The President of the Senate, Senator Bukola Saraki, has vowed that no amount of intimidation or blackmail would stop the National Assembly from investigating the alleged N25 billion Treasury Single Account (TSA) fraud. Saraki spoke at plenary yesterday while reacting to a motion moved by Senator Dino Melaye (APC, Kogi West) concerning a newspaper report allegedly blackmailing the Senate for resolving to investigate the alleged fraud.
He said the Senate would not relent in carrying out its constitutional duties, especially issues or actions that would be detrimental to the well being of the citizenry. He said: “No amount of either blackmail or intimidation will stop us from doing the work we have to do.
We have a responsibility here to ensure that there are no leakages in government funds and if there are, we will call the attention of the public and do whatever it takes to salvage the situation. It is our responsibility. “The fact about the TSA will come out and everybody will have opportunity before the committee to state the fact; the facts will speak for themselves.”
Saraki promised that the Red Chamber would expedite action on the inauguration of Standing Committees to enable it begin its oversight functions in earnest. While moving his motion, Melaye pointed out that it was the Senate’s stand on the alleged TSA fraud that led System- Specs to refund the one per cent it collected from the mopped up funds to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). ”
…We did not, at any time in this chamber, implicate President Buhari of being involved in TSA fraud. “We will not stop carrying out our legislative duties for fear of being blackmailed. The motion moved last week had two prayers. The first thing we did was to thank Mr. President and commend him for the implementation of the TSA and for anyone to say the Senate is fighting Mr. President is myopic, parochial and unacceptable.”
At the end of his presentation, the write-up and letters cited by Melaye were referred to the Senate Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petition for legislative input. The committee was also mandated to return its report to Senate in one week. Meanwhile, a meeting scheduled for yesterday at the instance of Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF) to address the controversy generated by collection fees charged on TSA implementation has been suspended. The suspension is to allow the National Assembly conclude its investigation.
Parties to TSA collection fee, CBN, System- Specs, commercial banks, OAGF and other stakeholders were billed for a meeting yesterday. Deputy Director (Press) in OAGF, Mrs. Offie Kenechukwu, confirmed the suspension of the meeting in a short messaging service (SMS) response to New Telegraph.
“The matter is on hold till after the investigation by National Assembly,” Kenechukwu said. Meanwhile, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has tackled the Federal Government on the controversies surrounding the handling of the remittances in the TSA. PDP National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh, at a press conference yesterday, noted that the conflicting statements emanating from the Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed and the CBN underscored the fear being raised by the Senate that there may have been underhand deals in the process.
“Whereas the Senate has ordered its committee on finance and public accounts to investigate the remitting and handling of N2.5 trillion into the TSA, the federal executive, through the minister of information, had earlier informed the nation that the sum of N1.4 trillion had been remitted, while the CBN put its figure at below a trillion and announced an estimated collectable amount of N1.2 trillion. “The PDP finds this discordant tune and Monday’s brazen attack by the Minister of I/nformation on whistle blowers as completely unacceptable and contradictory of a government that rode to power on the garb of ‘Mr. Clean’,” he added.
He further alleged that the firm handling the TSA remittances has been given the leeway to rake millions of naira into unknown purses from fees charged MDAs for training of their personnel involved in the TSA. According to him, each MDA was told to send five of their staff for training at a fee of N65, 000 per staff.
But the Minister of Information, Mohammed, has insisted that the funds that have accrued to the TSA remain intact, challenging anyone who has any fact and figure to the contrary to make such information public. In a statement issued in Abuja on Tuesday, the minister reiterated the fact that less than N2 trillion has accrued to the TSA, hence the one per cent charges on the amount could not have been N25 billion.
He said that apart from the resort to personal insults in the most un-dignifying statement, nowhere in the statement did Governor Ayodele Fayose controvert the facts that we stated concerning the TSA. Mohammed said: “The TSA deal was initiated by the immediate past administration, but only enjoyed a new lease of life under the administration of President Buhari because of his sterling leadership qualities of accountability, transparency, uprightness and respect for the rule of law. “Any agreement on the TSA charges was reached long before the present Administration assumed office.
“Even if the agreement on the charges is one per cent, it could not have amounted to N25 billion because the total amount of money that has accrued to the TSA is less than N2 trillion. “Even if one per cent was agreed as charges, whatever accrues therefrom was meant to be shared among the CBN, Systemspecs (the owner of the Remita software) and the commercial banks, hence no single company could have collected N25 billion as charges “As at the time the controversy over the TSA broke, the total amount of money in the TSA was less than N800 billion naira.
The TSA has neither been enveloped in any fraud nor has any money from the account been diverted. “The Senate’s investigation of the TSA issue is within its oversight responsibilities and is never a confirmation that the TSA funds have been diverted or that indeed one single company has made N25 billion as charges. ”These are the issues and we stand by them, irrespective of a rabblerousing and demeaning statement from any quarter,” the minister said.
