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| Abdulmumin Jibrin |
Jibrin, who spoke on a live telecast on Channels
TV yesterday, vindicated former President Olusegun Obasanjo who had severally
maintained that most members of the National Assembly were corrupt and morally
unsound to be among the nation’s lawmakers.
Jubrin had accused Speaker Yakubu Dogara, his
deputy, Yusuf Lasun, House Whip, Alhassan Doguwa, and Minority Leader, Leo
Ogor, of padding the 2016 Appropriation Bill with up to N40 billion...
“There is corruption in the House of Representatives,
and not only is there corruption, there is institutional corruption. These are
things that I can prove and it is what my struggle is about. Obasanjo is not
completely wrong in saying that lawmakers are corrupt; the only thing is that
we keep living in denial. I have been part of that system and I know that there
is corruption in the system. There is also institutional corruption.
“I have been there for five years and I have
seen a lot and I am so happy that something has triggered it. We want to take
advantage of this trigger to address the issues at the National Assembly to
force reforms. People are looking at it from a narrow perspective, but it is a
bigger problem. This issue is going to lead to a revolution in the National
Assembly. There are lot of issues that needs to be dealt with. The issue of
corruption needs to be dealt with. The issues regarding the conduct of members
would also be dealt with.
“The
amount inserted was about N284 billion. Technically, it was a movement of money
here and there in the budget. For five years, working on budgets as chairman
Finance, I have never seen this kind of situation. I didn’t know there was
some kind of recklessness in the past, but not as bad as this. I saw some kind
of insertions into the budget in years past, but in 2016, the insertions
completely went off the board.
“Even though the law allows it, personally, I
believe that the insertions were too much. It is also very important that the
constitution gives us the power to appropriate and insert, but the intention
of the constitution is not for you to make senseless insertions. These are the
issues that I fought internally. There were a lot of senseless insertions. The
fact that we are talking about our own side does not mean there were no
problems from the executive. There were issues with the budget team at the
budget office and those issues are still there. There were so many tussles
between the ministry of finance and the budget office.
“My problem was that I was not talking. I came
to the National Assembly and I was made to believe that when one is chairman of
finance, you have to live and die with certain information. Also, if you a
chairman of Appropriation, you have to be a custodian of information, meaning
there are a lot of things you must not say. I actually lived with that kind of
mentality for the past five years in House.
“Between when the committees brought in the
reports and when the first version of the budget went to the president, so much
happened. My colleagues were asking me, but I could not tell them that Speaker
tried to insert project worth N30 billion and that he was conspiring with the
deputy speaker, Leo Ogor and the rest to hijack the entire process and allocate
to themselves projects worth over N20 billion of wasteful project”, Jubrin
said.
Meanwhile, Jibrin made good his threat to
continue exposing the corrupt act of Dogara and other corrupt members of the
House of Representatives as he, yesterday, released pictures of guest houses,
which he claimed belong to the speaker.
The guest house is reportedly located at
Vistula Close, along Panama Crescent, Maitama, Abuja. He had alleged that
Dogara looted funds meant for legislative duties to furnish his guest houses
and other apartments being personally used by him.
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