The Presidency has dismissed reports that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu included a N5bn yacht in the Supplementary Budget for personal use.
This comes amid outrage after details of the N2.1 trillion supplementary budget the president submitted to the National Assembly were published.
N5.09 billion was allocated for the yacht in the budget, while N2.9 billion was for sport utility vehicles for the Presidential Villa.
In a statement released on Thursday, Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga said the yacht is for the Nigerian Navy and not for Tinubu as widely believed.
He explained that it comes with specialized security gadgets to enable Navy conduct high profile operation.
The statement read; “What was named as Presidential Yacht in the budget is an Operational Naval boat with specialized security gadgets suitable for high profile operational inspection and not for the use of the President.”
The yacht was listed under the Nigerian Navy’s proposed capital expenditure of N42.3 billion.
The House of Representatives has already removed the N5 billion presidential yacht from the 2023 Supplementary Budget.
The budget was passed on Tuesday by the House after adopting the report submitted by the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee, Abubakar Bichi from Kano State.
