At last, Sanwo-Olu signs 2019 budget of N873.5bn into law

Sanwo-Olu portrait

Gov. Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State.

Gov. Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State.

By Kazeem Ugbodaga

At last, Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu on Monday signed the 2019 appropriation bill of N873.5bn into law and also signs three other bills.

This is coming over one month after which the Lagos State House of Assembly passed the bill presented to it by former Lagos State Governor, Akinwunmi Ambode in February 2019.

The Assembly passed the budget on April 29, 2019 and added N21 billion to the original budget of N852.317 billion presented by the then governor, Ambode. The budget has been one filled with political undertone as the former governor could not present the budget in December and had to present it in February.

The new Capital Expenditure stands at N479.691 billion while Recurrent Expenditure is N393.841 billion.

Signing the bill into law at the State House, Ikeja, Sanwo-Olu said it was an exciting day for Lagosians as the law would be implemented to the fullest for their benefits.

He said he was awareness that the year was far gone, saying the his administration would deploy the state’s full machinery for effective performance of the budget.

According to him, “the eight Assembly has been effective in their duties. I am aware that the year is far gone but we will ensure that we quickly deploy all machinery of government in other to achieve full utilization and performance of the budget.

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“We will ensure that all the lines that you have laid will be fully adhere to, in other to ensure that citizens enjoy the benefit of government. As observed, the budget is a 55 to 45 percent, if we are lucky and push on our revenue side, it is not unlikely that before the end of the year, we will not sit to look at the budget again.”

The governor disclosed that the former administration incurred expenses as he could not spend above 25 percent of the budget since it was not signed into law before leaving office, adding that “we want Lagosians to feel the impact of this law.”

In his words: “The appropriation bill touches the lives of all residents of the state. We will quickly get to work. There were expenses that were incurred by the immediate past administration because the former governor has the right to spend certain percentage of the budget before it was signed into law.

“The signing today will help us to disaggregate to the respective ministries, Agencies and departments. So we will need to push on both the revenue and expenditure parts of the budget. This is to ensure that residents of the state feel the impact of the budget that is just signed into law.

“We will push on the capital revenue side, especially on our revenue and see what are the creative means of financing, that we can bring on board within the law, to ensure that citizens feel the benefit of democratic government.”

The governor also signed three other bills into law. They are: The Domestic Staff Service Provider Registration Law 2019;Lagos State House of Assembly Service Commission (Amended) Law 2019 the Lagos State Neighbourhood Safety Corps Agency Law.

 

 

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