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 February 2 to 13 for the consideration of the budget estimates at the committee level.

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

According to Mr Adeola, a professor of economics at the University of Lagos, Wasiu Adeoye will give a PowerPoint presentation during the budget hearing.

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, February 2, and continues to Friday, February 13, where all sub-committee chairmen will invite all their relevant MDAs for discussion and presentation,” he said.

As proposed by Mr Adeola and adopted by the committee, March 5 was set for an interactive session between the committee and the economic managers of the federal government.

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

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

He informed members of the committee that the Senate wanted the budget passed on March 12, but he convinced the leadership to grant an additional 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.

“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 committee adopted the timetable as moved by Adamu Aliero (APC-Kebbi) and seconded by Orji Kalu (APC-Abia).

(NAN)