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By Godswill Michael
Fresh details from the 2026 Appropriation Act have revealed that the Presidential Economic Advisory Council and Intervention Promotion Council was allocated N802,978,783 for personnel costs, despite an earlier disclaimer by the Office of the Chief of Staff to the President, Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, stating that no such office exists under the current administration.
Findings by Pointblanknews.com showed that the agency appears on pages 50 and 51 of the 2026 Appropriation Act with a total allocation of N1,302,979,784.
The budget breakdown includes N802,978,783 for personnel costs, N200,000,001 for overhead expenditure and N300,000,000 for capital projects.
The allocation has renewed questions over the status of the agency following an official disclaimer issued by the Office of the Chief of Staff on June 11, 2026.
The controversy stems from a notice issued by Gbajabiamila’s office distancing the Presidency from the purported Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council after reports emerged suggesting appointments had been made into the body.
In the disclaimer, the Chief of Staff had stated that “such an office does not exist under this administration and no appointment has been made in that regard.”
He also advised foreign and diplomatic missions, financial and multilateral institutions, development organisations and security agencies to take note of the notice regarding the purported Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council.
However, speaking at a press conference in Abuja, the embattled Director General of the Agency, Prince Adeniyi Matthew argued that the budgetary provision for the Presidential Economic Advisory Council and Intervention Promotion Council contradicted the position of the Chief of Staff.
He said, “Let’s assume for one second that all what the chief of staff published were right, that the agency does not exist. Then how did the agency’s name get into the 2026 appropriation budget pages 50 and 51?”
Adeniyi further stated, “If the agency does not exist, yet found its way into the Nigerian national budget, what that means is that the entire 2026 appropriation budget is a fraud and should be discarded.”
He questioned the integrity of the budget preparation process, noting that the Appropriation Bill passes through multiple stages before it is signed into law, including preparation by the executive, inputs from Ministries, Departments and Agencies, scrutiny by the Budget Office, consideration by the National Assembly and eventual presidential assent.
According to him, the inclusion of the council in the budget document raises questions that require official clarification.
Adeniyi therefore called on President Bola Tinubu to constitute an independent investigative panel to examine the budgetary references, review relevant institutional records, invite the officials involved in the budget preparation process and make its findings public.
The 2026 Appropriation Act, which was signed into law after passage by the National Assembly, contains expenditure estimates for federal Ministries, Departments and Agencies, including allocations for personnel, overhead and capital projects.
The apparent discrepancy between the budget document and the Office of the Chief of Staff’s earlier disclaimer has fuelled debate over whether the budgetary provision relates to an existing government entity or resulted from an administrative or drafting anomaly.
As of the time of filing this report, there was no official explanation reconciling the budgetary allocation with the June 11 disclaimer issued by the Office of the Chief of Staff.