Why we dropped presidential yacht from supplementary budget for student loan – Reps

The House of Representatives has removed the N5 billion for the presidential yacht from the 2023 supplementary budget.

Abubakar Bichi (APC, Kano), chairperson of the House Committee on Appropriation, stated this on Thursday after the House passed the N2.17 trillion supplementary budget.

Bichi told journalists that the committee eliminated the item and transferred the money to the student loan section to make it N10 billion.

He said, “As far as we are concerned we don’t have that presidential yacht anymore. We have increased the student loan,” he said.

“If you recall, the student loan was N5 billion in the budget but we have increased it to N10 billion.

In the 2023 supplementary budget, the Federal Government projected to spend more than N2 trillion.

A review of the budget found that N5 billion was recommended in the supplementary budget for the acquisition of a presidential yacht.

Many Nigerians were dissatisfied with the presidential yacht’s budgetary allocation, citing rising maintenance costs as a result of the elimination of fuel subsidies.