By Emman Ovuakporie

ABUJA – THE House of Representatives on its resumption for Tuesday plenary session started to process a bill which seeks to use the $322 million (or N101.26 billion) Abacha loot to fund
the Ajaokuta Steel company and Railway Line.

This is barely six days after the House passed a resolution urging President Muhammadu Buhari to halt ongoing plans to distribute the $322 million to 302,000 poor households in 19 states without database.

The details of the bill for an “Act to allocate the returned looted Nigerian government fund of $322 million from Switzerland for funding of Ajaokuta Steel Company and Railway line(s) projects in Nigeria and for other related matters,” obtained by Vanguard, was promoted by Rep Ossai Nicholas Ossai, PDP, Delta and five other lawmakers.

They are: Mohammed Umar Bago, Rita Orji, Darlington Nwokocha, Alagbaso Jerry and Nwabuwa Henry Ndochukwu.

Clause 1 of the bill seen by our Correspondent, seeks to establish a fund to be known as ‘Swiss Fund’.

Clause 2 (i, ii & iii) provides that: “The Fund shall be all the returned looted Nigerian government money of $322.5 million from Switzerland; shall be allocated for the funding of Ajaokuta Steel company; shall also be allocated for the funding of Lagos-Port Harcourt – Enugu – Ajaokuta railway lines projects.”

The explanatory memorandum of the bill further stipulates that the “bill seeks to ensure that returned looted Nigerian government funds are used for major infrastructural projects that will enhance economic growth and development in Nigeria.”

There has been public outcry over the plans by Federal Government to embark on sharing of the $322 million to a cross section of Nigerians described as ‘poor’ without any substantive evidence of their status, adding that such disbursement may create pipeline for corrupt
practices.

Also recall that some professional bodies in the housing sector and civil society organisations had called on the Buhari’s administration to halt the plans to share the $322 million to the poor but rather roll out modalities to channel the fund into more productive sector which has potential of adding value to the nation’s economy.

Recall that the House had during last Wednesday plenary passed a resolution to set up an Ad-hoc Committee that will investigate repatriated Abacha loot from 1998 till date, and mandated that the Ad-hoc Committee should report back within six weeks for further legislative action.

Read more at: https://www.vanguardngr.com/2018/07/abacha-322m-loot-reps-move-to-use-fund-to-resuscitate-ajaokuta-steel-railway-line/

Lol this is the 3rd bill they have in circulation regarding the plant. Oh well lets see how this plays out.

Buhari who have always maintained that abacha never stole only wants to purnish Nigerians by making useless these funds ,the dumb action is not for the good of generality of the people.

Buhari is bent on using the funds for stomach infrastructure which he condemns while there are campaign promises like ajaokuta steel which apc cannot fulfill, it is wise that that the populace support the house of assembly on this.

Hopefully it ends up being a good move.

Reps stylishly looking for money to steal...


That money go jst disappear and nobody go cough..




Its d naija factor



I always knew notin gud will come out of ds money owing to d kinda politicians presently in office

I hope they succeed in this...before bubu and osibanjo waste am dey do almajiri five five thousand dash to God knows who!!

Better than distrubiting it to the ghost of poor people.

As we speak, just one God father can open 100,000 bank account registered in 1993 and submit to FG

The corruption fighting warriors cannot allow that be because it will affect their budgeted election campaign fund.
Ndi ara

And they say abacha never stole and is not corrupt

That one don go b dat.

Reps want to chop it.

Give the money directly to the people for once!

Looting opportunity.

Did this government not tell us about two months ago that Ajaokuta is fully functional now? So which Ajaokuta agin?

Rail? Another white elephant task. What happened to all the former allocations to rail projects? Recovered to be relooted. They should not bother with rail again.

Just one fully functional international standard hospital in each of the geopolitical zones - 6 hospitals in all is okay for now. 2019 is already here.

One of the good bills read in a while now....

GavelSlam:
Dead on arrival.

APC ZOMBIE ARE AS DAFT AS BUHARI

SENDING THE MONEY ON CAPITAL PROJECT IS MORE VIABLE THAN DISTRIBUTING IT TO IMAGINARY LESS PRIVILEGE.

BUHARI IS DAFT & THERE'S NO DOUBT ABOUT THAT APC ASSLICKER ARE MAD

Reps want to chop it.

Give the money directly to the people for once!

That will be better than sharing the loot amongst the *poor"

Steel is one of the best and unique natural resource. For any country to be on it's feet and ready to export products then they need steel.

Hope it turns out true

Good move indeed...as if we dont know what will eventually happen

This is a very good and productive move by members of the National Assembly. However, I am of the opinion that the Government should set up a presidential panel to carry out a comprehensive assessment of how previous funds ejected into the project have failed to bring desired result.

In the lilly study I recently carried out on the failure of the project, I got to know that the continued underdevelopment of our steel sector can be alluded to some factors. One, using South Korea's POSCO as a reference due to their being founded in the same period, I found out that it is imperative that the project be partially or fully privatized, under a non corrupt and technocratic public bureaucracy. This is to gear it towards operational efficiency and optimization.

Second, policy inconsistencies, massive corruption and lack of 'steel patriotism' on the part of the Ajaokuta stakeholders are another round of problems impeding the project's path to fruition.

Third, the government and the National Assembly should deploy their informational mechanisms in sensitizing the Nigerian public on the indispensability of the steel project in the industrialization equation. Such step will further bring matters relating to the project into limelight, effectively making it a matter of national urgency and priority.

Trust me, when Nigerians are armed with the necessary information regarding the project, they will start monitoring it just like they monitor road construction and elections in the country. Thereafter, different constructive ideas will start coming out on how to bring Nigeria out of this industrial and infrastructural limbo.

Until all these anomalies are addressed as a matter of national urgency and enforcement's sincerity, no matter the amount of dollars pumped into the steel project, it will continue to serve as avenue for a very few group of elitist thieves in reminding themselves that Nigeria is a good place to be at the expense of the poor majority.

Better ! The only good thing has finally come out of NASS.

It’s a good idea only if they will truly use it..

How many times will they fund ajaokuta steel plant? Just some weeks back, a few BMC's were here saying ajaokuta was operational

For what.. Abeg share it for us nah

Hmmmmmm

They should channel the funds to grassroots projects in the 6 political zones

For me all the money should be channeled to roads.

The railways and Ajaokuta should be privatized.

Best

GOOD RIDDANCE TO A STUPID NONSENSE!