Written by Taiwo Adisa and Leon Usigbe, Abuja
Tuesday, 15 June 2010
A fresh rumble has erupted in the Senate over what has been called “a wide and unacceptable gulf” between the body of principal officers and the floor senators.
The development, according to sources, is already generating a tense situation in the relationship between some of the senators who are in the know and the leadership of the Senate.
Sources hinted that contrary to what was generally believed to be the quarterly allocations of the principal officers, members of the body of principal officers have been taking home far bigger allocations.
It was gathered that whereas the President of the Senate is believed to be enjoying a quarterly allocation of N140 million, funds channelled to his office stand at N250 million per quarter.
The Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, who is believed to be taking home N80 million per quarter, is also said to have been raking in about N150 million.
It was also gathered that eight other principal officers; the Majority Leader, Senator Teslim Folarin, the Chief Whip, Senator Mahmud Kanti Bello, Deputy Majority Leader, Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba (SAN), Deputy Chief Whip, Senator Mohammed Mana, Minority Leader, Senator Mana Maaji Lawan, his deputy, Senator Olorunnimbe Mamora, Minority Whip, Senator Ahmad Rufai Sani and the Deputy Minority Whip, Senator Kabiru Gaya, have been taking home allocation in the region of N78 million per quarter, instead of N55 million that was said to have been agreed to at the beginning of the current sixth National Assembly in 2007.
Incidentally, a floor member of the Senate has been collecting N45 million per quarter since 2007.
Some members are said to be looking into the budget to discover possible areas where the excess funds are possibly being sourced.
A source isolated the different subheads quoted for Travel and Training in the 2010 budget as the possible source of funding for the alleged huge allocations.
For instance, Senate’s budget for Training, Local and Foreign Tours in the 2010 budget indicates a total allocation of N6 billion.
The allocations are contained in three different overhead. The first allocation of N5.063 billion is captured under local travels and tours. Local travels and transport is put at N2.6 billion, while international travels and transport is put at N2.4 billion.
There is, however, another allocation of N640 million for travels and transport (General), which incorporates local travels and transport, put at N380 million and international travels and transport, put at N260 million.
Yet another allocation for Training (General), put at N420 million, is also accommodated in the Senate allocations. A breakdown of this subhead includes local training, put at N230 million and international tours, put at N190 million. There is also an allocation of N1.2 billion tagged security votes (including operations.)
Eyebrows are also being raised about the allocation of N500 million for the purchase of vehicles for Presiding and Principal Officers, (including liaison offices) departmental utility and staff buses.
Besides the fact that the National Assembly staff are not entitled to staff buses having started enjoying monetisation allowances since 2006, there are also questions about the rationale behind the planned purchase of new vehicles for presiding officers in the third year of a four-year legislative session.
Senate spokesman, Senator Ayogu Eze, could not be reached for comments on Monday. The vice chairman of Senate Committee on Information and Media, Senator Anthony Manzo, was also unavailable for comments. Messages sent to the duo’s phones went unanswered.
Meanwhile, President Goodluck Jonathan has identified the greed of people in government for more money as the greatest problem hindering the development of Nigeria.
Speaking on Monday in Abuja, at the presidential retreat on the first four years implementation plan of the Vision 20:2020 and public-private partnership framework for infrastructure development in Nigeria, he said greed was responsible for the inflation of contracts in the country.
According to him, “greed, of which corruption is a part, is the main stumbling block that stems our growth. If people are greedy, they tend to inflate contracts. If people are greedy, they intend to inflate the price; all these retard our development.”
Illustrating his claim, President Jonathan said “for example, somebody in the private sector, who is a contractor to the government and is to provide services or execute a contract, what is supposed to cost government N10,000 you will collaborate with the government functionaries to increase it to N30,000 and if you are cautioned, you will say you are a businessman, you are not corrupt.
“But to me, if procurement will cost three times what it is supposed to cost, then, by implication, any amount of money we spend from our capital budget, you are retarding us by a number of years.
“What we are supposed to do in one year we are doing in three years, what infrastructure that might produce 30 kilometres of road might not even be up to 10 kilometres. What we are supposed to be in three years’ time, you have, by your action, taken us back two years and yet you say you are not corrupt.
“That is why I’ll prefer to use the word ‘greed’ because it is one of the stumbling blocks to the growth of our nation,” he said.
President Jonathan further reiterated the determination of the administration to overhaul the procurement process of government, so as to ensure that projects were implemented at appropriate costs.
According to him, “that is one of the reasons why in the last Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting, we set up a committee to look into our procurement, because if we do not review our procurement, money that will give us three times the price of something ends up giving us only one.”
The president said contractors who were found to perpetually inflate contracts would not be prosecuted, but would, however, be blacklisted.
“Administratively, contractors that are not good enough or perpetually inflate contracts should not be retained. We are not going to take any contractor to court, but if we note a particular contractor to be inflating contracts, we should be able to tell him it is not business as usual, otherwise you can forget doing business in Nigeria. That was why we set up that committee,” he said.
President Jonathan further said apart from awarding contracts, ministers must monitor implementation of projects to ensure that they produced value for money.
“Even when you are given quotations for certain contracts and you are told as an engineer you will need 30,000 cubic metres whereas what you need is 10,000 cubic meters, you must be able to verify that what was quoted is what you need,” he said.
He added that “we must ensure that people, whether civil servants or contractors, who are chronic collaborators to exploit us as a nation no longer have a field day.”
President Jonathan regretted the rate of students’ failure and fraudulent practices in school certificate examinations, saying that “if somebody from day one is fraudulent, even in terms of getting simple certificate, then if that person becomes a minister, permanent secretary, governor, a president, you can only imagine how that person will lead.”
Also speaking, former head of Interim National Government (ING), Chief Ernest Shonekan, said one of the paradoxes of the country was that it remained in abject poverty in spite of “indisputable and widely-acknowledged potential for strong and sustained growth capacity of our economy.”
According to him, “there is clear evidence that two related factors have contributed significantly to this unhappy situation. One is the almost total abandonment of systematic and consistent planning in the management of our economy.
“The second contributory factor, which is, indeed, the consequence of the first, is the haphazard way and manner in which we continue to attempt to provide the basic economic and social infrastructure that is so vital for the creation of public goods and services that are essential for sustained improvement in the quality of life of our people.”
Speaking on the occasion, Senate President, David Mark, said a minimum of about N100 trillion investment in infrastructure was required every year in the next 10 years to put the country in a better shape, out of which N10 trillion would have to go into the construction of one million homes annually.
He said it was estimated that Nigeria would have a shortage of 16 million homes by 2025.
Minister of National Planning, Dr Shamsudeen Usman, said it would require about N32 trillion investments to actualise Vision 20:2020 from now till the target date.
Represented by former governor of Jigawa State, Senator Saminu Turaki, Senator Mark said the investments should be directed at infrastructure, such as power and roads, but must be done in collaboration with the private sector as government alone could not do it.
According to him, “there is no doubt that for this goal to be achieved, we will need private sector; local and foreign direct investment, as government does not possess the resources to do that.”
Senator Mark warned that “no one would invest huge capital in an atmosphere of uncertainty and instability where, for instance, any government can come and change the rules of the game.
“This calls for consensus building among the Nigerian polity of sacrosanct of contracts and agreements.
The big issue is continuity in policies and agreement.”
The Senate President condemned the recent $35 billion contract signed by the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) for constructing a refinery in Nigeria.
According to him, “it is known that China does not have the best technology in refinery, but Nigerian engineers working in Houston and other places could do the same if the infrastructure agency can raise the finance for them to do it.”
Dr Usman said the needed N32 trillion needed for the attainment of the Vision 20:2020 would be sourced from the three tiers of government, with the Federal Government contributing N10 trillion, state and local governments, N9 trillion, while the remaining N13 trillion was expected to come from the private sector.
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