PUBLIC BUDGETARY PROCESS AND BUDGET PADDING: THE NIGERIA EXPERIENCE

Abstract

old English word ''bougett'' which means a  It has become a culture for Ministries, sack or a pouch. It was a leather bag which  Departments, Agencies, and the legislature the British Chancellor of Exchequer to pad the budget. It has been extracted his papers to present to the institutionalized and many public servants parliament the government's financial and law makers see it as a source of easy programmes for the ensuing fiscal year. Ever money by inflating the budget of their since then, it has come to mean the papers agency and in nomination of constituency themselves especially those containing the projects. This paper attempted to unravel financial proposals. The budget is therefore a the nature of budget padding so as to comprehensive plan of income and ascertain whether the act is a crime or not. expenditure within a specified period of time  The paper is a documentary research and which serves as the basis of governmental relied on qualitative data from secondary activities during the fiscal year. It is a sources as expressed in text books, journals, systematically designed plan of financial newspapers and internet. Based on content proposals dealing with allocations to various analysis of data, it was found out that projects and programmes, matched with budget padding is occasioned by the fact detailed and carefully articulated estimations that the public budgetary process in Nigeria of income from government sources of is much more political than technocratic revenue in a given year (Encyclopaedia of because the budget actors see issues  Public Administration and Public Policy, surrounding the budget as a political  2003) . activity for political and personal advantage rather than a pro-poor exercise.