By Emmanuel Aziken

Budget presentation and approval in a democracy is about one of the most delectable engagements in a democracy. It is a time when the power of the purse belonging to the parliament is brought to the fore.

What an irony for those All Progressives Congress, APC puritans who two years ago vowed that President Muhammadu Buhari would never do anything with Senator Bukola Saraki and Rt. Hon. Yakubu Dogara as presiding officers of the National Assembly. Last Tuesday as the president laid the budget on the table, he did what could have been anathema to the APC puritans when he bowed before Saraki and Dogara sitting on the dais.

In major democracies, it is always a matter of style. In the United States, the president outlines his plans normally in the state of the union address in January but submits his budget proposals on the first Monday in February.

In the United Kingdom, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that is, the finance minister lays the budget normally in November. The budget in the UK normally flows from the broad outlines earlier proposed by the government in the Queen’s Speech which is delivered at the opening of parliament by Her Majesty.

In the UK, the budget is carried by the chancellor in his red box. Budget is derived from the French word, “bougette” which means little bag which dovetailed to the tradition of carrying the budget speech in a leather bag. Over the years, that little bag has now been replaced by the Red Box in which the budget is packaged.

Even though Nigeria now practises a United States-style presidential system of democracy, the country is increasingly adapting its budget processes to fit in with the British tradition.

Unfortunately, Nigerians who watched last Tuesday’s budget presentation on television did not get to see much of the flamboyance and form that went into the day.

Besides senators and members of the House of Representatives gathering into the chambers of the House, senior representatives of the executive arm of government and the judiciary are also present. By tradition, the budget presentation is one occasion outside the Presidential Villa and high profile party meetings where the president and the vice-president are seated in the same function.

On budget day, the most conspicuous thing to the outsider is the enhanced security in the grounds of the National Assembly. National Assembly security, normally supervised by the Sergeant-at-Arms is for the period before and during the presentation taken over by the presidential security team. The band of the Brigade of Guards dressed in ceremonial uniform take position and entertain before the president arrives.

Budget Day is undoubtedly the most inconvenient day for workers, journalists, and other stakeholders as the unfamiliar Presidential Villa security team usually do not brook nonsense. It is best for those not specially accredited not to come near.

As expected of an august visitor, the red carpet is laid for the president from the rotunda where he is received by the deputy presiding officers to the chamber of the House of Representatives where senators and members of the House of Representatives are expected to be seated waiting for his arrival.

On that day, the legislative practise of saying prayers from the Standing Orders is ditched. The prayer in the Standing Order does not acknowledge Jesus The Christ worshiped by Christians or Allah worshiped by Muslims. On budget day, Christian and Islamic prayers are said before the commencement of the ceremony and again at the end.

Following the prayers, the president of the Senate seated on a red chair welcomes the president of the Federal Republic and then invites him to make his budget presentation. Following the budget presentation, the Speaker of the House of Representatives seated on a green chair is then supposed to give a vote of thanks.

However, since Umar Ghali Na‘Abba to Yakubu Dogara now, speakers have always gone beyond doing the thanking to use the occasion to articulate touchy issues mostly doing with poor budget implementation. In some cases, the vote of thanks had gone for as long as 20 minutes.

Following the vote of thanks and the closing prayers, the president departs, and the presidential security team dismounts as life returns to normal. And in our case, the pattern of padding, put-downs and parliamentary bellicosity in which the legislators struggle to show that the power of the purse belongs to them continues.