Governor Ayade of Cross River state

The Cross River House of Assembly on Thursday passed the state 2016 appropriation bill of N303 billion.

Gov. Ben Ayade presented a N350 billion budget proposal to the assembly for scrutiny and passage last October.

Mrs Regina Anyogo, Chairman, House Committee on Finance and Appropriation presented the report of the budget to the House.

She said that the N47 billion reduction in the original budget proposal sent by the governor was arrived at due to the dwindling price of oil at the international market.

She said that after Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) defended their budget proposals, the committee carefully studied the budget and gave approval for the government to spend N303 billion this fiscal year.

The chairman said that recurrent expenditure in the 2016 budget was N64.88 billion, while capital expenditure was N285.11 billion.

“Recurrent expenditure for the 2016 fiscal year is proposed at N64.88 billion.

“Out of this amount, N24.92 billion is expected to be spent on Personnel Cost, while N20 .94 billion is for overhead cost and N19 billion for statutory expenditure.

“Also, the sum of N41.78 billion is expected to be drawn from the federation account allocation in 2016.

“After thorough analysis of the budget by the Finance and Appropriation Committee, the committee prays this honourable house to consider its recommendation and approve the sum of N303 billion for 2016 fiscal year, “ she said.

After much deliberation by members, the appropriation bill was unanimously passed by the House.

The Speaker, Mr John Gaul-Lebo, who commended the committee for a thorough work, said that the budget was approved to enable the governor execute his developmental projects.

He said that the passage of the budget would also assist the governor execute his signature projects which included the 260km super highway and the state deep sea port.

He advised MDA’s to make judicious use of the funds allocated to them, saying that the legislature would monitor them closely.

He directed the Clerk of the House, Mr Bassey Ekpeyong to prepare a clean copy of the budget estimate and forward same to the governor for his accent