What is a ‘security vote’?

Security votes are budgeted funds provided to certain
federal, state, and local government officials to spend at
their discretion on—in theory—anything security-related.
They are budgeted separately from planned security
expenditures such as personnel salaries, allowances,
equipment, training and operational expenses. Security
votes also differ from extra-budgetary defence spending
that may be authorised by the President—often in secret—from opaque sources like the Federal Government Independent Revenue account. In practice, however, security votes have become opaque discretionary accounts (‘slush funds’) that serve several overlapping functions:

• Formal. Supplement army, police and other
security agencies’ expenditures, often because
their budgets have been embezzled or withheld;

• Informal. Mobilise and sustain non-state security
actors (e.g. vigilantes, youth volunteers, local militias);

• Political. Channel public funds into political
patronage networks, party coffers, or to cover
the cost of elections including campaigns, vote
buying, rigging, hiring thugs and post-election litigation;

• Personal. Personally enrich senior politicians,
officials and security officers.

The use of the word ‘vote’ to describe a budget item dates back to the British colonial era. Outside of Nigeria, the term continues to be used by officials in the UK, India, Uganda, Kenya and Australia. In India, the term ‘vote-on-account’ describes temporary funds released by Parliament to cover exigent government expenses until a formal budget is passed.7

Unusually for a country as legalistic as Nigeria, security
votes do not have a specific constitutional or statutory
basis8—yet neither are they explicitly prohibited. Security votes somewhat resemble the ‘Contingencies Fund’, a Nigerian constitutional mechanism that gives federal and state legislators the power to create a fund for the executive to draw upon when there exists an ‘urgent and unforeseen need for expenditure for which no other provision exists’.9 Unlike security votes, the executive must justify to legislators any withdrawal from this contingency fund.10 The ‘Service Wide Vote’—a massive source of extra-budgetary cash that Ministry Departments and Agencies (MDAs) can apply to draw upon—also resembles a security vote. Appropriated by legislators and controlled by the Ministry of Finance, this pot of money (over $532 million/N191.6 billion in the 2017 budget) resembles the Contingencies Fund insofar as it is meant to cover unforeseen expenses.

The nature of these ‘emergency’ expenses covered by
security votes, the Contingencies Fund, and the Service
Wide Vote vary widely—personnel costs, pension arrears, election commission expenses, entitlements paid to former presidents and even security expenses—according to a 2013 government audit report.11 This audit also showed several ad hoc outlays including $35 million (N12.6 billion) in payments to the Nigerian Army Quick Response Group and $425.4 million (N153.1 billion) for the Presidential Amnesty Programme for ex-militants in the Niger Delta.

Historical origins

The origins of the modern security vote likely date back
to the late 1960s, when head of state General Yakubu
Gowon granted state military administrators small slush
funds—labeled ‘security votes’—they could use to placate civilian elites rankled by these officers’ new-found dominance over state affairs. In the late 1970s, head of state General Olusegun Obasanjo strengthened Nigeria’s regime security apparatus following the assassination of his predecessor General Murtala Muhammed in February 1976, creating the National Security Organisation (NSO)—forerunner to today’s State Security Service (SSS). Created by military decree, all operational and administrative information about the NSO—including its budget and expenditures—remained closely held secrets.12

During the civilian-led Second Republic (1979-1983) under President Shehu Shagari, the use of secretive security votes continued and were used by corrupt politicians to siphon public funds. When General Muhammadu Buhari became head of state following the 1983 military coup, his government arrested scores of former officials for embezzling these funds. In 1984, former Kwara State governor Adamu Atta was jailed for embezzling $2.7 million (equal to $6.3 million today) in security vote.13

Following the overthrow of Buhari, the General Ibrahim Babangida (1985-1993) and General Sani Abacha (1993-1998) governments perfected and institutionalised the use of security votes as a tool for self-enrichment. Under Babangida, only the president and his inner circle enjoyed privileged access to security votes—even state military governors received only token sums.14 Abacha and his associates embezzled over $2 billion in cash withdrawn from the central bank—ostensibly as a security vote—according to US Department of Justice court filings.15

Following Nigeria’s 1999 return to civilian rule, soldiers turned-civilian officials such as President Obasanjo and National Security Adviser Aliyu Mohammed Gusau
allowed security votes to multiply and proliferate across
government and the security sector. Nigeria’s 36 civilian
governors also embraced this powerful source of political patronage, campaign finance, and personal enrichment. Within just a few years of taking office, Nigeria’s civilian leaders had embraced and revitalised the security vote despite it being an anachronistic and controversial symbol of military rule.

Security votes as a political tool

Today, security votes are budgetary black boxes that are
ripe for abuse by politicians seeking reelection or officials looking to run for political office. Fungible, unaudited, and transacted entirely in cash, security vote is an ideal mechanism for covering electoral expenses—including unsanctioned ones like hiring political thugs, bribing election officials, running post-election litigation and even praying for divine intervention. In the words of one veteran politician:

Why are we probing security votes now? You see, security votes to my understanding can be used for native doctors, it can be used to hire Alphas [sooth-sayers] and it can be used for churches to pray
for the country. It can be used for even sponsoring
things.

One former governor was even more candid about the
political utility of security votes as he explained how a
hypothetical first term governor might seek to use it to co-opt the top election official in his state:

When the Resident Electoral Commissioner (REC) comes before the elections are conducted...he pays a courtesy call on the governor. It’s usually a televised event you know, and of course he says all the right things: “Your Excellency, I am here to
ensure that we have free and fair elections and I
will require your support.”

After the courtesy call, the REC now moves in for a one-on-one with the governor and says, “Your Excellency, since I came, I’ve been staying in this hotel, there is no accommodation for me and even my vehicle is broken down and the last Commissioner didn’t leave the vehicle…” The Governor says [to his Chief of Staff]: “Please ensure that the REC is accommodated. Put him in the Presidential lodge, allot two cars to him...”

A few weeks to the elections, the REC sees the governor...and says, “we need to conduct a training programme for the [polling unit] presiding officers and headquarters hasn’t sent us any money yet, you know...” [The governor asks] “How much would
that cost?” The REC replies: “N25 million [$170,000
as of 2010] for the first batch, we may have about
three batches.” [Calling his Chief of Staff, the governor says] “Make sure that we arrange N25 million this week...and N75 million in all...put it under ‘Security Vote’.” In other words...cash in huge Ghana Must Go bags.

Politics may also shape the ever-shifting distribution of security votes at the federal level. Analysis of federal security vote recipients from 2014 to 2018 suggests that the list of second-tier security vote recipients (those receiving token amounts of $30,000 / N10 million or less) varies widely year-to-year. For example, under President Goodluck Jonathan, the Nigerian Embassy in Moscow received a sizeable $263,000 (N42.1 million) security vote in 2014, but has not received one since. Perhaps it was not a coincidence that in 2014, the then-Ambassador to Russia Assam Assam was contesting in the People’s Democratic Party governorship primary in Akwa Ibom State.

President Buhari’s final budget for 2018—ahead of the
2019 elections—reveals a huge expansion of the use of
security votes, with the total number of MDAs receiving
a security vote from about 30 in 2016 to over 190 in 2018. With the approach of the 2019 election, this abrupt increase should ring alarm bells for those overseeing Nigerian public spending.

Source: http://ti-defence.org/publications/camouflaged-cash-how-security-votes-fuel-corruption-in-nigeria/