Don't sign 2017 budget - Falana to Osinbajo

Human rights activist, Femi Falana has advised acting president, Professor Yemi Osinbajo not to sign the 2017 budgeted sent to him by the National Assembly. Falana made the speech in Ilorin during a colloquium organised by the Movement for Genuine Change to mark the 50th anniversary of the creation of Kwara State. He said President Muhammadu Buhari lacks the competence to sign the bill into law since he was away on vacation. He said the president cannot exercise power until he transmit another letter to the National Assembly. According to him “The President is not competent to sign any bill into law while he is on vacation. The constitution did not envisage that a President who is on a vacation and an acting president, who is standing proxy for him will be exercising presidential powers simultaneously. “To that extent, pending the resumption of duties by President Buhari, the Acting President, Prof. Osinbajo, is competent to sign all bills validly passed by the NASS. “If President Buhari did not exercise powers during his vacation even though he was in the country, why would he want to do so while he is on medical vacation abroad? “Instead of dissipating energy over the competence of an appropriation bill signed into law by the Acting President, Nigerians should subject the 2017 budget to scrutiny. “We are therefore calling on the Acting President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, who is a professor of law not to endorse and sign the illegal appropriation bill of 2017 into law.” Falana said the National Assembly has no right to increase its budget and urged the acting president to peruse it properly. “The enemies of democracy are desperately trying to exploit President Buhari’s ill health to truncate the democratic dispensation. “Notwithstanding, the glaring shortcomings of the fragile democratic process, the people should be allowed to take advantage of the democratic structures to take their political destiny in their own hands. On their own part, the political class should stop playing into the hands of potential coup plotters. “While the decision of the Army chief to alert the nation of the devilish plot is appreciated, the authorites should proceed to fish out the coup plotters and their civilian collaborators with a view to trying them for treasonable felony.” Chief Ayo Opadokun who also spoke at the occasion agreed with Falana about the budget. He said: “The legislature does not have the legal authority to increase the budget because they are not the ones that will scout the revenues that will come in and they are not the ones to execute it.”