Chidi Samuel || The special adviser to President Mohammadu Buhari on National Assembly matters, Senator Ita Enang recanted his earlier position that ailing President Buhari on medical vacation abroad will sign 2017 Budget instead of Acting President, Prof Yemi Osinbajo.
Enang addressing newsmen on Friday after submitting the 2017 budget to the Acting President, said, ” Prof Osinbajo is now President and will assent to the Budget.”
Clarifying his earlier position on the matter, Enang said, ”The budget as passed by the National Assembly has just been transmitted to the Acting President. I just delivered it.”
“Let me use this opportunity to clarify an issue. The Acting President has the power to assent to the budget and he will assent to it when the processes are completed.
“The Acting President has the power to assent to the budget. In February, he assented to 7 or 8 bills. Those that he didn’t agree with, he wrote the Senate and House of Representatives that he had withheld his assent from them.”
He went on to maintain that the budget will be signed by the president as he earlier said, but the president here now is the acting president.
“He has the power of the president to assent to it. But the assent to the Appropriation Bill will be after the completion of the standard operation process.
“The bill has 30 days within which it will be assented to but the process can be completed within two or three days. So, it is not possible to say it will be assented to in so, so and so day or in two or three days.
“It’s upon the completion of the process that it will be assented to by the president and the president here now is the acting president.”