The Committees on Petroleum Upstream and Downstream and the Committee on Gas Development in the two chambers of the National Assembly, on Thursday, queried the recurrent expenditures of the parastatals under the Ministry of Petroleum Resources, with the lawmakers declaring that the sector was devoting over 80 per cent of its budgeted funds to recurrent votes at the expense of capital budget.

The revelation was made public when the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs Diezani Alison-Madueke led heads of parastatals under her ministry to a sitting of the joint committees of the National Assembly.

Of particular mention was the budgetary proposal of the Department of Petroleum Resources which will spend N30.399 billion out of its N51 billion on recurrent expenditure.

Senator Emmanuel Paulker, chairman, Senate Committee on Petroleum Upstream, who raised issues concerning the huge overhead costs in the petroleum sector, said the trend was worrisome.

He said that ministries and parastatals should strive to raise capital votes above recurrent expenditure.

A breakdown of the budget presentation tabled before the committees of the National Assembly showed that out of DPR’s N35, 997, 149, 841 budget in 2011, capital expenditure was only N4, 786, 302, 790 while N31, 210, 847, 051 will go to personnel costs and overheads.

The budget estimate also indicated that personnel costs for DPR in 2012 is N30, 399, 182, 331 while the remaining N811, 664, 720 is for overhead costs.

Director of the DPR, Mr Austin Olorunshola, however, told the joint committees that the department was expecting to recruit more staff within the next two weeks.

Senator Paulker said, “I feel so worried as a Nigerian because if our budget is tailored towards that style, then, we are not creating hopes for investing in infrastructure.”

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