NASS doubles rural electrification budget to N31bn

The National Assembly has doubled the 2017 budget proposal of the National Rural Electrification Agency, NREA, raising the executive expenditure proposal for the agency from N16,137,871,005 to N31,044,204551 as contained in the Appropriation Bill passed last Thursday.

In the budget, the agency itemized various projects for executions under the fiscal year, which include the rehabilitation, completion and construction of rural electrification projects across the nation.

The agencies under the Ministry of Power, which received various appropriations included: National Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC; National Electricity Management Services Agency, NEMSA; National Power Training Institute, NAPTI; National Electricity Liability Management Limited, NELMCO; Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN and National Bulk Electricity Trading, NBET.

The legislature also partially increased the N40 billion proposed in the budget by the Transmission Company of Nigeria, TCN, to N42.385 billion, which is a difference over N2 billion.

The appropriation bill also showed that the N2.718 billion allocated to the NELMCO was increased to N3.518 billion just as NAPTI budget proposal of N2.465 billion was reduced by only N127 million.

The National Assembly also appropriated a total of N3.725 billion to NBET as against N3.595 billion proposed in the executive bill, indication a an increment of N130 million.

However, the budget of NERC was reduced from N2 billion to N1.8 billion, by the National assembly.
Similarly, the N2.837billion allocated to MEMSA was also slashed to N1.129 billion by the legislature.