President Goodluck Jonathan is yet to assent to the 2014 budget recently passed because of distortions by the National Assembly, the Minister of information, Labaran Maku, has said.
Fielding questions from State House correspondents after the weekly Federal Executive Council meeting, Maku said government would not just overlook what he described as serious misrepresentation in the budget passed.
It will be recalled that both the Senate and the House of Representatives had passed an appropriation bill of N4.695 trillion for the 2014 fiscal year.
However, the President is yet to give assent despite the late passage by the lawmakers.
Maku said the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, briefed Council on the progress being made in the ongoing reconciliation of the figures.
The amount passed by the lawmakers is N53 billion higher than the N4.642 trillion presented by the executive.
Maku said: “It is very sad that we have almost entered the middle of the year and we don’t have a budget.
“This indeed is sad that the budget has taken so long in coming and practically we have less than seven months to execute the budget.
“There are few areas of distortions and there are those areas that are very serious and we think there is a need to look into them because of the negative impact those distortions may have on the implementation of the budget.
“We will do everything possible to reconcile the few differences that emerged in what was transmitted to the government by the national Assembly.
“Very shortly we believe that we are going to reconcile those areas and then the final budget will be announced to the nation by the President.”
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