COMPLETION of the second Niger Bridge is to cost the Federal Government N7 billion. This is captured in the 2013 budget of the Subsidy Re-Investment Programme (SURE-P).
Unfortunately, the National Assembly Joint Committee on Petroleum Resources (Downstream) wants the SURE-P scrapped.
Lawmakers are of the opinion that the establishment of SURE-P amounts to an indirect vote-of-no-confidence on Federal Government's ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs).
Speaking at the 2013 budget defence Wednesday, they maintained that the SURE-P is a share duplication of existing projects being handled by various government agencies. They also queried the N2 billion budget allocated to SURE-P for consultancy and logistics.
However, SURE-P Chairman, Christopher Kolade, urged the lawmakers to direct their comments to the Presidency.
In his remarks, Vice Chairman, Senate Committee on Petroleum Resources (Downstream), Danjuma Goje, called for outright scrapping of SURE-P on the ground that the committee cannot co-exist with ministries because they are doing the same duties already captured in the national budget.
He said: "SURE-P is an indirect loss of confidence in the federal ministries. Your work is just government indirectly saying that it has no confidence in its ministries. Ministries are still awarding contracts and some agencies as well. I see confusion somewhere along the line; either you avoid these ministries and give the job to SURE-P and they award the contracts and supervise the execution.
"It doesn't make any sense for somebody to award a job and for somebody else to come and see and make payments. Something is wrong somewhere in this set-up, otherwise, why would you award contract on the East-West Road based on old design, going through all the processes of the ministry, going before the Tenders Board and everything, only for another body to go round now and make payment.
"It doesn't add up. Something is wrong somewhere; one of the two bodies must give way, either SURE-P or the ministries but the two cannot go together because they are doing the same job. If you look at your budget, N1billion for SURE-P board. This is just for you and in 2013, you have another N1 billion. I see SURE-P as another way, or the Nigerian way of spending money on overheads (yet) we are talking of spending over 70 per cent of our revenue on recurrent expenditure."
In his response, Kolade reiterated that, "it's not the decision of the SURE-P board to take, the decision lies with the Federal Government."
