By Munachimso Obienyi
The Federal Government plans to spend N854.8 billion on pensions, gratuities and retirees’ benefits in the 2023 budget.
Nigeria’s President, Muhammadu Buhari disclosed this while presenting the 2023 appropriation bill to a joint session of the National Assembly in Abuja last weekend.
He disclosed that the total non-debt recurrent expenditure in January to July 2002 was 3.24 trillion, of which 2.87 trillion was for salaries, pensions and overheads.
The government, he said, would spend N20.15 trillion for the 2023 fiscal year.
Commenting on the development, the Chief Executive Officer at HighCap Securities, Imafidion Adonri, told NwafoLive via a telephone chat that the expenditure and deficit in the budget is likely to expand.
“And in the case that since the budget will be passed for the incoming administration, the challenges of twin deficit – budget deficit, that we are currently battling with together with trade deficit will suffice and have a negative impact on the macroeconomy and the country will experience severe challenges.
Hence, the budget is an expansionary one and judging from analysts that the global and domestic will experience slow growth”.
