on December 22, 2015. Quoting Saraki verbatim, he said, “We have received the report of the Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions on investigations surrounding 2016 Appropriation Bill.
Our finding is that Senator Ita Enang, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on National Assembly Matter (SSA), printed copies of the 2016 Appropriation Bill and brought to the Senate. We have discovered that what he brought is different from the version presented by Mr. President.
We have resolved to consider only the version presented by Mr. President as soon as we receive soft copy of the original document from the Executive.” Just like that! Without stating the action that will be meted to the culprits! Abeg! Enough of this patchiness Mr. Senate President, the business of legislation goes beyond political party’s interest but should recognise and respect the collective expectations of the people being represented if at all, at the NASS.
The most exasperating part of the entire sickening drama was when on Tuesday, the Senators emerged from a closed door session at the first day of resumption without saying a word to journalists covering the NASS disregarding all their efforts to get them comment on what transpired during the one-hour long session, so repulsive how they maintained sealed lips as if they had taken oath in a shrine and nervous over violating it in order not to incur the wrath of the gods.
One of our reporters narrated to me how the Chairman, Senate Committee on Media and Public Affairs, Aliyu Sabi, whose function it is to keep journalist abreast of developments during such closed door sessions disappeared like Willy Willy, the ghost in “Hot Cash” the rested soap opera aired on NTA in the early ’90s and switched off his identified mobile lines.
A national daily newspaper puts the scenario this way: “When some of them who were prevailed on earlier by the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, to maintain sealed lips could not stomach what they termed “national embarrassment”, they then spilled the beans—”the 2016 Budget has been stolen from us. That was the subject of our discussion at the closed door session this morning.” Just like that? Can you imagine! Who stole it?
When, where and how? How can a budget proposal that was openly presented to the Senate and the House of Representatives by President Buhari go missing? I think it is high time we activated the recall clause in our constitution and bring these men back to their various villages and constituencies.
Thank God Baba has accepted stealing, sorry, withdrawing the budget surreptitiously from the NASS. If not, the blame game has begun already. The PDP senators have started accusing the Presidency of being behind the theft of the documents, while their APC counterparts are speaking on the contrary.
According to the PDP senators they suspected that the presidency might have conspired with the management of the National Assembly to quietly withdraw the documents after detecting some discrepancies. Yes, they were right after all, Baba has confessed to the crime, but the question is who aided the stealing, sorry, withdrawal of the budget, under whose authority and with what influence? Well no matter how the Senators tactfully presented the stealing of the budget, sorry, the joke, one thing that is crystal clear like the early morning sun is that there was executive stealing.
If not that Baba confessed to the crime, EFCC and DSS would by now have raided the homes of perceived enemies in search of the stolen budget or simply accused Tompolo of masterminding its disappearance and effectively include it in his multiplicity of charges just to enliven and keep us busy. I am serious like heart attack because this is Naija where every joke goes.
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