National Assembly budget too low – Reps

The House of Representatives has lamented over the inadequacy of the National Assembly budget.

Benjamin Kalu, the spokesman of the House of Representatives, said the National Assembly cannot function effectively with a low budget.

Kalu disclosed this during an end-of-the-year award ceremony by the House of Representatives Press Corps in Abuja over the weekend where he bagged the award of the Most Outstanding Spokesman of the House.

Kalu lauded the Press Corps for its effort to strengthen democracy.

He said the corps has given stability to the image of the National Assembly.

He also said journalists were not getting what they deserved and more should be done to take care of them.

According to Kalu: “The budget of the National Assembly is low. We cannot function as expected by the mandate of the Constitution relying on that budget. People can criticize it the way they want.

“I have said it from the day I came [in]to the National Assembly, you cannot get the efficiency that we want to drive the legislature by depending on the current budget as it is. I am hoping that we would push it forward to accommodate other responsibilities of ours.”