President Muhammadu Buhari has thrown more light on the controversial statement he made concerning how the government recovered over N2.2 trillion in 3 months through the use of TSA.
President Muhammadu Buhari
President Muhammadu Buhari has explained how his administration government recovered N2.2 trillion in 3 months through the enforcement of the Treasury Single Account, TSA.
Buhari made the disclosure in London during a meeting with Nigerians resident in the city on Thursday night.
He revealed that the Nigerian National Petroleum Cooperation, NNPC had over 45 accounts scattered in different banks which made it difficult to account for misplaced funds. He revealed many government ministries and agencies were not left out in the mess. The sad occurrence was also noticed in branches of the military.
He said: “We are really in trouble. What we discovered was that we tried to enforce what we called treasury single account, TSA. And the reason was simple. This government did not initiate it. It was the previous government. But it was so unpopular to the bureaucracy and the previous government for its own reasons couldn’t enforce it. But when we came and found that we were broke, we said this is the way to do it. And I will just tell you two examples to convince you.
“First, NNPC, the cow that was giving the milk had more than 45 accounts, ministry of defense, that is the military Army, Navy and air force had over 70 accounts. Tell me which account we can trace in these several accounts. So we enforce TSA. We said there must be TSA.
“By the end of December, coming to January this year, that is last month, we mopped up more than N2.2trn which we have used through the bureaucracy system to raise vouchers and sign cheques so that they don’t go into the next budget.”
He also shed light on the current slide in naira and the hardship Nigerians home and abroad are facing.
“We found out, when I say we, I mean present federal government, that some of the directors in the central bank own the bureau de change businesses. So when the foreign exchange comes, they take it and give government the change. So we stopped the Federal Government giving bureau de change foreign exchange.
“Fellow country men and women, I am giving you a tip of the iceberg of the problem we inherited and we are getting so hard because we have no other way of running the country unless we make everybody accountable”, he said.
He begged Nigerians in diaspora to join hands with his government by providing the needed support that will benefit the country.
“We are critically looking at the system itself. We must make sure that the election process itself is credible”, he added.