By Our Reporter
The Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC) and Transparency International Nigeria, has bemoaned the rate at which the Presidency sends requests for approval for borrowing to the National Assembly.
The group said the call became necessary following the huge amount of resources wasted by various Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs).
Executive Director of CISLAC, Auwal Ibrahim Musa made this known on Tuesday at a press conference in Abuja.
Consequently, he urged the National Assembly not to entertain any more loan request by the Executive until there is a proper accountability and usage of previous loans received.
According to CISLAC, sometimes in April, this year, the Senate approved the sum of N55 billion for priority projects, while the House of Representatives also approved the sum of $22.7 billion that was rejected the previous year. The later was said to finance key infrastructures in the country.
They noted that, time and again, Civil Society Organisations and other stakeholders have cal|ed for accountability and transparency in the management and utilisation of recovered funds, yet the story remains the same as recovered loots are re-looted and even borrowed funds are allegedly diverted into personal pockets.
“We therefore call on the leadership of National Assembly to restrain from further approval of borrowing and mandate the Executive to recover misappropriated, mis-managed and looted funds”, because as they collect these loots, it is not accounted for. No register to show how much was received and how much each agency is collecting”.
CISLAC also noted that in 2018, findings from a series of audits of the oil and gas sector carried out by the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) showed that Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and its upstream arm, NPDC, had failed to remit $21.778 billion and N316.074 billion to the Federation Account. These were amounts due from three main sources: Federation assets divested to NPDC and Nigerian Petroleum Deveiopment Company’s (NPDC) legacy liabilities; payments for domestic crude allocation to NNPC; and dividends from investment in Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas Company (NLNG) paid to but withheld by the NNPC.
CISLAC also noted that the Auditor-General re-affirmed that as at June 30, 2019, 160 agencies defaulted in the submission of audited accounts for 2016; 265 agencies defaulted in submission of audited accounts for 2017; while 11 agencies had never submitted any financial statements since inception.
“In 2019, the former Executive Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service, Mr Tunde Fowler, noted that Nigeria loses about $15bn (N5.37tn at N358/dollar) to tax evasion annually. In the past five years the federaIIy-collectible tax projections gap has amounted to N7.189 trillion”.
Musa, added that the embattled acting chairman of Economic Financial Crime Commission was alleged to have declared N539 billion as recovered funds instead of N504billion as earlier claimed, amongst other allegations.
“It is very important for the legislature to do something because decent Nigerians are finding it difficult to survive while money is being looted and circulated among a few individuals” Musa concluded.
