The Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, on Thursday, says there was no proper coordination of the donations received from public-spirited individuals, corporate bodies and institutions to support the fight against the coronavirus pandemic.
Lawan stated this at a meeting between the leadership of the National Assembly and members of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19 led by its chairman, Boss Mustapha, who is the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF).
“I believe that we face one critical challenge today in our fight against COVID-19. We have donations made by various organisations, corporate bodies and so on but it is my candid opinion that there is no coordination,” Lawan was quoted as saying in a statement by his media aide, Ola Awoniyi.
“The Corporate Nigeria, as I was told as at yesterday (Wednesday), has gathered N22billion, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), I was told had $28million (dollars), CBN and the banks, I don’t know how much they have. The National Assembly, the ministers and so many individuals and institutions have also made donations,” Lawan said.
The Senate President advised that the donations should go to just one common platform as against multiple accounts.
“I believe we must have a central body and not the PTF nor the corporate groups should receive and manage the funds but based on what the Constitution provides for.
“Where everybody is just collecting and spending, I think it will lead us in a very bad shape. When people contribute their funds, they want to see such funds properly utilised. They want to see efficiency. They want to see transparency. They want to see accountability and of course, probity in what the funds are used for.
“There could be duplication, working across purposes. At the end of the day, there will certainly be inefficiency in the application of such resources,” Lawan said.
He therefore urged the PTF to have a better coordination to avoid duplication of the relevant bodies working at cross purposes.
In his remarks, the PTF chairman, said for transparency and accountability, the Task Force would not be directly involved in the collection and disbursement of the cash donations for COVID-19.
“The Accountant General of the Federation has already published the account details for collection through some commercial banks and also provided the modalities for its utilisation.
“All the main COVID-19 accounts shall be domiciled in the Central Bank of Nigeria. However, all non-cash donations shall be duly received by the PTF, acknowledged, documented and appropriately deployed,” Mustapha said.
