Ekiti House of Assembly passes N80.7b budget

The Ekiti House of Assembly has approved a revised budget of N80.7 billion for the state in 2012.
The approval was sequel to the acceptance of the report of the House Committee on Appropriation, which was saddled with the responsibility of scrutinising the budget.
Gov. Kayode Fayemi had last month presented a budget of N77.2 billion to the House for approval.
The Chairman of the House Committee on Finance and Appropriation, Mr Gbenga Odebunmi, who presented the report of his committee, said the revised budget was scaled up to N80.7 billion following a request for additional N3.5 billion from the executive.

He said the additional amount was to enable the executive to accommodate the budgetary requests from the Urban and Renewal Agency, Ekiti State Tourism Development Agency and some other agencies
Odebunmi said that all agencies were invited to justify their requests, which were found reasonable.
The revised budget is made up of N40.8 billion for capital expenditure and N39.8 billion for recurrent.
The Majority Leader, Mr Churchill Adedipe, later moved the motion for the adoption of the report, which was seconded by Mr Ade Ajayi.
The report was unanimously endorsed by the whole House.
The House has also approved a request by the government to borrow N1 billion from First Bank Plc to boost its agricultural development programme.
In a unanimous resolution approving the request, members expressed optimism that the fund, if well deployed, would boost food production in the state in line with the government’s eight-point agenda.
They, however, called for transparency in the disbursement of the loan to ensure that only real farmers benefited from the facility.
The Speaker, Mr Adewale Omirin, urged the House Committee on Agriculture to play its oversight functions effectively by ensuring that the facility was judiciously utilised.
Speaking under motion for adjournment, a member, Mr Gbenga Odebunmi, representing Ekiti West Constituency, urged local government administrations in the state to clear the roadsides of traders and unedifying structures as part of efforts to reduce the rate of accidents. (NAN)