Missing Budget: PDP wants Buhari, 2 Ministers removed from office
Nigeria’s main opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party, has asked the National Assembly to impeach President Muhammadu Buhari, over the budget scandal rocking the National Assembly.
Nigeria’s main opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party, has asked the National Assembly to impeach President Muhammadu Buhari, over the budget scandal rocking the National Assembly.
The party also demanded the resignation of two ministers, and the central bank governor.
The Senate on Thursday accused a senior special assistant to President Buhari, Ita Enang, of presenting to lawmakers an altered version of the 2016 budget.
Senators had earlier told PREMIUM TIMES on Tuesday that budget documents presented by the president in December were missing, prompting a senate investigation.
At its plenary on Thursday, the Senate said Mr. Enang, a former senator and now Mr. Buhari’s assistant on National Assembly, changed the contents of the original document as presented by Mr. Buhari.
The senate president, Bukola Saraki, said, “What he distributed is different from what was presented by Mr. President and we have resolved not to address any version until we receive the version presented by Mr. President”.
The PDP said in a statement signed by its acting national chairman, Uche Secondus, that its National Working Committee “rose from a meeting Thursday charging the National Assembly to commence impeachment of President Muhammadu Buhari for the various constitutional breaches especially the submission of two version of the 2006 budget”.
The party said the National Assembly should thoroughly investigate the “shameful act, including the distortion and banding of figures to accommodate their personal interest and ensure that appropriate sanctions is meted to whoever has a hand in the dubious action that has brought embarrassment to the legislative body”.
The party also asked the Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun, and Minister of Budget and National Planning, Udo Udoma, to resign “having failed to provide the much needed capacity in the management of the nation’s economy resulting in the embarrassing crashing of the nation’s currency to as low as N305 to a dollar”.
Also, the party asked the Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele, to resign “for plunging the country’s currency policy into chaos an action that thrown investors into total confusion”.
“We sympathizes with Nigerians who are seriously undergoing terrible hardship because of the now obvious inept leadership of APC despite the promise of one Naira to a dollar.
“What hope can a government that allows its currency to break a 43 year old record crashing to over N300 to one dollar offer and yet does not show it has clear focus of what to do,” the party said.
The party said that “APC government rather than address very grievous national issues created by its lack of capacity to govern has instead resorted to violation of peoples rights in the name of fighting corruption”.
