Lawmakers loyal to the Speaker of the green chamber, Yakubu Dogara have opened up on the alleged budget padding of Mr. Abdulmumin Jibrin which led to his sack as the chairman of appropriation committee.
Mr. Abdulmumin Jibrin
In a new twist to the recent drama in the House of Representatives, men close the Speaker of the House, Yakubu Dogara, have said that Mr. Abdulmumin Jibrin was sacked as Chairman of the House Committee on Appropriation for padding the budget with N250m, according to the Punch.
A senior member in the House of Representatives and one of Dogara’s aides, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that Jibrin was sacked by the Speaker because he had jerked up the budget by the said amount.
The sources said Jibrin’s plan was discovered after he had tabled the final copy of the budget document on a Thursday for passage by the two chambers of the National Assembly.
They said that it was the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, and Dogara, who blocked Jibrin’s move.
“The Senate President and the Speaker directed Jibrin to not only revert to original figure proposed by the President but also lower it by about N30bn because of expected drop in revenue,” one of the sources said.
“That was why the budget was not passed until the following Tuesday.”
But the fresh information contradicts claims by Jibrin in a statement released on Thursday that he was being victimised by the Speaker because he had objected to a request Dogara made that he (Jibrin) should allocate projects worth N40bn to him in the 2016 budget.
He had also alleged that the projects would have been shared among four principal officers, namely, Dogara; the Deputy Speaker, Mr. Yussuff Lasun; the Whip, Mr. Alhassan Ado-Doguwa; and the Minority Leader, Mr. Leo Ogor.
However, the source also accused Jibrin of allocating N4.1bn to his constituency – Kiru/Bebeji Federal constituency of Kano State. The source also alleged that Jibrin tinkered with reports of all standing committees on the budget by cutting10 per cent of all capital votes of all ministries, departments and agencies across board and also taking from the personnel budgets of some MDAs, making it difficult for them to pay workers’ salaries.
Meanwhile, two of the principal officers of the House Representatives indicted by Jibrin, Ado-Doguwa, and Ogor, on Friday also gave reasons why the leadership of the House relieved its former Chairman, Committee on Appropriation of his position.