2016/17 Budget Increased To K1.149 Trillion Now Passed

Goodall: Presented Budget on 27 May 2016

The 2016/17 National Budget has been passed on Thursday night by the National Assembly but the budget figure has now been increased to K1. 149 trillion from K1.140 trillion following the introduction of new budgetary allocation vote for the Greenbelt Initiative and increment made to Department of Human Resource Management and Development by K7.7 billion

Greenbelt Initiative which has just been created by Government is a new vote which has received an allocation of K300 million. It was omitted on the Order Paper until it appeared on Thursday night when Government presented Supplementary Order Paper.

The House passed the budget after it spent four days in the Committee of Supply where the Committee of the whole House was considering and passing each budgetary vote allocated to all Government Ministries, Departments and Agencies.

Government side was in a jolly atmosphere just after the very last vote had passed and the excitement took another level just after passing of the whole budget to the extent that Leader of House also Minister of Agriculture, George Chaponda was heard on top of the jubilant noise of Government MPs shouting his party slogan “DPP Woyeee!”

The excitement was inevitable considering that the Government was not sure if it would manage to meet the target of passing the Budget by the end of the day. This was because the committee of Supply was marred with delays right from the start on Monday as the House was spending over two hours of scrutinizing most votes since number of opposition MPs had a lot of questions and number of issues to raise to each allocation.

Due to the delays, Leader of House George Chaponda had for the past two days including on this day used to extend the time for the sitting of the House to allow members continue with Committee of Supply up to old hours in order to ensure that the budget is passed as planned.

George Chaponda

“My immediate reaction is happiness because the passing of the budget means that developmental projects for the Government will be pursued.” said Chaponda in an interview immediately after the House passed the Budget

“And secondly am also equally pleased because it has been passed after debate which was very constructive from both sides of the House.” He added 

Hon Chaponda also expressed his excitement that the budget has been passed with features in the budget that he said will be for the best interest of this nation.

He mentioned passing of the vote for Greenbelt Authority which has received amount of K300 million and also provision made to Department of Human Resources Management and Development which has received an allocation of K29. 508 billion an increment from K21. 738 billion which Chaponda said this increment “will mean difference in terms of increment of salaries of people.” 

Before all adjustments, the initial budget estimates were projected at K1, 136. 4 Trillion. But later with adjustment that was announced on Tuesday made to Farm Input Subsidy Programme the Budget was revised to One Trillion, One Hundred and Forty Billion, Seven Hundred Eleven Million, Two Hundred Ninety-Four Thousand, Eight Hundred and Twenty-Three Kwacha (K1, 140, 711, 294, 823). Now the budget has been passed as sum of One Trillion, One Hundred and Forty-Nine Billion, Three Hundred and Thirty-Five Million, Two Hundred and Fifty-Nine Thousand, Six Hundred and Forty-Six Kwacha (K1, 149, 335, 259, 646).

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