Appropriations, Abdulmumin Jibrin, yesterday, gave a startling revelation on
how 10 standing committees allegedly inserted constituency projects worth
N284 billion into the 2016 budget without the knowledge of their members.
He also alleged that the speaker, Yakubu Dogara, secretly persuaded him
to smuggle N20 billion into the budget through Service Wide Vote. Jibrin,
who stated this in a statement in Abuja, alleged that some cabals had
hijacked the speaker to always do their bidding.
Abdulmumini Jibrin He, however, exonerated the Majority Leader, Femi
Gbajabiamila, and three other principal officers from the alleged scandal
now rocking the padding of the 2016 budget by the House leadership,
adding that the budget inputs inserted on their names were exclusively
carried out by the speaker, his deputy, Yussuff Lasun; Chief Whip, Ado
Doguwa and the Minority Leader, Leo Ogor. Jibrin said: “I am compelled
again for the purpose of emphasis to state categorically that my
allegations are against the quartet of speaker, Yakubu Dogara; deputy
speaker, Yusuf Lasun; House Whip, Alhassan Doguwa, and Minority Leader,
Leo Ogor, not the Honourable House as an institution nor other members of
the body of principal officers. “I have to state this very clearly because this
quartet has resorted to desperate moves to drag the entire House of
Representatives into the case of gross abuse of office I have leveled
against them as individual presiding and principal officers of the House.
This is a mischievous move to set me on collision with the entire house.
“They have also recruited four from the very few members of their cabal to
use some elements of the Nigeria police to kidnap, harass, blackmail and
intimidate me into silence. Until yesterday, the police were laying siege to
my house, blocking the entrance and exit, shouting that they wanted
budget documents. “They embarrassed my entire family with a nursing
mother and a seven-month-old baby that cried all night.
The game plan was to arrest me and dump me in police net while a heavy
media propaganda will be carried out to mislead the world that I have been
sacked and police have picked me up as a culprit in 2016 budget. “When
ever I am released, an irreparable damage would have been done to my
person that will stick for life. “As God Almighty will have it, I had traveled
out of town before they could execute their evil plan. God is always with
the innocent.
The members in the tick of this plot are Jagaba Adams, Jika both chairmen
interior and police affairs respectively, Muhammed Bago, Muhammed
Zakari and the last one I need not introduce him to Nigerians. “During the
budget period, when they discovered that I was not the kind of person they
could use to perpetrate their illegality, Mr Speaker and the three other
principal officers took away the entire Appropriation Committee secretariat
to a secret location where all sort of insertions were made into the budget.
“The blackmail has always been, Abdul people will laugh at you if anything
goes wrong between you and Dogara because of the lead role you played
and the many toes you stepped on to get him elected. It’s been a painful
experience. “Again the secretariat was taken away from me on Speaker
Dogara’s instruction for the second time to a location I didn’t know and all
sort of insertions into the budget were made and returned to me for
signature.
“I said over my dead body! It was a massive crisis behind the scene until
the early morning of the Friday that Mr President assented the budget. It
was Sen Danjuma Goje that brokered a compromise that since the deputy
speaker led the harmonization committee, he should also sign such that
the harmonization committee will share responsibility with us. “Senator
Goje pleaded with me so hard all night and later shouted heavily at me
reminding me that he was not talking to me as a senator but as a father. I
cried heavily all night. “When the budget harmonization committee, headed
by Deputy Speaker Yusuf Lasun, gave out 80% concession across board to
the executive demands during the harmonization negotiation, it was agreed
that the remaining 20% should go to the entire NASS. The deputy speaker
excused himself that he wanted to go and consult with Mr speaker.
“He came back after few hours and in an unprecedented display of greed,
presented to me a hand written note distributing the remaining 20% to only
principal officers. 70% of the 20% was reserved for Mr Speaker and himself,
while the remaining 30% of the 20% went to other principal officers. I am
sure he will recognize the hand writing when he sees it.” My colleagues
didn’t know all of these. “Mr Speaker also directed me to create what I
advised him will be a controversial line item under service wide vote to
introduce about N20 billion projects using the name of NASS. He directed
me to see a highly placed PDP politician which I did and collected the
documents.
I advised him repeatedly against it but he kept pressuring me until I bluntly
told him I will not! “When the Appropriation committee received all the
budget reports from standing committees, an analysis was conducted. We
discovered that about 10 of the 96 standing committees of the House
introduced about 2,000 (two thousand) projects without the knowledge of
their committee members, amounting to about N284 billion.’’
“I was alarmed. But I was cautious because at our pre budget meeting with
the committee chairmen, I was clearly warned not to touch their budgets. I
reported the matter to the speaker. He did nothing about it obviously
because he was working behind the scene with the committee chairmen.
That was the beginning of the whole budget problem from the side of
House and the whole exercise had to go through several versions before it
was passed.
“So, is it Abdul that introduced 2000 projects into budget worth 284
billion? But I quietly bore the pain and abuses from all over the country and
continue to defend the committee inputs as a show of loyalty to the
institution I represent which I so much love and still have many great
minds in there. Apart from Chairman Agriculture Hon Mongunu who owned
up and explained his inputs at the only executive session I was allowed to
attend, the other few chairmen who loaded the budget kept quiet and
watched me bashed from every angle by angry Nigerians.’’ Continuing,
Jibrin said:
“Speaker Dogara has completely derailed, remains clueless, keeps on with
an unmatched ego and surely leading the House to the biggest scandal it
may ever experience. ‘’He has failed to live above the fog in public duty and
private thinking, a direct opposite of what my favorite American Poet,
Josiah Gilbet Holland, prayed Lord to grant us leaders.
“All I am asking for is my right to be heard by my colleagues which they
denied me. I am calling on my colleagues to plead with Speaker Yakubu
Dogara, Deputy Lasun, Whip Doguwa and Minority leader Ogor to stop
obstructing justice and allow me my right to be heard by the House. ‘’It is
the House that will institute a special investigation on this matter to allow
me testify and provide evidence. Vanguard
No comments:
Post a Comment