Senate, ministry feud over expenses on biros, others
Senators have uncovered frivolous expenditure by the Ministry of Petroleum Resources which allegedly spent N14.5 million to buy Schneider Biros, N46 million for letter heads and N56 million on tonners for photocopy machines.
The shocking revelation was unearthed by the Senate Committee on Public Account chaired by Senator Mathew Urhogbide while scrutinizing the 2015 audited report of the Office of the Auditor General of Federation.
The Office had in a query asked the ministry to explain how “the contract for the supply of Schneider biros worth N14.5 million was split into smaller packages of less than N5 million each and awarded to four different companies in order to circumvent the permanent secretary’s approval threshold of N5 million.
“Similarly, the contract for the printing of the Ministry’s letter headed papers worth N46 million was also split and awarded to 11 different contractors.
“Also, the contract for the supply of tonnes worth N56 million was split and awarded to 7 different contractors.
“The Permanent Secretary has been requested to explain this contravention of the public procurement Act, 2007.”
Urhoghide thereafter asked the representative of the Ministry, Godwin Akubo, to respond to the query by the auditor general of the federation.
The Ministry in its response said, “ The action of the Ministry was a quick response to need of the various department in the Ministry of Petroleum Resources.
“These awards followed normal rules and procedures.
“The contract were not split. They were awarded to the various contractors at different times when item were needed.
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“The sum of N46.6 million used for printing of letter headed papers followed due process and large sum of money is explained by the volume of the letter headed papers produced for most of Department as per attached different letter headed papers. “
Not satisfied by the shoddy defence by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, the Chairman sustained the query and asked the Committee’s Secretariat to document the money spent and asked for the refund from the officers involved.
