During a parliamentary session, the House of Representatives revealed uncovering issues of mismanagement and discrepancies in the allocation of funds designated for managing the COVID-19 pandemic.
The lawmakers received a report from the Public Accounts Committee, overseen by Chairman Bamidele Salam, detailing the examination into the distribution and handling of the funds for the years 2020 to 2022. The committee engaged with 92 ministries, departments, and agencies during this period.
The investigation commenced following a motion discussed on October 17, 2023, citing concerns about the mishandling of COVID-19 relief funds. The committee under Salam’s leadership initiated a public inquiry on November 27, 2023, summoning the relevant bodies for inquiries.
The findings highlight instances of mishandling, lack of adherence to regulations, and clear violations of procurement laws by several MDAs and private sector beneficiaries. Records from the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation outline a total inflow of N1.32 trillion.
Of this sum, donations equivalent to $3.4 billion from the International Monetary Fund to the Federal Government accounted for N1.28 trillion, while Federal Government contributions amounted to N34.4 billion. General donations totaled N6.09 billion, with contributions from the China General Chamber of Commerce at N48.12 million, Nigeria Content Development and Monitoring Board at N70 million, and Remita E-payment at N50 million.
According to the document reviewed by our correspondent, entities such as the Ministry of Water Resources, Federal Ministry of Finance, University Teaching Hospitals, Federal Medical Centres, Specialized Health Institutions, and The Rural Electrification Agency were among those called before the committee as part of the investigation.
The report read in part, “There were many cases of non-appearance, delayed appearance, non-submission of required documents, and late submission of documents by some MDAs of government who got funds from the Federal Government COVID-19 intervention funding.
“The Central Bank of Nigeria did not provide the required information on time despite several letters written by the Committee.
“There were several cases of deliberate refusal by some beneficiary entities to provide the certificates of no-objection issued to them by the Bureau of Public Procurement on procurements during the pandemic for verification by the committee.
“There were several instances of unjustifiable delay in procurements by Chief Executive Officers contrary to provisions of the Procurement Act for which funds were released between 2020 and 2021 but yet to be completed to date.
“The committee observed that most of the private sector beneficiaries of the COVID-19 Intervention Funding used the funds for purposes other than those for which they were approved by the disbursing MDAs.”
The report indicted some airline operators, stating, “The most apparent examples were private airline operators like ArikAir, Air Peace, Dana Airline, Azman Air, MAX Air, Aero Contractors Overland, etc., and other subsidiary airport service providers who used the funds provided for activities in their normal course of operations rather than payment of staff salaries or maintenance of aircraft during the period of shutdown.
“The airline operators also shun invitations to provide more information on the use of funds received from the Federal Government. A private airline operator (King Airlines and Travels Limited), which received a sum of N15 million and kept the money in a dedicated account, has, however, offered to refund the money to the Federal Government.
“Investigation also reveals that few of the MDAs diverted their COVID-19 intervention funds to different programmes or projects for which similar budgetary provisions had adequately been made in the Appropriation Acts for the period under review.
“Some medical centres and teaching hospitals claimed to have refunded unspent balances of their funds to the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related Offences Commission dedicated accounts without providing pieces of evidence of such refunds.”
The Bamidele-led committee also established instances of “outright violation of the Procurement Act for works and services, Financial Regulations, violation of provisions of extant circulars on approval limits, as well as unauthorised virement of funds by many MDAs.”
Salam, a federal lawmaker representing Ede North, Ede South, and Ejigbo in Osun State, has promised to disclose additional information from Volume 2 of the report, which investigates the financial expenditures of various federal ministries, agencies, and departments, including those responsible for agriculture, education, health, and humanitarian affairs.
