The federal government has said that talks to reach a truce between it and the National Assembly on grey areas in the controversial 2016 budget were still on going and as such could not give a definite date to sign the approved copy from the legislature.
The government has instead set out the timetable for the submission of the 2017 budget, saying that the idea was to ensure early delivery of the document. This came as the government also stated that there was no currency deal swap with the Chinese government.
The implication of the no-date-for-signing is that the hope of many Nigerians who were expectant that the 2016 budget would have been signed into law anytime soon had been dashed.
The decision for further negotiation with the federal lawmakers taken at the Federal Executive Council, FEC meeting which held on Wednesday at the presidential villa, Abuja presided over by president Mohammadu Buhari.
Briefing State House Correspondents at the end of the meeting, Minister of Budget and National Planning, Udo Udoma who were flanked by his colleagues in the Ministries of Petroleum Resources, Ine Kachikwu, Power, Housing and Works, Babatunde Fashola, Communication and Technology, Adebayo Shittu stated that ahead of the eventual signing of the fiscal document, the federal government has set up Monitoring and Evaluation mechanism to ensure that the budget was duly implementation.
Udoma also denied that the document was returned to the National Assembly for a fresh work on it.
He also said that the Council noted the report of the Nigerian Economic Summit Group which in partnership with the National Planning Commission (NPC) organised an economic summit last year and made various recommendations.
On his part, the Minister of Communication, Adebayo Shittu said that no negotiation has been reached yet with MTN on the fine imposed on the telecommunications firm.
He disclosed that one of the memos which also came before FEC was the one requiring approval of the final Acts and instruments amending the International Telecoms Radio Regulations.
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