Senate to pass 2026 budget on 17 March

The Senate on Friday fixed 17 March for final consideration and passage of the N58—472 trillion 2026 budget.

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The Senate Committee on Appropriations, at a special session held in Abuja, fixed 2 February to 13 February for the consideration of the budget estimates at the committee levels.

Chairman of the committee, Solomon Adeola, also fixed 9 February for a public hearing on the budget proposal.

According to Mr Adeola, a professor of Economics at the University of Lagos, Wasiu Adeoye, will give a PowerPoint presentation during the budget hearing.

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He gave the topic for the public hearing as: ‘Strengthening the Microeconomic Stability, Accelerating Infrastructure Delivery, and Improving Security through Fiscal Discipline and Effective Implementation of the 2026 Budget’.

“Budget hearing and engagement with MDAs starts on Monday, 2 February to Friday, 13 February, where all sub-committee chairmen will invite all their relevant MDAs for discussion and presentation,” he said.

As proposed by Mr Adeola and adopted by the committee, 5 March was set for an interactive session between the committee and the economic managers of the federal government.

These, the senator said, would include the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun and Minister of Budget and National Planning, Atiku Bagudu.

Mr Adeola added that 16 February to 23 February had been fixed for the submission of budget defence reports by the various committee chairmen, for presentation by the committees to the Senate on 17 March.

He informed the committee that the Senate wanted the budget passed on 12 March, but he convinced the leadership to grant an additional week.

“We must make sure we work within the time and ensure that the budget is passed, even though the leadership is asking for 12 March for the budget to be passed.

“Because I know how tedious this job can be once we start, so I try to convince them that we should look at 17 March and 19 so that we can pass the budget,” the senator said.

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He added that for meticulous scrutiny and consideration of the budget estimates, hard copies of the 2026 budget had been printed for chairmen and members of the various standing committees.

The News Agency of Nigeria NAN reports that the committee adopted the timetable as moved by Adamu Aliero (APC-Kebbi) and seconded by Orji Kalu (APC-Abia).

President Bola Tinubu presented the budget to a joint session of the National Assembly on 19 December 2025.

(NAN)