Bolaji Owasanoye, chairman of the
Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC),
says the agency uncovered N12.4 billion padded into 2019 budget.
Owasanoye said this on Thursday
in Abuja while giving a report on the tracking of constituency projects in the
country.
The ICPC chairman said about a
month ago, the commission prevented N9.2 billion from leaving government’s
purse.
According to him, budget padding
is still prevalent in the MDAs because “oversight is not strong enough”.
“We broke down the 2019 budget
and we are going to announce publicly what project is allocated to each state,”
he said.
“People can call ICPC and ask for
it and we will tell them what project they should expect. This is much more
effective way of fighting corruption.
“Part of our prevention mandate
is to go into government agencies and look at how public fund is used. A month
ago, we restrained N9.2bn from going out. What happened was that when we looked
at the budget and what has been appropriated and how it was to be used, I can
tell you authoritatively that there is still budget padding.
“This is because the oversight is
not strong enough. If you have personnel vote that is not exhausted and people
do not complain that salaries have not been paid, you can tell that someone has
made budget proposal of more than what is needed to pay salary. The agency
involved did not dispute it and we informed the ministry of finance, budget and
national planning.
“The figure has moved because it
is an ongoing exercise. As at this morning (Thursday), we found an additional
N3.2bn. Hopefully, by the time we finish, we would have found more money and
saved government personnel cost.”
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