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The Nigerian House of Representatives is again mired in allegations of corruption as a member accuses four leaders of the House of corruptly padding the 2016 Budget
| By Anayo Ezugwu | Aug 15, 2016 @ 01:00 GMT |
THE current conflagration in the House of Representative is like the saying that hell hath no fury like a “man” scorned. This is exactly playing out in the House where two former friends are now at each other’s throat because one of them has been scorned. This has resurrected the old worn allegations of budget padding. This time around the brouhaha over budget padding is generating political heat wave across the country basically because Yakubu Dogara, speaker of the House of Representative scorned his friend and ally, Abdulmumin Jibrin, former chairman, House Committee on Appropriation by removing him from his plum committee job on July 22.
Since then the dirty dealings of the two estranged friends have been hitting the air waves and the pages of the newspapers. All the secrets that the speaker and Jibrin shared as partners in the alleged padding of the Budget 2016 have been circulating like a foul odour polluting the political environment. Jibrin has been squealing on how the Dogara-led House of Representative padded the 2016 budget. And in return, those who support Dogara has equally been firing from their own can of worms in order to discredit Jibrin and save the neck of the speaker.
Leo Ogar, minority leader in the House, has accused Jubrin of allegedly manipulating the final version of the 2016 budget and diverting more than N4 billion to his Kiru/Bebeji Federal Constituency of Kano State. This is why the lawmakers allegedly removed Jibrin because he was becoming increasingly unreliable. He was accused of dribbling all the committees during the heated debate over the budget.
Ironically, during the previous controversial budget 2016 debate early in the year, Jibrin had denied that the House padded the budget. On April 25, he denied that he distorted the 2016 budget details, stressing that the details sent to the Presidency were largely the inputs received from the standing committees of the House.
He said: “Following the transmission of the 2016 Appropriation Bill and details passed by the National Assembly, there have been all manner of misinformation, misrepresentations and innuendos about the roles played by the House Committee on Appropriation in the course of passing the budget.
“Even though most of the allegations, especially those specifically levelled against me as chairman of the committee are unfounded, I intend to respond to them at the appropriate time. For now, what I consider important is to resolve the impasse around the budget and get it assented to so that its implementation can begin in the interest of all Nigerians.
He, however, put on record that the details aggregated and transmitted to the executive were largely the inputs he received from the standing committee of the House of Representatives. “Given the foregoing, and all factors considered, I hereby state that I have had enough controversy over the 2016 budget. What is needful right now is a resolution of the differences and to that end, I call on my colleagues in the House to accede to the request by His Excellency, President Muhammadu Buhari to have a second look at the details and make the necessary adjustments so that he can assent. This, in my opinion,.. To the extent that there are already ongoing consultations, a debate about who is right or wrong is unhelpful in the circumstance; and in any case, does not advance the cause of our country men and women whose interest I have been elected to serve,” Jibrin had said.
Perhaps now is the appropriate time and Jibrin is singing like a bird and wants to pull down both the executive and the National Assembly in his tell all tales about the budget padding. Jibrin, who has been brandishing all manner of documents to prove his case including having a recorded tape of all the conversations he had with the House leadership on the budget padding, has roundly implicated the four principal officers in the House. He said they requested for the inclusion of N40 billion projects in the 2016 budget, besides sundry projects in sums ranging from N20 billion to N30 billion. He claimed that his refusal to oblige the four principal officers and his opposition to several financial infractions were responsible for his removal by Dogara as chairman of the Appropriation Committee.
Jibrin has since petitioned the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission; the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission, Nigeria Police and the Department of State Services. He urged the security agencies to prosecute Dogara, Yussuff Sulaimon Lasun, Deputy Speaker; Alhassan Ado Doguwa, Chief Whip, Leo Ogor, Minority Leader. He accused them of corrupt practices and abuse of office. Jibrin equally called on them to resign their positions.
When he went to the EFCC, Jibrin said he came to submit a formal petition and give further clarification and insight on the allegation of corruption, abuse of trust of office by Mr. Speaker, Yakubu Dogara; his deputy, Yusuf Lasun; the Whip of the House, Alhassan Dogwa; Minority Leader of the House, Leo Ogor, and nine other members of the House who are also chairmen of different committees.
“We have submitted the petition and the chairman of the commission received us in person. We exchanged a couple of ideas on how to move forward. I hope to see a very quick commencement of investigations so that these corrupt set of Nigerians can be prosecuted in earnest and if found guilty, sent to jail immediately so that it will send a very powerful signal of the anti-corruption fight of this government.”
The allegation and counter-allegation by Jibrin and Dogara, is calling to question the integrity of the 2016 budget. It has also raised many questions than answers. For instance, why did Jibrin wait until he was removed from office before making the allegations? How did the presidency miss the insertions by the National Assembly despite engaging in a clean-up of the budget prior to passage? Are the insertions into the budget by members of National Assembly illegal or do they constitute part of the oversight functions granted to legislators by the Constitution?
There are no easy answers. But the House is working assiduously to douse the tension created by the allegation, especially the rumour of moves to impeach Dogara based on it. Some factions of the House, who are loyal to Dogara have declared support and faith in his leadership of the House. Also, some like Femi Gbajabiamila, majority leader of the House, has cautioned against passing judgment on persons accused of corrupt practices, saying they are all innocent until proven otherwise.
According to Gbajabiamila, “It is clear that our budget process needs radical reform and very quickly too. Yes, allegations have been made but I strongly believe judgment should not be passed based on allegations. We operate a constitutional democracy and we must at all times submit to its dictates and ethos. All parties are innocent until otherwise proven. This should be our guide. I plead with all members. The mudslinging must stop.”
“Since the budget controversy that engulfed the House about a week ago, I have pointedly maintained a dignified silence. I did this for the sake of the institution I represent and which I have laboured hard to grow and protect, knowing that whatever I say could be impactful both within the House and outside it. I was determined to keep in place the glue that holds an otherwise fragmented House, protect its integrity and at same time avoid eroding the little confidence and vestiges of hope Nigerians have in us.
“Unfortunately, the controversy has now taken a different turn following the rather strange if not comical text making the rounds among members about my complicity in this rather sordid matter. I am being dragged into an arena I tried very hard to stay out of only for the good of the House. The speakership election has come and gone. The election was divisive and acrimonious but I have since worked hard to heal the wounds some of which still fester among members on both sides. It is my responsibility to bring all tendencies in a House I lead together and I have worked well with the Speaker and all other principal officers in a bi- partisan manner and in the interest of the institution and the country.
“This text message, which desperately seeks to finger me in some macabre plot to destabilise the House is a throwback and echoes our dark post speakership election history. The resurfacing or resurgence of the faceless text messengers will not help us as a House, and let me quickly add that it will fail,” he said.
He suggested that radical reforms are needed very quickly to improve the budget systems in the country to avoid the kind of controversy that has trailed budget 2016.
Nonetheless, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, caucus in the House has also shown support to the Dogara-led House. The caucus has dismissed any plot of impeachment against Dogara. Although the PDP caucus did not hold its meeting which was scheduled to take place on Tuesday, August 2, Ogor presented its position, when he said, the allegations levelled against the speaker and other principal officers were non-issues. He added that investigations by the anti-graft agencies would unravel what is really the truth.
“The first point of call would be to examine what happened to the budget that Mr. President refused to assent to and the truth would be revealed. We would see who would laugh last, but it is definitely not those shouting wolf today. We, in the PDP caucus, would not lose sleep over this,” he said.
Ogor noted that Dogara had the full support of the caucus. “How can you impeach him, what are the offences? There is an impeachment process…let him (Jibrin) come and make his allegations open. Is it the Zonal Intervention Fund? Let us see the allegations, we should be confronted with facts, then we will respond clearly to them. We are happy and excited that the man himself has run to the EFCC and ICPC, so we are waiting for their invitation. Our doors are open because it would unravel a lot of things,” he said.
The ruling All Progressive Congress party has on its part initiated moves to save the House and the party from further embarrassment. Realnews learnt that the efforts by the party did not yield any result on Tuesday when it summoned Dogara and Jibrin to appear before it to resolve their differences.
However, the party succeeded in extracting a commitment from the warring parties that they would refrain from further media war.
Since the current round of controversy over the budget, some Nigerians have condemned the action while others regard the accusation as a needless distraction. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who visited President Muhammadu Buhari recently stated that Jibrin’s allegation corroborates his earlier statement that the National Assembly was dominated by thieves. He had urged President Buhari to be vigilant with any document sent to him from the National Assembly.
The former President also advised that it was time to elect people of integrity into the National Assembly to avert embarrassing incidences of corruption in the process of lawmaking. It should be recalled that Obasanjo in a letter addressed to the leadership of the National Assembly in January this year lambasted members, accusing them of greed, impunity and corruption.
Obasanjo lamented that members of the two chambers had failed to show understanding in the midst of the economic downturn occasioned by the drop in the price of oil at the international market.
Also, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project, SERAP, has also joined in calling for an independent investigation of the allegation by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, and the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission, ICPC, into the alleged N40 billion 2016 budget padding by the National Assembly.
A statement signed by Adetokunboh Mumuni, executive director, SERAP, urged the Speaker of the House to allow the anti-graft agencies investigate the allegations of the budget padding by the leadership of the National Assembly for the House to save its name.
Reacting, Afenifere, a Yoruba socio-cultural organisation said that the allegation of budget padding has rubbished the claim of fighting corruption by Buhari’s government. In a communiqué at the end of the group’s meeting, Afenifere expressed disappointment in the behaviour of the lawmakers despite the existence of anti-corruption crusade of President Buhari.
“The imperative of this for us is that Nigeria must restructure at this moment. We need a new model of governance that makes it a question of service, development and not for personal pursuit which the present structure offers.”
But Senator Ali Ndume, Senate Majority Leader, believes that National Assembly has the power to make amendment to budget appropriation. He said, “I do not know where the issue of this budget padding we are talking about is coming from. If we are not to tinker with the budget as submitted by the President, then there would not have been the need to submit it to the National Assembly.
“We have the constitutional duty to add, subtract and adjust. That was what was done. This is the first time we did a budget that was collectively produced in the sense that it was done in such a way that the Senate, House of Representatives and the Executive played different parts.”
All said, some Nigerians are no longer interested in the allegations over budget padding or debate over the integrity of budget. They want to know how it has performed in lifting the populace from their economic misery so far. What the masses are yearning after is for the APC-led government to put its in-house in order and pay attention to the hunger and economic hardship in the country.
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