Reps query ministry over N4bn expenditure on 100 sanitation personnel

The House of Representatives Public Account Committee has queried the Ministry of Water Resources for spending N4 billion on the recruitment of 100 personnel for a period of three months. The money was said to be for a project known as Youth Engagement for Sanitation (YES) across the 774 local government areas in the country. […]

The House of Representatives Public Account Committee has queried the Ministry of Water Resources for spending N4 billion on the recruitment of 100 personnel for a period of three months.

The money was said to be for a project known as Youth Engagement for Sanitation (YES) across the 774 local government areas in the country.

Rep Bamidele Salam, the chairman of the committee, issued the query while investigating Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the government on the alleged mismanagement of COVID-19 intervention funds from 2020 to 2022.

He also queried the ministry for reportedly sinking boreholes for between N25m and N12.5m per unit, describing it as unacceptable.

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The Permanent Secretary of the ministry, Mrs Didi Walson-Jack, told the committee that the boreholes were sunk in some locations across the states of the federation and the FCT.

She said, “In total, 299 new water schemes were embarked upon during the period, just as a total of 188 old and abandoned solar boreholes were resuscitated during the period.”

The committee members also sought to know the modality of recruitment of the personnel, the full list of the youths involved, their account numbers and the schedule of payments sent to their respective banks. (NAN)

Salam further said that the committee would embark on project verification, adding that it would not only be limited to the ministry, but to other MDAs which claimed to have done one project or another. (NAN)