From Lateef Taiwo
Kaduna State house of assembly has today constituted a 13 man committee to investigate the financial status of the past administration.
This followed a matter of public importance raised on the floor of the house as a motion during today’s plenary by Yusuf Mugu member representing Kaura constituency.
According to the mover of the motion Yusuf, it very important to bring up the issue as negative comments have been passed on them there by belittling them as lawmakers and also putting the state to ridicule.
“I am speaking specifically on the issue of the town hall meeting held on the 30th March, 2024 by his excellency Gov. Uba Sani to brief the public on the affairs of the state where the Governor explained to the public what the state is passing through in handling it’s affairs.
“Consequently there were revelations emanating from that town hall meeting which put Kaduna State indebtedness to about $587 million, another whooping sum of 85 billion naira and 115 contractor liabilities in the state.”
Yusuf said the comments and assassination of character on the leadership of the state has necessitated the assembly to talk, adding they cannot sit to watch but to come up with the request that the speaker constitutes a committee to investigate the allegation.
“This is the only way the state can rekindle its confidence on its development partners, collaborators, and also those who give us loans and grants as failure to do this will push the indicators of the state to a situation whereby nobody will want to do business with us.”
Samuel Kambai member representing Zangon Kataf while commenting on the floor of the house said he knows that it is the duty of the legislators to give approval before the governor goes ahead to collect the loan, the committee should therefore summon the 8th and 9th speakers alongside members of same assembly to come and give explanations on how the loan was collected and expended.
Also speaking, former speaker and member representing Igabi West Constituency, Ibrahim Yusuf Zailani said he has been waiting for this time, saying he suffered a lot in order not to give approval for the loan to be collected.
He said, “even the then deputy speaker Auta Zankhai was against me because I disagree for the loan to be collected, I told the then governor to look at the number of loans we have on ground and if we have paid them or not but they did not listen to me, hence I want to align myself with the mover of the loan that it came at the right time and investigation should be carried out for the truth to be told to the public.
Member representing Jaba Constituency and also chairman house committee on information said they are not having any problem with the loans collected if all intended with the loan is achieved, we cannot have incomplete projects littering everywhere, If we cannot pay salaries when are we going to get money to complete the roads.
These loans I believe were taken to make life difficult for the people of Kaduna State, few weeks before Elrufai left as Kaduna State Governor, he still borrowed N20m and used the State IGR account to service it . How do you expect the present government to run his administration where all the allocations are used to service loan.
The speaker Yusuf Dahiru Liman after listening to all the comments made by members on the floor of the house assured the house that the matter will be properly looked into saying they will give each and everyone the liberty to speak the truth.
“We just want to critically analyze the last administration’s spendings so that we can stand with our shoulders high by the time we finish from the assembly, we do not want anyone to call us rubber stamp legislators, we are not going to do this investigation to ridicule anybody, but we will do the right thing.
The house however unanimously agreed that the committee should request for the handing over notes given to Uba Sani by the previous administration so that it guides the committee on the financial status of the state.
The 13 member Committee include Aminu Anti representing Doka Gabasawa Constituency will chair the committee, Yusuf Mugu Kaura constituency will deputise him, and the speaker Yusuf Dahiru Liman will oversee the committee, Munirat Suleiman as member and nine others as members.
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