Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, a former Special Adviser to President Bola Tinubu on Political Affairs, has called for an explanation on the ₦6.93 trillion that was purportedly incorporated into the 2025 budget.
According to reports, BudgIT Nigeria, a non-governmental civic and transparency organization, claimed that 11,122 projects totaling ₦6.93 trillion were added to the 2025 budget by the 10th National Assembly (NASS).
238 projects worth more than ₦5 billion apiece, totaling ₦2 trillion, were added with little to no explanation, according to BudgIT’s investigation.
BudgIT claims that a total of ₦641.38 billion was arbitrarily introduced into 984 projects valued at ₦1.71 trillion and 1,119 projects between ₦500 million and ₦1 billion.
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According to the report released on Tuesday, a closer examination revealed that 1,972 projects totaling ₦444.04 billion were allocated to senatorial districts and 3,573 projects totaling ₦653.19 billion were directly assigned to federal constituencies.
Baba-Ahmed responded to BudgIT’s report by saying that the Presidency and NASS must explain to Nigerians how trillions were added to the budget.
Additionally, he said that if the federal government believes that BudgIT’s report was fraudulent, it should sue the latter.
“If BudgIT’s assertion is untrue, then the Presidency and NSS should sue it for disclosing the insertion of trillions into the 2025 budget. Accepting the validity of the published findings is the alternative. In any event, the government ought to provide Nigerians with an explanation,” he tweeted on Thursday on his 𝕏 handle.
