NEWS DIGEST – The 23 Local Government Areas of Kaduna State have proposed a budget of N55.9 billion for the 2018 fiscal year.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the 23 local councils appeared before the State House of Assembly Committee on Appropriation to defend their area’s budget for the year.
A total of N34.8 billion, representing 62.24% of the budget, has been earmarked for recurrent while N21.1 billion which covers 37.7% of the total budget, would go to capital expenditure.
Chairman of the committee, Alhaji Ahmed Mohammed, told newsmen after the budget defence that “the exercise was conducted smoothly and the total estimate of N55, 991,240,959.84 has been scrutinised by the members.
“I believe each and every items put in the budget is put for a purpose to serve the local government and the entire state.”
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NAN reports that the 23 local government Sole Administrators had earlier defended their budget before the committee, with Lere local council having the highest budget size of over N3 billion and Kudan with the lowest budget of N1.5 billion.
The ALGON Chairman, Alhaji Yahaya Sale, who spoke with journalists after defending the budget of Giwa Local Government, said it was a zero based-budget.
Sale said: “we are looking at what we have presented; we have no problem because we have sat down with most members at individual local government level.
“We have deliberated with them to locate gray areas and make corrections which is why the budget defence went on smoothly and all process was harmonized.’’
He called for more investments in rural areas in areas such as, “building of schools, hospitals, road construction and giving services to people in communities at a cheaper rate.” (NAN)
