Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe has spoken up on the controversy currently eating up the Nigerian Senate, amidst allegations of budget padding by the lawmaker representing Bauchi Central, Senator Abdul Ningi.
Senator Enyinnaya representing Abia South Senatorial District who spoke on how much he received from the 2024 budget noted that contrary to the claim that some ranking senators received N500 million from the 2024 budget, he only received N266 million.
Recall that the senator representing Cross River North, Agom Jarigbe on Tuesday, March 12, revealed that senior ranking senators had received N500 million each from the 2024 budget while he got nothing.
Lawmakers who have spent at least four years in the Senate are regarded as ranking senators.
Jarigbe made the revelation on the floor of the Senate while speaking on allegations of budget padding raised by Senator Ningi.
Ningi had earlier accused the Senate of padding the 2024 budget, saying the National Assembly added an extra N3.7 trillion to the initial budget.
Reacting to the allegation on Arise Television on Wednesday, March 13, Abaribe said Ningi knew it was a mistake to make a claim he could not prove.
Abaribe then denied receiving N500 million as alleged by Jarigbe. He added that despite being a senior senator, he only received N266 million.
Abaribe said: “Senator Ningi knew it was going to be a mistake. He knew. He’s a member of the Senate. He can’t say he didn’t know. He’s an old Senator. He has been in the Senate before. He knew that this wasn’t correct.
“I never got 500 million. I think Jarigbe tried to clarify his statement. He came back subsequently to say, ‘No, Ningi told me I was given’, because he didn’t get. He’s also a ranking Senator.
“So, I think that at the end of the day, what you see really is that…well, I’m an APGA Senator–the only APGA Senator in the Senate. Maybe being a minority of the minority, they didn’t consider me worthy of being given. Nobody told me about that money.
“I wanted to say that, without equivocation, that both Jarigbe and the Senate leader tried to clarify this issue. Number one: nobody was given 500 million. Even a few of my colleagues called me to say, ‘Ahh you get 500 million we dey beg you for money but you no wan give us one naira out of it.’ Can you imagine?”
Abaribe proceeded to explain how the Zonal Intervention Project funds were shared among senators.
Abaribe said he got N266 million from the money allocated to lawmakers in the six geo-political zones. According to him, lawmakers from some zones, like the Northwest, which has seven states, would expect to get less than what he got, as his Southeast zone has only five states.
He said: “So, of course, I got 266 million for what’s called Zonal Intervention Fund which Nigerians call “constituency project” funds. And this thing takes a budget circle which is twelve months. So if at the end of twelve months, you don’t see what’s in the budget for your constituency, then you hold your representatives whether in the Reps or Senate culpable.”
He added, “I have been saying that all fingers are not equal and by privilege of office, certain people will get but not every Senator gets an equal amount.
“These are six zones in the country, and every zone gets its own N10 billion in intervention. Now, if you are from the Northwest zone, because you have seven states, the senator will get less than me who comes from the five-state zone.
“My state, Abia, gets N2 billion and if we break it down for both the Senate and the representatives, the Senate is getting 40% and the House gets 60%.
“I got about N266 million as zonal intervention. The person in the Northwest who has seven states will necessarily get less, about a hundred million and something.
“So it’s not correct when we say every constituency must get an equal amount.”
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