#BudgetOfFraud: 'N3.9b Aso Rock clinic is not my idea' - Buhari’s Minister disowns 2016 budget

President Buhari presenting the budget 2016 in December last year

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A minister under President Muhammadu Buhari has exonerated himself from the 2016 Appropriation bill, stating that the budget proposals were padded with spurious figures.

Minister of Health, Professor Isaac Adewole

The Minister of Health, Professor Isaac Adewole stated this on Monday, February 9, as he dazed members of the Senate Committee on Health when he informed the legislators that the original budget of his ministry which was submitted to the Senate by Buhari had been largely distorted.

The minister insisted that his ministry would re-submit a fresh budget proposal to the Senate for consideration.

Adewole, speaking further told the committee that there were some health issues on which conclusions had not been made by the ministry and yet allocations were made on them without the ministry’s knowledge.

The revelation forced the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Senator Lanre Tejuosho, to convene a closed door session with the minister, apparently to discuss the development.

At the end of the session, Adewole maintained that the provisions of the budget before the National Assembly was in contrast with the priorities of the health sector, as contained in the original budget it prepared and submitted to the budget office.


“In the revised budget as re-submitted, N15.7 billion for capital allocation has been moved to other areas. Some allocations made are not in keeping with our priorities. There is nothing allocated to public health and family health. Over the last two years, nothing has been done on HIV…

“We have to look into the details of the budget and re-submit it to the committee. This was not what we submitted.

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“We’ll submit another one. We don’t want anything foreign to creep into that budget. What we submitted is not there. We have not reached that stage and we find the money there.” Adewole stated.

President Buhari addressing the senate in December 2015

The Chairman, Senate Committee on Health in reaction said, “Honourable minister, we need to have an executive session.

“What you said about this budget is that public health is not there. Obviously, the budget we are looking at now is not your own”.

Adewole reportedly said: “Yes, it’s not. We’ll submit the revised document tomorrow(Tuesday 9th February). It will be an updated version of what you have.”

He further stated that the State House Clinic which N3.9 billion was budgeted for, was not under the supervision of the Ministry of Health. He explained that the clinic is under the Presidency.

President Buhari taking a bow after presenting the controversial budget

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He reiterated that the figure paraded might not have been the original allocation to the clinic by State House, noting that the original allocation might have been inflated by the same forces, which he said, had distorted his ministry’s original estimates.