President Bola Tinubu has begun working with the National Assembly to ensure that unsuitable projects forced on ministries and agencies of the federal government by lawmakers are halted. 

Presidential spokesperson Ajuri Ngelale, who disclosed this in an interview with Channels TV on Monday, said this was to stop lawmakers from padding the budget to reduce the cost of governance. 

“The president is working hand in hand with the National Assembly to see how we can also bring down the level of expenditure within the National Assembly, both on the books and off the books,” Mr Ngelale said.

Mr Ngelale further explained that “off the books” pointed clearly to budget padding and shady deals by the legislators. 

“What I mean by off the books without being controversial is that we know that there has been a history of the National Assembly injecting a lot of projects within MDAs that may not be suited to the function and roles of those Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs), and the president is ready to do that,” Mr Ngelale stated.

Aside from being criticised as one of the highest-paid lawmakers in the world despite increasing poverty in the country, Nigerian legislators are notorious for budget padding and smuggling fictitious projects into the budget for their self-enrichment. 

In 2016, former President Muhammadu Buhari, for the first time in Nigerian history, raised the alarm on the budget being padded by federal lawmakers. About N481 billion was padded into the budget in 2016.

The Lagos Division of the Federal High Court directed Mr Buhari to order the anti-corruption agencies to investigate and prosecute those behind the 2016 budget padding.