The government has sought to explain that the amendment made to the appropriations act, during Tuesday’s emergency meeting of parliament was to fix a transcription error.

This in the wake of criticism from the opposition about the budget blunder and calls for Finance Minister Dr. Nigel Clarke to take responsibility for it.

On Tuesday, the members of parliament passed the amendments to the appropriations act 2024, so that it excludes the amounts related to statutory expenditure, which had been inadvertently included in the act.

The bill was also passed in the upper house yesterday, despite heated exchanges between government and opposition senators, about the matter.

It will next go to the Governor General for his royal assent.

In response to the criticisms, Dr. Clarke noted that there seems to be a deliberate effort to confuse citizens about the amendment and the reasons for it.

The minister, who is overseas on government business, posted on social media that the estimates of expenditure are correct, but there was a transcription error in copying from the estimates of expenditure, to the appropriations act.

Dr. Clarke explained that in the document, a particular column of data was copied into the appropriations act, instead of the data from another column.

The amendment was to undo this data entry error and have the correct column of data reflected in the appropriations act.

Dr.Clarke stressed that the amendment does not change the estimates of expenditure for any ministry, nor does it change the totals.

Meantime, speaking in the upper house yesterday, leader of government business in the Senate, Kamina Johnson Smith said because there is no change to the budget, all the benefits remain as is.

Mrs. Johnson Smith sought to allay fears that the amendment could affect the allocation of funds and urged citizens to avoid being misled by detractors.