The Senate has approved the Conference Committee report on the recommital of the National Assembly Budget and Research Office (NABRO) (Est. etc) Bill, 2017 which seeks to create a budget office that will provide the National Assembly with objective, timely and non-partisan analysis needed for economic and budgetary decisions.
Presenting the report at the plenary session of Tuesday, 6 June 2017, the Chairman of the Committee, Sen. Emmanuel Paulker( PDP:Bayelsa) informed the Senate that the Committee had deliberated extensively on the salient issues raised by the Directorate of Legal Services as follows:
- That in Clause 4, the composition of the Governing Board of NABRO should be made up of serving legislators;
- That by virtue of Section 1 of the Bill, NABRO is conferred with the status of a statutory body to be headed by a Director General. As such, it is required to include provisions for quarterly reports, power to accept gifts; power to borrow; procedure for suit against NABRO; service of summons; indemnity of members and acquisition of property which were inadvertently not included in the Bill;
- That in Clause 13, a fund was provided for NABRO without first establishing it. Therefore, there was the need to specifically create one; and;
- That the power conferred on the Director General in Clauses 7(6) and 15 with respect to obtaining data from public bodies are so broad and pose a potential conflict between NABRO and Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs).
Sen. Paulker stated that the Conference Committee had considered the points highlighted above and provided the following inputs:
- The Committee agreed to retain the original provisions in the harmonized report because NABRO is a specialized statutory body, principally set up to serve the National Assembly especially in the areas of budgeting and its mandate does not fall within the purview of the regular statutory agencies;
- That the Committee had introduced new Clauses, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21 and 22 which deals with annual reports, the power to accept gifts; procedure for suit against NABRO; service of summons; indemnity of members and acquisition of property which were inadvertently not included in the Bill;
- On issues raised in Clause 13 which deals with Funds, estimates of expenditure, etc, the Committee created a new sub-clause (1) which allows for NABRO to establish and maintain a fund which shall be applied towards the discharge of its functions; and
- That the Committee had amended Clause 15 which prescribed a two year imprisonment for any person who refuses or neglects to submit data, estimates and statistics requested by NABRO, and recommended instead that any such person found to have committed such offence shall be liable to dismissal from duty if he or she is an employee of the Civil Service and a fine of N2, 000,000 if he/she is an appointee of the Government.
In view of the legislative summary above, the Committee observed that:
- The Legislative steps taken to allow for additional input into the Bill was appropriate as it complies with Order (1) of the Senate Standing Orders, 2015 as amended;
- The observation of the Directorate of Legal Services was commendable without which the Bill would not have been assented to if transmitted to the President without the newly inserted clauses; and
- The approval of the recommendation therein by the Senate would confer NABRO with the statutory rights to effectively and efficiently perform its function without any impediment when eventually the Bill is passed into law.
It would be recalled that the Senate had approved the recommittal of the NABRO Bill at the plenary session of Wednesday, 5 April 2017 after their attention was drawn to some fundamental. It is expected that the Bill would be transmitted to the President for assent.
