By NAOMI SHARANG/KINGSLEY OKOYE

The Senate on Friday fixed March 17 for final consideration and passage of the N58. 472 trillion 2026 budget.

The Senate Committee on Appropriations, at a special session held in Abuja, fixed Feb. 2 to Feb. 13 for consideration of the budget estimates at committee levels.

Chairman of the committee, Sen. Solomon Adeola, also fixed Feb. 9 for public hearing on the budget proposal.

According to Adeola, a Professor of Economics from University of Lagos, Wasiu Adeoye, will make a power-point presentation during the hearing on the budget.

He gave the topic for the public hearing as: ‘Strengthening the Microeconomic Stability, Accelerating Infrastructure Delivery, and Improving Security through Fiscal Discipline and Effective Implementation of the 2026 Budget’.

“Budget hearing and engagement with MDAs starts on Monday, Feb. 2 to Friday, Feb. 13, where all sub-committee chairmen will invite all their relevant MDAs for discussion and presentation,” he said.

As proposed by Adeola and adopted by the committee, March 5 was fixed for an interactive session between members of the committee and economic managers of the Federal Government.

These, Adeola said, would include the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun and Minister of Budget and National Planning, Atiku Bagudu.

Adeola added that Feb. 16 to Feb. 23 had been fixed for submission of reports on budget defence by the various committee chairmen for presentation of reports by the committee to the Senate on March 17.

He informed members of the committee that the senate wanted the budget passed on March 12 before he convinced the leadership for an additional one week.

“We must make sure we work within the time and ensure that the budget is passed, even though the leadership is asking for March 12 for the budget to be passed.

“Because I know how tedious this job can be once we start, so I try to convince them that we should look at March 17 and 19 so that we can pass the budget,” the senator said.

He added that for meticulous scrutiny and consideration of the budget estimates, hard copies of the 2026 budget had been printed for chairmen and members of the various standing committees.

The News Agency of Nigeria NAN reports that the committee adopted the time table as moved by Sen. Adamu Aliero (APC-Kebbi) and seconded by Sen. Orji Kalu (APC-Abia). (NAN)

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