By Johnbosco Agbakwuru & Joseph Erunke

ABUJA —The Senate, yesterday, reduced the oil benchmark from the initial $65 per barrel to $52 to reflect the reality of the current fluctuating and dwindling oil price in the international market.

This was one of the decisions taken after a closed door meeting where issues concerning the 2015 Appropriation Bill was said to have dominated discussions as well as the poor budgetary allocation to the capital expenditure.

The Senate also decried the non release of funds for the execution of capital projects, while allocation for the recurrent expenditure was on the increase.

The Senate President, David Mark, had in the secret meeting ordered different committee heads to expedite action on budget defence so that it would be passed before the Senate commences another recess for the general elections.

Mark regretted that about four months after the presentation of the 2015 Appropriation Bill, nothing much had been done on it.

Although journalists were not formally briefed on issues that dominated the secret meeting, some Senators who spoke to Vanguard, preferring not to be mentioned, said the Senate President convened the session principally to draw attention of the legislators to what he called the slow pace of work being accorded the budget treatment.

Mark was said to have expressed fears that if the budget was not expeditiously treated and passed before the National Assembly proceeds on another round of recess to witness the March 28 and April 14 elections, it may delay attention, thus, affecting the smooth running of government.

To this end, he therefore asked all Senators, especially chairmen of committees handing the defence of ministries, parastatals and agencies’ budgets to brace up with a view to completing their assignments and submitting their work for consideration before the election recess.

It was gathered that majority of the Senators had lamented during the closed-door session that lasted about one hour that the executive had been in the habit of making poor budgetary allocation to capital projects.

Journalists, who had anxiously waited to officially hear the issues raised at the meeting were disappointed when Mark and other Senators in attendance emerged from the forum with sealed lips.

Speaking before the Senate continued its plenary, the Senate President said: “At the closed-door session, we deliberated issues bordering on national interest, and national development.”

However, some of the Senators said lawmakers expressed concern over meagre allocation of N387 billion for capital projects in the 2015 budget which they said was unprecedented even as the recurrent component was allocated over 90 percent of the N4.3 trillion budget.

The lawmakers were said to have insisted that they will not approve such huge lopsided budget allocation.

Consequently, the committees were directed to liaise with the various Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) to cut down on recurrent votes in order to make more fund available for projects.

Expressing anger on the way economic issues were being handled by the finance ministry, one of the senators that did not want his name published said majority of Senators expressed anger that the finance ministry was deliberately drawing back the wheel of the nation’s progress.