Reps Committee Declares FG’s Envelop Budgeting for MDAs Unconstitutional

The Federal Government’s envelope budgeting method for its Ministries, Departments, and Agencies was deemed insufficient by the House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs on Tuesday, which also rejected the N286 million allotted to support Nigeria’s 109 overseas missions.

According to documents the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs provided to the Committee, which was presided over by Representative Busayo Oluwole Oke, the Ministry had suggested a budget of almost N1.5 trillion based on an evaluation of the embassies’ needs.

Rep. Oke, the committee chairman, stated, “I have not seen anywhere in our laws where envelope budgeting is mentioned,” during an interactive session with the Ministry and the Federation’s Budget Office on Tuesday during the 2025 Budget defense. He also described the budget as being too inadequate for missions that were meant to represent the nation’s image.
We are concerned that your submission to Mr. President violates the law and was not founded on a needs assessment,” he continued.

Tanimu Yakubu, the Director General of the Budget Office, clarified in his presentation that the 2025 budget increased the budgetary allotment for the missions by 25%. In order to increase the country’s revenue generation, he also asked the National Assembly to approve the tax reform proposals.

Yakubu suggested that until the nation improved its revenue generation, fewer foreign missions should be established. He said, “Why don’t we think about drastically cutting back on our overseas missions until we can increase our revenue?”

“We have 109 diplomatic missions abroad, which include 11 consulates, 22 high commissions, and 76 embassies,” he said. As you correctly pointed out, the issue is as pervasive as Nigeria’s current international circumstances.Three years ago, when Nigeria’s debt servicing took nearly all of its revenue, the situation was undoubtedly worse. But when debt financial engineering decreased debt service from as high as 100 percent to 55 percent in the first year, we began to see improvement under this administration.

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“If you speak with our missions overseas, they will tell you that they began to feel some respite last year. We haven’t arrived yet. The present administration has instituted bold reforms, beginning with the abolition of the PMS and other product subsidies and the deregulation of the foreign currency rate.

With these two models, we anticipate saving roughly N11 trillion. Although the savings began to appear in October of last year, the primary recipients—state governments in particular—collected the funds and remained mute. We do know, though, that they took a lot more than they had in a number of years.

In order to increase our revenue collection, we anticipate you to make improvements to the tax measures that we have presented to the National Assembly for your consideration.

“Mr. President has made a special effort to insist on 2.12 million barrels per day, which is an extremely ambitious goal for oil production. He understands that in order to meet these needs, we must look for revenue. The budget for this year is ambitious as a result. It is about N50 trillion this year, compared to roughly N36 trillion last year.

“We must keep managing scarcity, whether we refer to it as envelope budgeting,” he stated.