The Federal Government has allocated a whooping sum of N3.3bn as entitlement and severance package for former heads of state, government ministries, departments and agencies in 2023, Theliberationnews reports.
While the entitlements of former presidents/heads of state and vice presidents/Chief of General Staff were pegged at N2.3bn, N1bn was allocated for severance benefits to retired heads of government agencies and parastatals.
The beneficiaries of this bogus benefits include former Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan; ex-military Heads of State, Ibrahim Babangida, Abdulsalami Abubakar and Yakubu Gowon; former Vice-Presidents Atiku Abubakar and Namadi Sambo, among others.
This is contained in the 2023 Appropriation Bill passed by the National Assembly, with the total estimates raised from the proposed N20,507,942,180,704 to N21,827,188,747,391, a difference of N1,319,246,566,687.
In the appropriation bill, the Federal Government proposed a total of N470bn for revitalisation of tertiary institutions and the upgrade of university lecturers’ salaries.
However, the National Assembly has passed only the N300bn budgeted for the institutions’ revitalisation, leaving out the N170bn proposed for an upward salary review for university lecturers.
President Muhammadu Buhari, in his address to a joint session of the National Assembly, while laying the budget on December 7, 2022, announced a N470bn intervention fund to end the protracted crisis between the Federal Government and the Academic Staff Union of Universities.
In the budget, the Nigerian Postal Service also got N10bn for restructuring and recapitalisation, while the sum of N1.92bn was allocated to ‘special intervention fund for construction of storage facility in Benin to house repatriated artifacts.’
Under statutory transfers, the National Assembly and its affiliated bodies will spend a total of N194,839,144,401, while the National Judicial Council, which manages the judicial arm of the Federal Government, has been allocated 165,000,000,000.
Though the sum of N169bn was proposed for the federal bi-cameral legislature in the original bill, while the judiciary had a proposed budget of N150bn, N30bn more than it was allocated in 2022.
