EMBATTLED Babachir David Lawal, secretary to the government of the federation, SGF, has denied involvement in contract awards in the Presidential Initiative on the North East, PINE, being currently investigated by the Senate.

Lawal, in a statement issued by Bolaji Adebiyi, director press, in the Office of the SGF, said that newspaper reports linking him to alleged “N1.3 billion contracts” and “contracts awarded to 20 ghost firms” were untrue.

The statement said in part: “The general public should not be misled into believe that the Secretary to the Government of the Federation has the authority or power to award contracts.  This, indeed, is not the case. As with all awards of contract in government, the PINE projects under investigation went through what is referred to as due process in public expenditure.

“The contracts were awarded only after the requisite clearances were obtained from the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP). It is expected that these clearances are obtained only when all conditions precedent to the awards of contracts are met. Apart from the BPP huddle, the Tenders Board of the procuring agencies, in this instance, the OSGF has to approve of the contracts before they are awarded.  At no time were these processes compromised in the award of contracts by PINE. It must be emphasized also, that the SGF is not even a member of the Tenders Board.”

Lawal further said that he could not award contracts despite his position in government as he was not even a member of the Tenders Board and that all contracts must pass the acid test of obtaining clearance from the BPP and the scrutiny of the Tenders Board.

“PINE contracts were awarded following strict compliance with public expenditure and procurement processes. It will interest everyone to know too, that all PINE projects were properly and satisfactorily executed. The beneficiaries have continued to express their appreciation to the Federal Government for PINE intervention, that in many cases, has accelerated the return of normalcy to hitherto ravaged communities,” he said.

—  Apr 3, 2017 @ 01:00 GMT

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