Dogara Attempted Padding N 30billion Into 2016 Budget – Jibrin
The sacked chairman of the House of
Representatives Committee on
Appropriation, Abdulmumin Jibrin, has
opened can of worms on what led to his
sudden ouster.
Jibrin, who was said to be the ‘right hand man’ of the speaker, Yakubu Dogara, said he chose to back down for personal reasons.
In a long statement he released late
Thursday, Jibrin alleged that the Speaker,
Dogara attempted to pad N30 billion into the controversial 2016 budget.
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However, Dogara in a swift reaction
described his claim as unfounded.
He’s full statement reads in full:
“I am obliged to make further statement
after listening to the full statement of
Speaker Yakubu Dogara on why I had to
leave as Chairman Appropriation. It is a
fact I went up to the Speaker and told him
clearly I wanted to leave.
He confirmed this in his statement but it
appeared he wished he had fired me
instead of my personal decision to step
down.
Thereafter I proceeded to my office. I was
therefore not surprised when an aide of
mine walked into my office to inform me
that the Speaker had announced my
departure. I was relieved and went straight
to address the press and released a
statement.
It was only later in the evening while
monitoring the news that I watched the full
statement he made on the floor.
Speaker Dogara’s statement was a
complete misrepresentation of the facts,
false, mischievous, unfair and a calculated
attempt to bring my name to disrepute,
blackmail, silence and use me as a scape goat.
The plan is to execute it just before the
recess so that by the time we return I
would have been buried and the issue
forgotten. Mr Speaker, this issue will never
be swept under the carpet. We are closing
for recess with it and we shall commence
the next session with this issue. This was
the last option they had after every attempt
to find something to nail me failed. It is a
known fact that I am a very blunt person
by nature.
I don’t know how to pretend. I don’t do eye
service neither will I ever be a sycophant. I
don’t give returns. I just do my job
faithfully and dedicatedly. My offence was
asserting my independence and insisting
that we do the right thing at all times and
expose corrupt people in the House.
Lately I openly disagreed with some
principal officers on the issue of immunity
for Lawmakers and budget issues. I still
maintained I will never support immunity.
I strongly believe with every conviction that
in cleaning up the budgeting system and
considering what transpired during 2016
budget which I have all the facts
documented, Speaker Dogara, Deputy
Speaker Lasun, Whip Doguwa and minority
Leader Leo Ogor should resign.
These members of the body of principal
officers were not comfortable with my
independent disposition and my refusal to
cover up their unilateral decision to allocate
to themselves 40billion naira out of the
100billion allocated to the entire National Assembly.
ALSO READ: Get the latest Etisalat Bis Unlimited With Tweakware working like mad
The four of them met and took that
decision, in addition to billions of wasteful
projects running over 20 billion they
allocated to their constituencies. They must
come out clean. My inability to admit into
the budget almost 30 billion personal
requests from Mr. Speaker and the 3 other
principal officers also became an issue. I
have every documented evidence to this
effect. After the submission of the first
version of the budget which was returned
by Mr. President, I briefed members in
executive session and told them as agreed
at our pre budget meeting with chairmen
and deputy chairmen of standing
committees, we simply adopted their
reports with little amendments. No body
faulted my submission.
Members insisted they must know how the
N100 billion was allocated. I told them the
truth. Since after that meeting, Mr Speaker
with the suport of the three other principal
officers effectively blocked me from briefing
members, ensured I was not at the last
executive session and refused to
investigate issues I raised that I believe
must be addressed if we intend to build a
better budget system for the House. I gave
Mr. Speaker statistics of 2000 new projects
introduced into the budget by less than 10
committee chairmen without the knowledge
of their committee members, he did nothing
about it because he was part of the mess,
yet he is talking about improving the
budget system.
I did nothing wrong. I worked within the
rules of the House and instructions of Mr. Speaker. During the budget period, Mr. President graciously granted myself and Sen. Goje audience.
It was a very good meeting. Speaker
Dogara took it extremely personal that we
saw the president without his knowledge
and went on to scuttle all our efforts to
help the president during the budget
process because he wanted to be seen by
the president as the only good man. He
forgot that he sees heads of MDA’s daily
which he enjoys doing more than his job as
Speaker for reasons best known to him
anyway, without Mr. President’s knowledge.
ALSO READ: DOWNLOAD THE ONE ONLY MUSIC TITTLED MY MAMA by JOLAMIKKY
That is how petty and narrow minded
Dogara can be. A coward, hypocrite and
pretender of the highest order. Mr President
must be very careful with him. He wines
with Mr. President and dines with Mr.
President’s enemies. I am glad that I am
finally free from his emotional blackmail of
constantly trying to make me see my
appointment as appropriation chairman as a favour.
He has failed to realise that I came a long
way and even attained chairman finance
when he was chairman House services
before this appointment. Seeing as the
Speaker claimed that they have taken the
decision or were going to take decision to
replace me, he now has a responsibility to
tell the world why they took or were going
to take such decision. I challenge them to
tell the world why? I will be releasing a
more detailed statement in due course.
Meanwhile, I intend to explore all internal
avenues of the House to brief my
colleagues in detail and testify against
Speaker Dogara, Deputy Lasun, Whip
Doguwa and Minority leader Leo Ogor on
why they should resign. If I am not allowed
to exercise my privilege, I shall consider
legal options. I can no longer bear the
brunt of abuses and baseless allegations,
keeping quiet all in the name of
“confidentiality” expected of an
appropriation chairman. I will not allow
anybody no matter how highly placed to
destroy my life as intended by the full
statement of Speaker Yakubu Dogara. Now
Nigerians will see clearly the ulterior motive
behind the desperate moves for immunity
for principal officers of the National
Assembly.”
Reacting however, the speaker in a
statement by the spokesperson for the
house, Abdulrazak Namdas, dismissed Mr.
Jibrin’s claims.
He said, “Our attention has been down to
media statements made by the former
Chairman of House Appropriation
Committee, Hon Abdulmumuni Jibrin
wherein he made wild allegations against
the House of Representatives and its
leaders.
“We wish to say that it is the prerogative
of the Selection Committee of the House to
appoint and remove Committee Chairmen.
That power has been so exercised in the
case of Hon. Abdulmumin Jibrin as
chairman of Appropriation Committee.
“Most of the allegations on the 2016
budget process and his opposition to
immunity of Presiding officers are non-
issues and mere afterthought manufactured simply because the House relieved him of his position.
“If he had all these ‘facts’ before, why
didn’t he make them public? Why is he
doing that now?
“Hon. Abdulmumin Jibrin, like any other
member of the House knows that there are
conventions and precedents as it relates to
budgets and projects for principal officers
of the National Assembly. Why is he
making it an issue now? In any case, he is
entitled to his opinion as a Nigerian and as
a legislator while acting within the laws of
Nigeria and rules of the House.
“We must make it abundantly clear that he
was not removed because of his support or
otherwise on immunity bill. After all he is
not the only one who opposed the bill.
“The bill is still pending before committee
on review of constitution and it has to be
voted upon by each and every member of
the House, get Senate concurrence,
endorsed by two-third of the 36 State
Houses of Assembly and be assented to by
the President. It is a cheap blackmail on
the part of Hon. Jibrin to even insinuate
that he was removed because he opposed
immunity bill.
“He should not distract the House from
giving legislative support on important
issues facing the government concerning
the revival of the economy, insecurity in the country, pursuit of anti-corruption measures, poverty alleviation, infrastructural development etc. The
Nigerian people are simply not ready to
waste their time on personal issues and
personal egos of our leaders. We should
face the urgent tasks before us for which we were elected.”
Representatives Committee on
Appropriation, Abdulmumin Jibrin, has
opened can of worms on what led to his
sudden ouster.
Jibrin, who was said to be the ‘right hand man’ of the speaker, Yakubu Dogara, said he chose to back down for personal reasons.
In a long statement he released late
Thursday, Jibrin alleged that the Speaker,
Dogara attempted to pad N30 billion into the controversial 2016 budget.
ALSO READ: Get the Latest Glo 0.0k unlimited via psiphon vpn july 2016 cheat
However, Dogara in a swift reaction
described his claim as unfounded.
He’s full statement reads in full:
“I am obliged to make further statement
after listening to the full statement of
Speaker Yakubu Dogara on why I had to
leave as Chairman Appropriation. It is a
fact I went up to the Speaker and told him
clearly I wanted to leave.
He confirmed this in his statement but it
appeared he wished he had fired me
instead of my personal decision to step
down.
Thereafter I proceeded to my office. I was
therefore not surprised when an aide of
mine walked into my office to inform me
that the Speaker had announced my
departure. I was relieved and went straight
to address the press and released a
statement.
It was only later in the evening while
monitoring the news that I watched the full
statement he made on the floor.
Speaker Dogara’s statement was a
complete misrepresentation of the facts,
false, mischievous, unfair and a calculated
attempt to bring my name to disrepute,
blackmail, silence and use me as a scape goat.
The plan is to execute it just before the
recess so that by the time we return I
would have been buried and the issue
forgotten. Mr Speaker, this issue will never
be swept under the carpet. We are closing
for recess with it and we shall commence
the next session with this issue. This was
the last option they had after every attempt
to find something to nail me failed. It is a
known fact that I am a very blunt person
by nature.
I don’t know how to pretend. I don’t do eye
service neither will I ever be a sycophant. I
don’t give returns. I just do my job
faithfully and dedicatedly. My offence was
asserting my independence and insisting
that we do the right thing at all times and
expose corrupt people in the House.
Lately I openly disagreed with some
principal officers on the issue of immunity
for Lawmakers and budget issues. I still
maintained I will never support immunity.
I strongly believe with every conviction that
in cleaning up the budgeting system and
considering what transpired during 2016
budget which I have all the facts
documented, Speaker Dogara, Deputy
Speaker Lasun, Whip Doguwa and minority
Leader Leo Ogor should resign.
These members of the body of principal
officers were not comfortable with my
independent disposition and my refusal to
cover up their unilateral decision to allocate
to themselves 40billion naira out of the
100billion allocated to the entire National Assembly.
ALSO READ: Get the latest Etisalat Bis Unlimited With Tweakware working like mad
The four of them met and took that
decision, in addition to billions of wasteful
projects running over 20 billion they
allocated to their constituencies. They must
come out clean. My inability to admit into
the budget almost 30 billion personal
requests from Mr. Speaker and the 3 other
principal officers also became an issue. I
have every documented evidence to this
effect. After the submission of the first
version of the budget which was returned
by Mr. President, I briefed members in
executive session and told them as agreed
at our pre budget meeting with chairmen
and deputy chairmen of standing
committees, we simply adopted their
reports with little amendments. No body
faulted my submission.
Members insisted they must know how the
N100 billion was allocated. I told them the
truth. Since after that meeting, Mr Speaker
with the suport of the three other principal
officers effectively blocked me from briefing
members, ensured I was not at the last
executive session and refused to
investigate issues I raised that I believe
must be addressed if we intend to build a
better budget system for the House. I gave
Mr. Speaker statistics of 2000 new projects
introduced into the budget by less than 10
committee chairmen without the knowledge
of their committee members, he did nothing
about it because he was part of the mess,
yet he is talking about improving the
budget system.
I did nothing wrong. I worked within the
rules of the House and instructions of Mr. Speaker. During the budget period, Mr. President graciously granted myself and Sen. Goje audience.
It was a very good meeting. Speaker
Dogara took it extremely personal that we
saw the president without his knowledge
and went on to scuttle all our efforts to
help the president during the budget
process because he wanted to be seen by
the president as the only good man. He
forgot that he sees heads of MDA’s daily
which he enjoys doing more than his job as
Speaker for reasons best known to him
anyway, without Mr. President’s knowledge.
ALSO READ: DOWNLOAD THE ONE ONLY MUSIC TITTLED MY MAMA by JOLAMIKKY
That is how petty and narrow minded
Dogara can be. A coward, hypocrite and
pretender of the highest order. Mr President
must be very careful with him. He wines
with Mr. President and dines with Mr.
President’s enemies. I am glad that I am
finally free from his emotional blackmail of
constantly trying to make me see my
appointment as appropriation chairman as a favour.
He has failed to realise that I came a long
way and even attained chairman finance
when he was chairman House services
before this appointment. Seeing as the
Speaker claimed that they have taken the
decision or were going to take decision to
replace me, he now has a responsibility to
tell the world why they took or were going
to take such decision. I challenge them to
tell the world why? I will be releasing a
more detailed statement in due course.
Meanwhile, I intend to explore all internal
avenues of the House to brief my
colleagues in detail and testify against
Speaker Dogara, Deputy Lasun, Whip
Doguwa and Minority leader Leo Ogor on
why they should resign. If I am not allowed
to exercise my privilege, I shall consider
legal options. I can no longer bear the
brunt of abuses and baseless allegations,
keeping quiet all in the name of
“confidentiality” expected of an
appropriation chairman. I will not allow
anybody no matter how highly placed to
destroy my life as intended by the full
statement of Speaker Yakubu Dogara. Now
Nigerians will see clearly the ulterior motive
behind the desperate moves for immunity
for principal officers of the National
Assembly.”
Reacting however, the speaker in a
statement by the spokesperson for the
house, Abdulrazak Namdas, dismissed Mr.
Jibrin’s claims.
He said, “Our attention has been down to
media statements made by the former
Chairman of House Appropriation
Committee, Hon Abdulmumuni Jibrin
wherein he made wild allegations against
the House of Representatives and its
leaders.
“We wish to say that it is the prerogative
of the Selection Committee of the House to
appoint and remove Committee Chairmen.
That power has been so exercised in the
case of Hon. Abdulmumin Jibrin as
chairman of Appropriation Committee.
“Most of the allegations on the 2016
budget process and his opposition to
immunity of Presiding officers are non-
issues and mere afterthought manufactured simply because the House relieved him of his position.
“If he had all these ‘facts’ before, why
didn’t he make them public? Why is he
doing that now?
“Hon. Abdulmumin Jibrin, like any other
member of the House knows that there are
conventions and precedents as it relates to
budgets and projects for principal officers
of the National Assembly. Why is he
making it an issue now? In any case, he is
entitled to his opinion as a Nigerian and as
a legislator while acting within the laws of
Nigeria and rules of the House.
“We must make it abundantly clear that he
was not removed because of his support or
otherwise on immunity bill. After all he is
not the only one who opposed the bill.
“The bill is still pending before committee
on review of constitution and it has to be
voted upon by each and every member of
the House, get Senate concurrence,
endorsed by two-third of the 36 State
Houses of Assembly and be assented to by
the President. It is a cheap blackmail on
the part of Hon. Jibrin to even insinuate
that he was removed because he opposed
immunity bill.
“He should not distract the House from
giving legislative support on important
issues facing the government concerning
the revival of the economy, insecurity in the country, pursuit of anti-corruption measures, poverty alleviation, infrastructural development etc. The
Nigerian people are simply not ready to
waste their time on personal issues and
personal egos of our leaders. We should
face the urgent tasks before us for which we were elected.”
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