“As to whether the National Assembly has the power to make inputs to Appropriation Bills laid before it, our stand is that the parliament is constitutionally empowered to make inputs. What the constitution enjoins Mr. President to lay before the National Assembly are mere estimates, not immutable figures.”
Senate President, David Mark has warned President Goodluck Jonathan against seeing the National Assembly as “a mere mechanical rubber-stamp that must robotically pass budget estimates as presented.”
Insisting that they would continue to make input to Appropriation Bills as constitutionally provided, the Senate President said: “Once the estimates are so laid, their consideration becomes subject to the constitutionally prescribed modes of exercising legislative power.”