Mohammed Bello El-Rufai, the House of Representatives member for Kaduna North Constituency, has demanded that ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) scrap the annual purchase of cutlery, vehicles and furniture in their budgets.
He stated this during the debate on the 2025 budget on Wednesday. He explained that some items ministries, departments and agencies included in the 2024 budgets in their recurrent expenditure should not be allowed in the 2025 budget.
“Sir, the recurrent issue is in every budget, even a young person like myself, we budget for vehicles every year, we budget for utensils every year. So what I would like us to do, sir, to open more revenues or block loopholes is to look at all these ministries that are bringing their budgets.
“If they bought vehicles last year, please, they should just relax now. Vehicles do not expire. These are the little things, Mr. Speaker, that if, unless we start looking at them, the loopholes we talk about will not come out. I want to thank the leadership for sessions like this and other experienced members. It’s a learning opportunity, but on this, the Orasanye report, sir, should be implemented. It is key. That is one,” he said.
The All Progressives Congress (APC) lawmaker further demanded financial discipline from leaders just as Nigerians are encouraged to endure the current hardship in the country.
“The second and most important thing to me, since I was a, well, I’m still a young man, since I was a boy, budgets every year come with new computers, new furniture. These things don’t expire, sir. We should cut them out totally. We can’t be asking Nigerians, we can’t have a tax reform bill that could shape the fiscal shape of this country. Well, as leaders, we are not cutting anything.
“So I urge the chairman, I’m honored, sir, that I chair a committee that has CBN, but my budget is not on here. But committee chairmen that are more experienced than myself should look into this. Nigerians are tired of every agency buying fork and knife every year,” he added.
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‘Scrap Annual Buying of Cutlery, Vehicles, Furniture for MDAs’ – El-Rufai (video)