Nigeria’s parliament passed the 2012 budget on Thursday with higher expenditure than the finance minister advised, risking further delays to implementing spending plans if President Goodluck Jonathan refuses to approve them. 

Last year lawmakers inflated spending proposed by government but Jonathan sent back the budget and asked them to make more cuts, before a compromise was reached weeks later. 

Government departments often lobby legislators to increase spending on their ministries. 

Nigeria’s lower and upper house agreed total expenditure of 4.88 trillion naira ($31 billion), increased from 4.65 trillion proposed by Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala last month. 

The spending plans assume a $72 a barrel benchmark oil price, up from $70 in the proposal submitted by Okonjo-Iweala, boosting revenues available to the government. 

Africa’s largest oil exporter saves money it earns over the benchmark price to cushion the economy against price shocks and economists and the Central Bank Governor Lamido Sanusi have urged lawmakers not to push it above $70 barrel. 

The budget assumes oil production of 2.48 million barrels per day, an exchange rate of 155 naira to the dollar, 9.5 percent inflation and GDP growth of 7.2 percent. These are all unchanged from last month’s proposal. 

Spending plans for Africa’s second largest economy have a history of being delayed, leaving ministries uncertain of how much money they will have until months into the year. 

Delays to the budget, widespread corruption and a patronage culture means many of the capital projects proposed in budgets never get completed, leaving infrastructure dilapidated. Okonjo-Iweala says improving implementation is a top priority. 

Despite holding the world’s seventh-largest gas reserves Nigeria only produces enough electricity to power a medium-sized European city, putting a major break on economic development.

Source: Reuters