Senate Hails Tinubu’s N58.47trn 2026 Appropriation Bill, Backs Infrastructure, Security Push

•Passes N43.5trn 2024, 2025 reworked budgets, extends 2025 appropriation to March 2026

Sunday Aborisade in Abuja

The Senate yesterday endorsed President Bola Tinubu’s N58.47 trillion 2026 Appropriation Bill, praising its strong emphasis on infrastructure, security, debt servicing and macroeconomic stability.

This emerged on the same day the Senate passed a consolidated sum of N43.5 trillion contained in the 2024 and 2025 Appropriations Act (Repeal and Re-enactment) Bills, describing the exercise as a major step toward fiscal discipline, transparency and effective budget implementation.

The 2026 proposed budget was, however, higher than the N58.18 trillion presented to the joint session of the National Assembly last Friday by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, with defence and security emerging as the single largest sectoral allocation at N5.41 trillion.

The appropriation bill tagged “Budget of Consolidation, Renewed Resilience and Shared Prosperity,” projected total revenue of N34.33 trillion and total expenditure of N58.18 trillion, including N15.52 trillion for debt service.

The proposal puts recurrent (non-debt) expenditure at N15.25 trillion, capital expenditure at N26.08 trillion, and a fiscal deficit of N23.85 trillion, representing 4.28 per cent of Gross Domestic Product.

Debate on the general principles of the bill followed a lead presentation by the Senate Leader, Senator Opeyemi Bamidele, who described the proposal as a “budget of consolidation” designed to stabilise the economy after far-reaching reforms, deepen growth and strengthen public finance.

Bamidele explained that the bill seeks legislative authorisation for total expenditure of N58.472 trillion for the 2026 fiscal year, made up of N4.097 trillion for statutory transfers, N15.909 trillion for debt service, N15.252 trillion for recurrent (non-debt) expenditure, and N23.214 trillion for capital expenditure.

According to him, capital spending remains the backbone of the budget, targeting transport infrastructure, power, agriculture, housing, industrial development and the digital economy, to stimulate private investment, creating jobs and boosting productivity.

Seconding the motion for the bill to be read a second time, Minority Leader, Senator Abba Moro, described the budget as “beautifully crafted” but cautioned that worrying trends remained, particularly in agriculture.

Moro noted that while food prices had fallen, many farmers who borrowed at high interest rates were struggling because cheaper inputs and farm implements were not available to match increased production.

He urged the government to prioritise affordable inputs in implementation to avoid deepening farmers’ hardship.

Deputy Senate President, Senator Barau Jibrin, said he was “highly impressed” by the scale of capital allocations, describing them as unprecedented since the Ninth Assembly.

He expressed optimism that proper implementation would significantly transform infrastructure, especially roads, rail and power, and boost their contribution to GDP.

On debt service, Senator Mohammed Sani Musa said the allocation of about N15.9 trillion was necessary to sustain confidence in the economy and reassure development partners.

He stressed that failure to meet debt obligations would pose serious risks, adding that the heavy investment in roads was timely given years of neglect.

“This is a budget of consolidation,” Musa said, expressing confidence that 2026 would be better economically than previous years if the bill scaled second reading.

Senator Tahir Monguno linked the large infrastructure allocation to job creation, arguing that Nigeria was likely to witness “job-led growth rather than jobless growth.”

He also defended the size of the debt service provision, noting that many of the debts were inherited and had reached maturity under the current administration.

Monguno stressed the primacy of security, saying no development could be sustained without safety, but urged stronger legislative oversight to ensure transparency, proper procurement and value for money in defence spending.

Former Senate President, Senator Ahmed Lawan, described the proposal as a “historic, bold and courageous” budget, particularly for its focus on security, development and welfare.

While commending the large defence allocation, he argued that security agencies still needed more resources.

Lawan also warned that 2026 would be dominated by political activities, urging the Senate and Executive to ensure that politics did not undermine budget implementation.

He called for faster release of funds to contractors to avoid abandoned projects and highlighted what he described as inadequate funding for the livestock sector, which he said had both economic and security implications.

“This budget will make Nigeria far better,” Lawan said, calling for collective commitment to full implementation.

Adding his voice, Senator Asuquo Ekpeyong said the N58.4 trillion budget proposal was remarkable for its clear priorities, including about N5 trillion for security, N3.5 trillion for education and N2.48 trillion for health and social services.

He appealed for implementation that would surpass previous years.

Earlier in his lead debate, Bamidele said the budget philosophy was anchored on consolidating macroeconomic stability, improving the investment climate, promoting job-rich growth and strengthening human capital while protecting the vulnerable.

He noted that the projected deficit of about 4.28 per cent of GDP remained within approved fiscal parameters.

At the end of deliberations, Senate President Godswill Akpabio, who presided, committed the 2026 Appropriation Bill to the Senate Committee on Appropriations, mandating it to conduct detailed scrutiny and report back to the chamber within one month.

Meanwhile, the Senate yesterday passed a consolidated sum of N43.5 trillion contained in the 2024 and 2025 Appropriations Act (Repeal and Re-enactment) Bills, describing the exercise as a major step toward fiscal discipline, transparency and effective budget implementation.

The passage followed the consideration and approval of the report of the Senate Committee on Appropriations, presented during plenary by its Chairman, Senator Solomon Adeola (APC, Ogun West).

The legislation seeks to repeal earlier budget figures and re-enact revised sums to address emerging economic realities, revenue constraints and the need to rationalise overlapping budget cycles.

According to the report, the 2024 Appropriations Act was repealed and re-enacted with an aggregate expenditure of N43.561 trillion, up from the earlier N35.005 trillion.

The increase, the committee explained, was largely driven by the introduction of an additional N8.5 trillion into the capital component to accommodate special interventions, particularly in response to security, humanitarian and economic emergencies confronting the country.

For the 2025 fiscal year, the committee recommended the repeal of the earlier N54.990 trillion Appropriations Act and its replacement with a revised total expenditure of N48.316 trillion.

The report noted that N6.674 trillion was reduced from the capital allocation and rolled over into the 2026 fiscal year due to funding constraints, a move aimed at making the budget more realistic and effective in line with anticipated revenue growth in the next fiscal year.

The report further highlighted concerns over the long-standing practice of running multiple budget cycles concurrently, warning that extending the implementation of one budget deep into another fiscal year weakens fiscal discipline and blurs budget clarity.

To address this, the Senate approved the extension of the 2025 budget implementation timeline to March 31, 2026, to allow for the completion of ongoing capital projects.

Deputy Senate President, Senator Jibrin Barau, commended the Appropriations Committee for what he described as a “top-notch” report, noting that it was produced within an unusually short period of two days.

“This is the best of the best. When you see something that is good, you know it is good. There is really nothing to debate. We should move ahead and pass it,” Barau said.

Several senators echoed similar sentiments. Senator Mohammed Sani Musa (Niger East) said the revised budgets prioritised critical infrastructure such as roads, railways and border community projects, adding that infrastructure remained the country’s biggest deficit.

Senator Adetokunbo Abiru (Lagos East) said the exercise would strengthen fiscal discipline while preventing the loss of major infrastructure spending due to overlapping projects and weak oversight.

Chief Whip of the Senate, Senator Tahir Monguno (Borno North), said the repeal and re-enactment would finally put an end to the “ugly scenario” of running multiple budgets on a single revenue inflow, which he said had historically distorted Nigeria’s budgetary system.

Following the approval of the report at the Committee of Supply and plenary, Akpabio put the bill to a voice vote for third reading, with the “Ayes” prevailing.

Ruling on the passage, Akpabio described the development as “a major transformative step” that would enhance transparency and strengthen confidence in the nation’s public finance management.