by Akan Ido

President  Goodluck Jonathan’s proposal to spend N4.6 trillion as the government budget in 2014 has been approved by the Nigerian senate.

There was a minimal raise of N53 billion in the budget by the Senate.

The budget which is the lowest in 3 years  passed a second reading on February 4 with the approval coming  four months into the new fiscal year and a third reading  passage is expected by the House of Representatives before a harmonization of the bill, ahead of the president’s assent.

The sum of the original budget  submitted in December 2013 was N4.642 trillion, presented to the lawmakers by the finance minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, on behalf of the president.

The budget sum was divided into two with  3.54 trillion slated for the recurrent expenditure while the remaining N1.1 trillion-the equivalent of 23.7 percent, to be used for capital projects.