|
|
Nigeria: House Committee Summons Soludo, Others Over N2.14 Billion Debt
 |
 |
|||||||||
|
||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||
|
||||||||||
Daily Trust (Abuja)
15 November 2007
Posted to the web 15 November 2007
Tashikalmah Hallah
House of Representatives Committee on Power and Steel has summoned the Governor of the Central Bank, the Managing Director of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria and the Accountant General of the Federation to appear before it within the next one week in connection with the delay in the payment of N2.14 billion owed to contractors handling various rural electrification projects.
The committee also requested the Due Process Office and the Ministry of Energy to appear before it within a week. Chairman of the committee, Mr Ndudi Elumelu, also announced that the committee rejected President Yar'Adua's attempt to transfer the burden of rural electrification from the federal government to the states and local government councils without seeking National Assembly's approval.
The House gave directives at a meeting with the Managing Director of Rural Electrification Agency, Mr Sam Geppe and the contractors of the agency over the 2008 budget in Abuja yesterday. Elumelu said the public officials would need to come before the committee to clarify issues surrounding why it has not been possible to pay contractors of the project even when budgetary provisions have been made for it in this year's budget.
The committee's chairman also said it was wrong for the President to propose to transfer projects constitutionally listed on the concurrent list to the other tiers of government without seeking an amendment to the constitution. He said such matters could not be done by a presidential fiat but by following the rule of law as enunciated by the president.
Over N2.14 billion outstanding liabilities follows problems encountered with the due process office and getting authorisation to draw warrants, amongst other conditions.
Elumelu said there were over 2,110 ongoing rural electrification projects across the country, which have been slowed down by the inability of its agency to mop up funds allocated to it.
Meanwhile, yesterday the Energy Commission of Nigeria Amendment Bill, 2007, passed the Second Reading in the House of Representatives. It was referred to the Committee on Power and Steel for further work.
|
The bill seeks to grant priority to the promotion and development of alternative sources of energy for the country.
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Copyright © 2007 Daily Trust. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections -- or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Make allAfrica.com your home page | RSS Feed | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Top | Site Guide | Who We Are | Advertising | Search | Subscribe | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Questions or Comments? Contact us. Read our Privacy Statement. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
