Technical issues stall $29b loan approval request

 Senate at plenary session. Twitter photo.

Technical issues caused the rejection of President Muhammadu Buhari’s request for approval to obtain $29.9 billion loan from the World Bank.

Senate leader Ali Ndume said on Tuesday though he was shocked over the rejection but the request could not be approved because of technical issues.

He told journalists shortly after the plenary he was optimistic that the request would be approved when the technical issues were resolved and represented.

“The problem came on a technical ground, it is supposed to go to the committee level and the committee is supposed to take a look at it.

“I am going to appeal to my colleagues to take a look at it again and see how we are going to bring it back.

He explained that whereas the letter asking for the request said there was an attached draft, but the attachment was not there.

“So these are some of the lapses that we will look at in bringing it back.

“We were thinking that there was going to be details but there was no detail of the borrowing plan.

“I believe that those will be included in the next one,” he said.

The Leader of the Senate said that the Red Chamber did not have the power to give anticipatory approval of any bill or document that it had not received.

He however assured that there was no need to worry as the Senate was poised to doing things the right way and would reconsider the request on its merits.

“We are trying to do things the way it should be done this time around, but we cannot throw away the baby with the bath water.

“In the appropriation Act we approved that the budget will be financed through internal and external borrowing.
“The internal borrowing is going on, we also approved external borrowing so we will look at these areas that are necessary for the funding of the budget,” he said.

Ndume however did not give a specific date or period within which the request would be represented but assured that he was going to interface with the President.

“I cannot tell you now when it would be represented: I as a leader is in contact with the executive which i try to market in the Senate.

“As I told you I was shocked by the decision, my colleagues surprised me today, I was not expecting that.

He explained that if he the inclination the request would not succeed he would market it or not present it.

“Today the senators had their way and I had my say,” he said.

(NAN)