The House of Representatives has directed its principal officers to meet with the committee of finance and currency over the failure of some ministries, departments, and agencies (MDAs) to attend the 2022 budget defence.
The Deputy Speaker of the House, Ahmed Wase, made the ruling during the plenary session on Wednesday after a motion of personal explanation by Fatau Mohammed, All Progressives Congress (APC) lawmaker from Katsina state.
Mohammed while moving his motion, stated that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Company, and the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) did not come before the house committee.
Referencing orders of the house standing orders, the lawmaker stated that it is against the law for the agencies to fail to appear and defend their budget.
Order 20, rule 18 (1) stipulates that “There shall be a Committee to be known as Committee on Banking and Currency consisting of not more than 40 members constituted at the commencement of the life of the House” and the committee’s jurisdiction shall cover the oversight of CBN and AMCON.
The lawmaker, noted that the rule empowers the committee to carry out oversight functions on the agencies.
“It will interest the house to know that none of the above agencies have had oversight in the past two years, and they have failed to make their 2022 budget available to the committee. How long shall we allow these illegalities to continue? he said.
The Deputy Minority leader of the House, Toby Okechukwu, while contributing to the motion, stated that it is a violation of the law for the agencies to fail to appear before the lawmakers.
“This is a breach of the law of which this house should make a finding and place it properly the culpability of these agencies. It would be proper for this to come in a way of a motion for an investigation,” he said.
Ruling on the matter, Wase said that the leadership of the green chamber would interface with the committee to resolve the issue.
