Senate threatens to stop appropriating funds for SURE-P

The Senate ad hoc Committee on the Subsidy Reinvestment Empowerment-Programme, on Wednesday threatened to stop further appropriation of funds for the scheme.

Chairman of the ad hoc committee,  Senator Abdul Ningi,  issued the threat following what he said was the persistent refusal of officials managing the resources to appear before the committee.

Ningi in an interview with journalists,  said “some ministers have persistently refused to honour invitations to render accounts of their stewardship in their various ministries.”

He said, “We take a strong exception to any minister who thinks he is above the law. We are going to use every available legal instrument against them.

“This is the last time this committee will condone such an act from any minister who fails to honour our invitation without any genuine reason.

“By failing to appear, they are trying to shroud their activities in secrecy. We may not appropriate fund to the SURE-P any longer because of these people.

“It is no longer business as usual. People must be accountable for their actions.”

He particularly frowned on the failure of the Minister of Works, Mr. Mike Onolememen, to appear before his committee on Wednesday.

He said, “Neither the minister, the Minister of State, Alhaji Bashir Yuguda, nor the ministry’s Permanent Secretary showed up, after keeping members of the committee waiting for more than one and half hours, and without any reason for their failure to turn up.

“A huge amount of money, totaling over N30bn, was allocated to the Ministry of Works under the SURE-P. We accordingly invited the minister to render an account of the activities of his ministry under the SURE-P from 2012 to 2013.”

Ningi also said the decision of the executive to divert the N18bn meant for the payment of the unemployed youths under the SURE-P to infrastructure had denied thousands of unemployed youths their rights.