2024 Budget: “The Can Of Worms I have Opened Can Neither Be Controlled By The Senate Nor I” – Suspended Senator Ningi

By Adesina Soyooye

Suspended Senator Abdul Ningi has refused to be cowed.

Ningi was on Tuesday, during Plenary at the Senate, thrown under the bus by his colleagues for, according to them, defaming and dragging their names and reputation to the mud.

Ningi had, in an interview he granted the BBC Hausa Service, alleged that there are two versions of the 2024 Budget, and that the Budget was padded to the tune of N3.7 trillion. He also alleged that the Budget was skewed in favour of the South against the North.

The anger of his colleagues rose to high heaven at Plenary, and even though he apologized and insisted that the interpretation given to his interview was not what he meant, it did not save him. He was slammed with a three-month suspension.

Ningi, PDP, Bauchi Central, who was the Chairman of the Northern Senators Forum, quit the position of Chairman as soon as he was suspended. But since that, he has upped the ante, and is sounding defiant.

In an interview with Arise Television on Wednesday, Ningi alleged that the Senate was after him in order to shut him up for exposing the alleged N3.7 trillion padding of the 2024 Budget. According to him, they want to silence him and make him vulnerable for arrest.

He, however, said none of that will work because nobody, neither the Senate nor even himself, can control it.

His words: “That is why I said I know this parliament very well. I have come a long way. And that is why we are speaking. Let’s speak.

“Have they ever asked me since the beginning of this so-called crisis, where are your findings? Where are the documents? I’m not using my head to come up with figures.

“Nobody has talked to me about evidence. Nobody has suggested even listening to me. All they are trying to do is to ensure that ‘how do we make sure that Ningi is silenced or arrested so that he doesn’t do anything?’

“I have opened this can of worms. Neither they, nor I will be able to control it.”

On Tuesday, before his suspension was pegged at three months, one of his Senator-colleagues, Jimoh Ibrahim had urged the Senate to suspend him for twelve months, while the Senate Leader, Opeyemi Bamidele, described Ningi’s outing in the BBC interview as a “civilian coup.”