Senate begins probe of Accountant General over N978bn SWV fund
.To pass 2023 Budget on Thursday
By Tunde Opalana
The Senate has commenced investigation into over N978 billion intake by the Office of Accountant General of the Federation received from Service Wide Votes (SWV) between 2017- 2021.
The N978 billion received from Service Wide Votes consisting of both Capital and recurrent expenditures were disbursed to the Ministries, Department and Agencies.
The investigation is coming less than one week that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) disclosed that it has collected about N30 billion from the former Accountant General of Federation, Idris Ahmed who is currently under investigation for N110 billion fraud.
Speaking at the opening of the investigative hearing, the Chairman of Senate Public Accounts Committee, Senator Mathew Urhoghide observed that there are some releases from Service Wide Votes (SWV) without Authority to Incure Expenditure (AIE) and this elicited suspension of the Committee adding it was only memos provided to back the releases.
The Chairman who was not satisfied with submission of the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation said that the Office needs to give the explanation to the committee on bit by bit of the expenditures for proper understanding because the figures are enormous and response to the committee is not satisfactory.
“From what I have seen, we may need time so that we can analyse the expenditure one by one, these figures are enormous and the response is not satisfactory,” he said.
However, the Office of Accountant General of the Federation, represented by Director of Fund, Sabo Mohammed asked that the committee give them more time to respond to issues raised by the lawmakers.
He said “it will take some time, we should do it systematically to save our time and your time, this is a matter of going back and do them one after the other.
“We have responded to some, we will still go back and separate our own from that of MDAs.
“We have found out that many of the figures may not be correct.”
The Chairman therefore, asked the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation to go back and put the documents together and appear on Thursday.
In another development, Nigerians have been assured of passage of the 2023 appropriation bill on Thursday to keep up with the tradition of the 9th National Assembly to ensure January to December budget cycle.
President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan who gave this assurance at plenary on Tuesday said that serious efforts are ongoing to ensure that the Red Chamber pass the 2023 budget on Thursday.
Lawan also assured that the proposed appropriation bill will be harmonized with the House of Representatives before passage on Thursday.
The quest for the passage of the 2023 budget, he said, is to make sure that the budget circle commence on the first of January like previous budgets since the beginning of the 9th Senate.
It would be recalled that President Muhammadu Buhari presented the 2023 budget proposal of N20.513Tri to a joint session of the National Assembly on October 7th, 2022.
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During the consideration of the budget, several MDAs appeared before the relevant committees of the Senate to defend their budget proposals with the Senate threatened to give zero allocation to any agency that failed to appear before its committees to defend their budget.
Senate President also stressed that the must be passed latest Thursday to allow lawmakers go to their constituencies for Christmas and New Year celebration.
