Following the submission of the minister of power, Engr. Abubakar Aliyu and inability to explain the bilateral and multilateral funds in the 2022 and 2023 budget, the Senate and House of Representatives Committtee on power has said it will invite the minister of finance, Zainab Ahmed to appear before it.
The chairman of the Senate committee, Senator Gabriel Suswam made this known on Tuesday during the budget defence of the ministry of power and its agencies held in Abuja.
The minister, while presenting the budget performance of the 2022 budget ran into trouble over a N49 billion bilateral fund, saying he does not know anything about the fund.
Specifically, Aliyu put the blame at the door step of the minister of finance.
“Bilateral and multilateral funds question should be directed to minister of finance. We did not put N49 billion in the budget.
Senator Suswam bemoaned why the ministry of finance will be appropriating money for project not awarded. “We will invite the minister of finance to tell us why we will be appropriating money for project not awarded” he said.
Similarly, the committtee has invited the permanent Secretary of ministry of power and desk officers to appear on Tuesday to brief the committtee on the mambilla hydro project with details on consultancy money.
“Each year there is money appropriated, why are we spending so much money without action” he asked?
Commenting further on the bilateral and multilateral funds, the joint committtee noted that cumulatively, though no projects were awarded yet, N195 billion was inserted into the 2023 budget, apart from the N49 billion in the 2022 budget.
