Fashola To Reshuffle Budget Over LASU Fees 'Shortfall', Ebola Virus

Lagos state governor, Babatunde Fashola, has written a letter to the Lagos State House of Assembly (LSHA) seeking the readjustment of the budget.

Fashola's letter, titled 'Year 2014 Budget Re-ordering of priorities’, was on read at the LSHA plenary on Wednesday.

According to the letter, read by Clerk of the House, Mr. Ganiyu Abiru, the need for the review of the budget is due to compelling issues, chief of which are the Ebola Virus Disease and the inevitable shortfall in the Lagos State University (LASU) revenue, due to the recent reversal of the hike in tuition fee.

"[The reordering] is to take care of emerging issues like the reversal of Lagos State University, LASU, school fees policy which requires us to make provisions to cover LASU shortfall in projected revenues in order to service the school; the unanticipated but very urgent need to address the threat of the Ebola Virus Epidemic, EVD, and also a need for counterpart funding request that enables us to access developmental funds to install solar power panels in 172 public schools and 11 primary health centres in the first phase” Fashola said.

The letter stated that the re-ordering will not swell the budget, but rather re-allocate funds originally allocated for other purposes.

"We have discovered that there are still unutilized provisions by some Ministries, Departments and Agencies, MDAs, which may remain so till year end," the governor wrote.

"Hence we are proposing to move such provisions to where they are more urgently needed to enable the state government address pressing needs in the areas identified above and other areas like security, housing among others.”

With the new challenges, Fashola would want a substantial addition to the of N51.378 billion budgeted for Education and N22.07 billion budgeted for health in the 2014 budget.

The LSHA had approved a total sum of N489. 690 billion as budget for the 2014 appropriation year on the 9th of January 2014.

LSHA House Committee on Economic Planning and Budget would deliberate and report back to the House today, Thursday.