Sack Senator Barau from Appropriation Committee over alledged budget padding – Lawan told

Some Civil Society Organisations have called for the sack of the Chairman of Senate Committee on Appropriation, Senator Jibrin Barau.

The group in Abuja called on President of the Senate, Dr. Ahmad Ibrahim Lawan to remove Barau over alledged 2022 budget padding and large scale corruption.

The groups, Guidance of Democracy and Development Initiative and Partners for Legislative Agenda in Nigeria (PLAN) want the lawmaker sanctioned to save the image of the National Assembly.

Leaders of the group, Comrade Danesi Momoh Prince of GDDI and Comrade Igwe Ude-Umanta, explained that the Senate Committee on Appropriation was too sensitive to be headed by Senator Barau who has been accused of.aoilong his hands in dirty deals.

“It is therefore incumbent on you as the Senate President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to rise to the moral and patriotic occasion before you and sack the indicted senator.”
They further said:

“We are very saddened about the manifestation of corruption in Nigeria in its instituted forms. At a period of undeniable economic downturn and financial austerity for the federal government, it is suffocating to live with the fact that as long as a character like Senator Barau Jibrin chairs the appropriation committee of the Senate, budget padding will be the order of the day.

“The 2020 Appropriation Act is full of padded expenditures which have now been pronounced by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) as failing in all the integrity tests of accepted procedures in procurement and an aberration to the provisions of the Procurement Act.

“In the reported constituency and executive tracking exercise phase 3 report of the ICPC, it has become obvious that Senator Barau Jibrin has bestrode our national budget as a monstrous colossus, creating expenditures that can only be criminally explained, or accounted for.

“And expectedly, the senator has not denied the allegations in the ICPC report against him. A man who is found to have grossly abused our National Budget should not by any moral compass be allowed to continue to superintend over the legislative scrutiny of our national budget.”