Jennifer Ugwueke
Investigations into allegations of sleaze and misappropriation of N100 billion by the management of the North East Development Commission (NEDC) is set to commence by the House of Representatives.
The House on Thursday mandated its standing Committees on Finance, Procurement and NEDC to exhaustively investigate these allegations and report back in eight weeks.
The resolution followed the adoption of a Motion of Urgent Public Importance brought by the House Minority Leader, Rep. Ndudi Elumelu (PDP, Delta), calling attention to the need to investigate the allegations.
Elumelu, in his presentation, noted that the North East Development Commission bill was signed into law in October 2017 by president Buhari to replace other initiatives such as the presidential initiative on Northeast (PINE) and victims support fund (VSF) and the board of management inaugurated in may 2019.
“The commission was established with a mission of coordinating funds accruing from the federation account and donor agencies for the purposes of rehabilitating and resettling of victims of insurgency, reconstruction of homes, infrastructural development and tackling of illiteracy in the North Eastern part of the country.
“There has been massive displacement of Nigerian citizens in the North East as a result of the activities of Boko Haram insurgents, where houses, schools, mosques, churches , farmlands and businesses were destroyed thereby rendering people homeless and jobless.
“The NEDC which was set up to ameliorate the sufferings of the people is alleged to be enmeshed in serious corrupt practices by the management .
“The corrupt practices includes high handedness by the managing director Mohammed goni alkali, over inflation of contracts, awards of non existent contracts, massive contract splitting and flagrant disregard for the procurement laws in the award of contracts”, he said.
The opposition leader further disclosed that “the N100 billion so far disbursed to the Commission by the federal government is said to have vanished under a year without any visible impact on the refugees nor any infrastructural development credited to the name of the Commission in the whole of the Northeast”.
According to him, “there are allegations of how the managing director and his close associates diverted funds meant for the commission to purchasing of choice properties in highbrow neighborhoods of Abuja, Kaduna and maiduguri to the detriment of the suffering refugees and infrastructural development”.
“There are allegations of how the minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Disaster Management, Sadiya Umar Farouk was said to have entered into an unholy deal with the managing director of the commission to illegally withdraw the sum of N5 billion from the account of the commission to purchase military vehicles without any recourse to the board, an act which completely disregards the country’s procurement laws and must be seriously frowned at.
“Though the managing director single handedly procured all Corona virus materials and supplies to the tune of N5 billion without an approval from the board, there is said to be another massive corruption scheme on the verge of being implemented in the name of housing scheme in maiduguri without the board’s knowledge.
“This consistent abuse of procurement laws if not put to check may defeat the purpose for the establishment of the commission, hence the need for an urgentu investigation,” he added.