New Telegraph

Senate gives ministry, others ultimatum over N7.5bn secret withdrawal

The Senate Committee on Public Accounts, yesterday, gave the Ministry of Finance, Office of Accountant-General of the Federation and Office of the National Security Adviser six days to explain alleged secret withdrawal of N7.5 billion. The withdrawal was allegedly made from the two per cent National Automotive Council Design and Development Council (NADDC) Levy Account, domiciled with Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). The committee had, two weeks ago, summoned the affected agencies to appear before the lawmakers, but they were not present at the scheduled meeting yesterday.

Presenting the details of the withdrawal before the committee, the Director- General of NADDC, Jelani Tukur, said that the agency had already written to the Minister of Finance, Ahmed Zainab and the Accountant-General of the Federation on the withdrawal of N3.7 billion as loan to NAFCON, withdrawal of N3.8 billion for security personnel car loan scheme and another withdrawal of N2.3 billion as loan to Steyrs Nigeria Limited. He added that the agency had also written a letter to remind Niger Insurance Plc on the agreement reached on July 9, 2020 as ordered by the committee.

The first letters were written to the Minister of Finance and Accountant- General of the Federation on 23 April, 2021 and were delivered to the Minister and Accountant-General of the Federation on April 26, 2021. The second was written to the minister on April 26 and was delivered on April 27 while that of Accountant- General of the Federation were delivered on 26. The committee, chaired by Senator Mathew Urhoghide, said that all parties involved in the withdrawal of the money must be present by next week Tuesday to give the committee assurance that the money would be returned to NADDC’s account, which is domiciled in the Central Bank.

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