Details

The parliamentary training for 40 Members of the state Houses of Assembly of Cross River, Lagos, Ogun and Plateau States was held on December 14 – 15, 2013 at Protea Hotel, Asokoro, Abuja. The Country Representative of KAS, Mrs. Hildegard Behrendt-Kigozi welcomed all participants and the German Ambassador to Nigeria, Mrs. Dorothee Janetzke-Wenzel, gave some insight about the importance which the Germans attach to Budget procedures and Budget decisions taken.

Amongst the participants were the Speaker of Cross River State House of Assembly, Right Honourable Larry Odey, and the Speaker of Plateau State House of Assembly, Right Honourable Titus Alams, who led the delegations from their different Houses to the training. The Chief Whip of Ogun State, Hon. Olusegun Solarin and his colleagues represented Ogun State House of Assembly, while Hon. Rotimi Olowo led his colleagues from Lagos State House of Assembly to the training.

It was discussed that the executive arm of government has more knowledge on how to compile a budget, while the legislative arm that is supposed to approve the budget and pass it into law is handicapped. The Members of the State Houses of Assembly come from different backgrounds, and have probably never gone through a complete budget before while the Executive has well trained Accountants and other Budget Professionals who do budgeting as their lifetime job. This specialized training organized by KAS, is supposed to help the Parliamentarians to be more confident working and examining the Budgets proposals from the Eexecutive.

Some of the topics covered at the training are; ‘Budget Monitoring and Implementation at State Level’ by Barrister J. Etuk, from the Budget Office of the Federation; ‘Budget Examination and Feedback to the Executive’ by Barrister Ray Esebagbon from LAW-Links Consults; ‘State Budgeting and Fiscal Discipline: Bedrock for Sustainable Development’ by Mr. Joakins Alaneme from ICPC.