By Ignatius Okorocha
Disturbed by Federal Government’s frequent loans requests, Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISlAC), has urged the National Assembly to stop further approval of domestic and foreign loan requests by President Muhammadu Buhari given huge finances allegedly squandered by Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs).
The Executive Director of CISLAC, Auwal Ibrahim stated this on Tuesday while briefing Senate Press Corps in Abuja.
According to him, “The Senate had, on March 5, approved 22.7 billion dollars foreign loan request from the Executive.
“The Upper Legislative Chamber had also approved N850 billion and 5.513 billion dollars borrowing requests from President Muhammadu Buhari in April and June.”
Recall that President of Senate, Ahmad Lawan, had also disclosed in a speech that the Senate had so far approved 28 billion dollars as loan request for the Executive.
Auwal, speaking further also called on the National Assembly to prevail on the Executive to ensure recovering of misappropriated, and looted funds as indicated in various government reports.
He said the 2018 findings and reports of Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiatives (NEITI) had showed that there were some agencies in the extractive sector that had failed to remit funds due to the Federation Account.
According to him, Office of Auditor-General of the Federation reports had also indicated that 160 agencies had defaulted in the submission of their audited accounts for 2016.
He said 265 agencies had also defaulted in submission of audited accounts for 2017, while 11 agencies had never submitted any financial statements since inception.
He said it was not in the best interest of Nigerians to be appropriating funds to agencies that were yet to account for funds it had received over the years.
Auwal said the civil society organisations and other stakeholders had severally called for accountability and transparency in the utilisation of recovered funds, adding that the story remains same, as recovered loots are re-looted.
He expressed worry that even borrowed funds are alleged to have been diverted into personal pockets.
