Secret Reporters No place to hide
Chief Sunny Onuesoke, former governorship aspirant of the Peoples Democratic Party in Delta state, Chief Sunny Onuesoke has called for the immediate arrest of Hon. Abdulmumin Jibrin over his role in the budget padding saga currently rocking the Federal House of Representatives.
Onuesoke who made this known in an interview also said that the suspension of Jibrin by the Federal House of Representatives yesterday was in order, saying there is nothing like padding of budget in the Nigeria constitution.
Onuesoke said “when I say we don’t have anything like padding in the budget, it’s a very simple thing, it is the duty of the executive to bring their proposal to the National Assembly, and it’s the function and constitutional right of the National Assembly to remove, add, input, include, make corrections of what the president brought to the house.
“If as a legislator you noticed that nothing in your constituency was inputted in the budget, don’t you have the right to protest. If you give 50% priority to the north, what stops you from giving same 50% to the southern region by virtue of the federal character. What Yakubu Dogara did was that he scrutinized the budget and found out that the area he came from, much attention was not given to it in the budget and of course he added to it, what is wrong in doing that?
“It is the principle of the legislature all over the globe to screen, delete and add to the budget, that is not padding. With this ongoing padding issue, I am very convinced that many Nigerians are yet to know the tenets of democratic politics; they are very ignorant of the legislative business. There is nothing like budget padding in the legislative arm, they only screen, remove and add”.
According to Onuesoke, “If a legislative arm receives budget proposal and passed it without screening, removing and adding, it will be called a rubber stamp house. What Yakubu Dogara did was very okay, it is the duty of Abdulmumin Jibrin to alert his colleagues of all wrongs before passage of the budget. Assuming he raised alarm and told Mr. Speaker that the projects he added were much, and advised him to spread them, it could have been better, not after the passage of the budget and he started crying wolf of budget padding.
“I am disappointed in Jibrin, I wonder the kind of school he attended. I think Jibrin is crying over splitted milk, I believe he is jealous of Mr. Speaker, if not he could have made his observations as chairman of appropriation committee before the passage of the budget. If at all that the security agents should investigate issues surrounding the budget then it must be Jibrin. In line with this I call for the immediate arrest and prosecution of Jibrin”.
