ABUJA, September 30, (THEWILL) – The House of Representatives on Monday frowned at the irregular release of money by the Federal Government to fund capital projects in the 2013 budget, saying it was unjustifiable.
Chairman, House Committee on Petroleum Resources (Upstream), Hon. Muraina Ajibola, expressed the concern while scrutinising the 2013 budget performance of the Nigerian Nuclear Regulatory Authority, NNRA.
“As a parliament, we are worried; we are worried because we are not only tracking money released and revenue generated. We are worried on the releases of money to fund the budget. We are calling on the appropriate quarters to ensure that releases are done as at when due,”he said .
Earlier, while briefing the committee on the releases of 2013 budget, the acting director general of NNRA, Dr. Martin Ogharanduku, explained that the capital component of the Authority’s 2013 budget was only implemented up to 23 percent, stressing that the poor implementation was as a result of non-release of fund in time.
He noted that in the 2013 budget, the Authority proposed the sum of N 1.154,206,974, but N235, 000,000 was appropriated for NNRA under capital projects based on the ceiling given by the Ministry of Petroleum Resources.
According to him, out of the N235 million appropriated for the Authority as capital project component, “the sum of N52, 675 million has been released to NNRA which represent 23 percent. Out of the amount released, the sum of N 41,224 million has been paid to the contractors who have completed their work. The remaining balance of N11, 451 million is in our account.”
Ogharanduku said in the first quarter, the Authority got N30,300,316; second quarter, N22,374,919; while the third quarter release, according to him, was still been awaited.
It will be recalled that the committee had last week queried the director general over his failure to defend the agency’s 2013 budget performance and summoned him to appear before the committee on September 30.
By Saint Mugaga, Abuja
