President Muhammdu Buhari has said that some Ministries may get significantly less capital allocation than they received in 2016, while others may get significantly more.
“In this regard, let me inform you that because of the need to focus on our key priorities, some Ministries may get significantly less capital allocation than they received in 2016, while others may get significantly more.”
The President spoke today, Thursday, at a ministerial retreat on recession vis-a-vis the 2017 national budget, held at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
He said that the inclusion of some key non-spending agencies, such as the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC), the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE), the National Sovereign Investment Authority (NSIA) and the National Pension Commission (PENCOM), in the retreat underscores the commitment of his government to leverage on private sector resources, through Public Private Partnerships (PPP) and other arrangements, in order to augment the scarce budgetary resources at our disposal and to accelerate investments in building critical infrastructure.
The President is confident that the level of private investment will grow as his government is determined to make it easier to do business in Nigeria by the reforms the government is introducing under the auspices of the Presidential Committee on Ease of Doing Business.
“Let me reiterate that this Government will continue to strategize on how we can turn the current challenges into opportunities for our nation and especially for our vibrant youth on whose shoulders lies the future of this nation. This is why we have embarked on measures and actions that will open up the opportunities we have seen in the Power, Housing, Agriculture, Mining, Trade and Investment, Information Communication Technology (ICT) Sectors, Tourism, Transport and other sectors.
“I wish to reassure its teeming youth that this Government would remain steadfast in its effort to ensure greater progress and prosperity for you.
“While Government is taking the lead in the task of repositioning our economy for Change, we cannot achieve this completely by ourselves. We will need, and we ask for the support and cooperation of the private sector’s domestic and foreign investors, the States and Local Governments, the National Assembly and the Judiciary as well as all well-meaning Nigerians in this important task. We are confident that working together, we shall succeed.”
Buhari asked the cabinet members to learn from the experiences of the Resource persons and facilitators at the retreat to enable them prioritise their sector programmes and projects to bring the country out of the current economic recession and place it on the path of growth and development.
He also asked the Ministers and other senior government officials at the retreat to actively participate in the Second Technical Session, which he believed will provide them with deeper insight into the complex issues that will open opportunities for them to identify critical priority projects and programmes for the 2017 Budget. [myad]
