Ahead of the Senate Committee on Niger Delta’s consideration of the 2015 Status Report of the Presidential Amnesty Programme at the Senate today, senators have indicated their disapproval of the over N48 billion purportedly spent by the President Muhammadu Buhari’s coordinator of the programme, Brig-Gen. Paul Boro (rtd), since he assumed office last July. The senators, who preferred not to be named, were particularly concerned over Boro’s purchase of official vehicles for his office for over N157 million as well as the huge sums of money purported to have been expended on the training of ex-militants between November and December last year. The expenditure, which according to the senators, was listed in the annual status report of the Amnesty Office sent to the Senate Committees on Niger Delta and Public Procurement, have made nonsense of the federal government’s efforts at belt tightening measures, arising from the nation’s dwindling earnings from crude oil. The annual report, which the two Senate committees would review along with the office’s 2016 budget today, said the senators, indicated that Boro who took over from Hon. Kingsley Kuku as Presidential Adviser on the Amnesty Programme under the current administration, in just five months awarded contracts worth about N48 billion. Describing most of the contracts awarded by Boro as “mostly nebulous or frivolous”, the senators were particularly irked that at a time Buhari had castigated the National Assembly for its proposal to buy official cars for senators and members of the House of Representatives, the Amnesty Office coordinator, who is just an appointee of the president, had since acquired as his official car, an armoured Lexus LX 570 Sport Utility Vehicle (SUV) with communications equipment for VIP movement. The exotic official car was acquired from Wada Autos Limited at the princely sum of N55 million and full payment has since been made by the Amnesty Office. “The president claims to be fighting corruption while his aides are already swimming in corruption. Can you imagine a Special Adviser using a bullet proof Lexus car worth N55 million as an official car at a time the president is trying to stop us from buying our own official cars worth about N5 million each? So what happened to the monetisation policy of the federal government?” queried an irate senator, who is a member of the Senate Committee on Niger Delta. The report before the two Senate committees and sighted by THISDAY also indicated that Boro had further acquired for his office from Globe Motors Limited, the following cars: one Toyota Land Cruiser VX V8 at the cost of N25.85 million; four Toyota Camry 3.5L V6 cars and four Toyota Hilux 4WD buses at the total sum of N75.35 million. Globe Motors has since been paid fully the sum. Some of the senators complained that a thorough analysis of contract documents attached to the report showed that at a time Nigeria is experiencing perhaps its worst economic downturn in recent times, Buhari’s adviser on the Niger Delta Amnesty Programme appears only concerned about awarding “frivolous” contracts. “We expected him to restructure the budget he inherited from his predecessor at the Amnesty Office to fit into current economic realities and in line with the anti-corruption crusade of President Buhari. Unfortunately Boro is just spending recklessly,” lamented another senator who did not want to be named. Credible sources at the Amnesty Office, however, confided in THISDAY that Boro began the contract awards in November 2015 apparently to beat the December 31 deadline for the return of unspent monies to the treasury, as stipulated by the extant financial regulations in Nigeria. The nation’s financial regulations stipulate that unspent appropriated funds be returned to the treasury after December 31 every year. However, the federal government made exemptions for the funding of capital projects to continue till March 2016. Latching on to the need to “empower” already trained Niger Delta ex-agitators, THISDAY sources claimed that some of the contracts did not follow established guidelines for awards. Said a source: “In several instances, the same contractors used by the former administration of Kingsley Kuku, who already had due clearance from the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP) were rushed in to handle the so-called empowerment contracts.” According to an angry senator, the contract awards occurred in spite of the fact that several of the Amnesty Programme’s trainees in universities abroad were either stranded or had been repatriated due to their inability to meet with their financial obligations to their schools. The senator said his investigations had revealed that under the guise that there was no money to pay the ex- militants’ tuition and in-training allowances, Boro had ordered the students in universities in the UK, United States of America, Canada, United Arab Emirates, Russia, the Philippines, Belarus and elsewhere abroad, to return to Nigeria. “Several of them have since returned and are on the verge of being placed in Nigerian universities to continue their education. The Amnesty Office cannot afford to deploy or maintain delegates offshore anymore,” he quoted a senior official of the Education Department of the Amnesty Office as saying. The senator said officials of the Amnesty Office told him that N510 million was paid to an institution, Westerfield Colleges, to prepare 150 students for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME). This transaction, according to him, stipulated that over a period spanning just two months, Westerfield Colleges would prepare the students for the UTME organised by JAMB at a cost of N3.4 million per delegate. “The same Boro who has been telling Nigerians that the Amnesty Office does not have money to fund the education of students abroad is the one awarding a contract worth N510 million to an institution to organise JAMB classes for fresh students. This is really very silly and embarrassing,” he said. Even more curious, he claimed, was the fact that the payment of the N510 million by the Amnesty Office was not treated as a contract, hence no award letter was issued to Westerfield. Rather, the senator further claimed, Boro in glaring breach of the Procurement Act and other extant financial regulations of the federal government, ordered that the payment to Westerfield be passed off as a direct payment to a school and students.

Mynd44

chai, what an episode. anyway he is fighting kworoptoin

Na today?, abi no be naija we dy.

Very predictable.

Buhari is no saint, he too is very corrupt.

This gonna be a very long tiring boring walk for Nigerians
Some wanyed it

510 million naira just for jamb, This must be a political telemundi.

Hmmmm.APC.they just de start,by de time they clock 4years na then we go know say Dasuki own was child's play.

Buhari shouldn't hesitate in firing all the undercover Goats that are bent on reviving the culture of pillaging our Yam barn as was the case under the Ineffectual Buffoon.

Now, look at what is going on, all the blame would be on the president (rightly so, and I blame him as well). No one cares if the said crook is a Hausa, Yoruba or Igbo man, or if he's from the North or South, all that matters is that he was appointed by Buhari!

When appointments are being made, all we hear from Ekpas is "another Northerner", and that was why I insisted Baba should ignore the blackmail of those ethnic jingoists. I insisted he appointed the people he felt he could trust and disregard the "need" to satisfy tribal bigots because he ultimately takes credit for whatever the appointees do.

I suggest EFCC be brought in to investigate the issue and prosecute those found to have committed financial crimes.

Judgement without justice
Arrest without jail term

#mediatrials

This clown should be fired right away....

This is what you get when you hire the son of thw soil from that region, they all have ibori tendencies...

Can the treacherous South see the mess they put Nigeria into.


God bless the better South.

Buhari and Corruption are Siamese twins.

arresa:
This clown should be fired right away....

This is what you get when you hire the son of thw soil from that region, they all have ibori tendencies...

Very true

Like OBJ and the stolen $16b electricity money

All OBJ people have similar tendencies.

“Those who are neck deep in the sewage of corruption ensure that they splatter sewage in all possible and improbable directions.” - Prof W. Soyinka

All I see from this report and thread is a desperate bid by the wailing lovers of corruption to drag Buhari's name into their cesspit of corruption. If an employee of Buhari decides to steal, he will be investigated and brought to book. We are no longer in the old order where the president and defender in chief of looters upon hearing of a case of corruption levelled against someone would jump into instant defensive mode even before he gets the details and start blabbing things like 'stealing is not corruption.'

I wouldn't forget in a hurry how a certain sitting president when asked by CNN about the leaked ekiti election tape quickly blurted out that it was a fabricated recording; and this was just a day after 2 of those in the tapes had ready admitted to their involvement. Walahi.. I will forever be grateful to God for delivering Nigeria from that order.

laughing in swahili

It is really good to see our senate truly rising up to their oversight function. This is honestly a new Nigeria. It is suddenly looking like I will see Nigeria become great in my lifetime.

Buhari is Corrupt! Let's call a spade, a spade.

Sai baba

#buhariisa419

Sai Barber o.

Iroh88:
Buhari shouldn't hesitate in firing all the undercover Goats that are bent on reviving the culture of pillaging our Yam barn

arresa:
This clown should be fired right away....

This is what you get when you hire the son of thw soil from that region, they all have ibori tendencies...

obailala:
All I see from this report and thread is a desperate bid by the wailing lovers of corruption to drag Buhari's name into their cesspit of corruption. If an employee of Buhari decides to steal, he will be investigated and brought to book.

So was Femi Adesina also dragging Buhari's name into his own "cesspit of corruption"
When will the followers of this PRETENTIOUS crook wake up & smell the ogi/akamu and realise they have been duped?
The juju must be strong walahi.



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OP, please include the source

Found the same story on This Day =>

Sleaze in Amnesty Office's N48bn Expenditure in Five Months Exposed




Brig-Gen. Paul Boro

• Report shows Boro spent N157.2m on armoured, other cars, N510m on 150 ex-militants to take UTME in two months


More from: http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/sleaze-in-amnesty-offices-n48bn-expenditure-in-five-months-exposed/231558/

This is what you get when you have a dullard as a president

What is it with Government Officails and luxury cars?
Once an officail resumes a post first thing he will think of is a new car.

I will "pight kworuption" when corruption is under your nose, what an irony...SMH

My brother the thing just be like movie soo oh.He could have spent the #510 paying fees of the students so they can finish their programs.

Elosky20:
510 million naira just for jamb, This must be a political telemundi.

WTF

PMB will not see this one, as long as GEJ or PDP is not mentioned there is no 'kwaruption'

If this is true, its time for me to join the league of wailers.

Who dey sell the registration form abeg?

When u want to lie, use sense...

Has the budget being passed? Which ministry did u see that is spending currently? Everyone is doing their researches and u're here, lying

Like I said earlier

''those supposed to 'rescue' the country are now the ones 'drowning' it. Hypocrites everywhere."