SERAP urged him to “direct Mr Malami and appropriate anti-corruption agencies to investigate why the Safe Schools Initiative, established to bolster security at schools in response to the abduction of the Chibok schoolgirls has failed to stop frequent abductions of students, and to ensure the safety and security of Nigerian children in schools across the country.”
Browsing: SERAP
SERAP also urged Mbam “to send your review and recommendations to the National Assembly for appropriate remedial and legislative action, as provided for by the Nigerian Constitution 1999 [as amended].”
SERAP stated that “if there is relevant and sufficient admissible evidence, anyone suspected to be involved should face prosecution, as appropriate.”
The suit followed recent move by the Federal Government to take over and borrow unclaimed dividends and dormant account balances owned by Nigerians in any bank in the country.
The organization is also urging him to “provide details of spending of overdrafts and loans obtained from the CBN by successive governments between 1999 and 2015.”
The organisation is also urging him to “ensure the full recovery of any missing public funds, revealed in the 2017 annual audited report by the Office of the Auditor-General of the Federation.”
The organisation also urged President Buhari to “direct Mr Malami and the anticorruption agencies to make public the outcome of any investigation, and to prosecute suspected perpetrators if there is relevant admissible evidence, as well as fully recover any missing public funds.”
The World Bank Board of Directors had last week approved $500 million “to help boost access to electricity in Nigeria and improve the performance of the electricity distribution companies in the country.”
The demand was contained in an open letter dated January 20, 2021 and signed by SERAP’s Deputy Director, Kolawole Oluwadare, made public on Sunday.
SERAP also urged her to “explain the rationale for paying N5,000 to 24.3 million poor Nigerians, which translates to five-percent of the country’s budget of N13.6 trillion for 2021, and to clarify if this proposed spending is part of the N5.6 trillion budget deficit.”
The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, had last week reportedly confirmed that the Federal Government would sell some-government-owned properties to fund the 2021 budget.
The Finance Act, signed into law by Buhari last December, would allow the government to borrow unclaimed dividends and dormant account balances owned by Nigerians in any bank in the country.
SERAP said: “The Working Group should request the Nigerian authorities to withdraw the bogus charges against Mr Sowore and four other activists, and to immediately and unconditionally release them.”
SERAP said: “In the wake of the abduction of over 300 students from the Government Science Secondary School, Kankara, Katsina State, and ongoing security challenges in several parts of the country, the time has come to demonstrate transparency and accountability in the spending of public funds meant to secure people’s lives and property.”
The organization also urged him “to instruct Mr Pantami and Mr Abubakar to take concrete measures to promptly ensure that the NIMC is able to faithfully and effectively discharge its statutory functions to harmonize and integrate existing identification databases in government agencies into the National Identity Database, and to use the information to update SIM card registration.”
The Office of the Auditor-General for the Federation had last Thursday before the Senate Public Accounts Committee revealed that officials of the Ministry of Petroleum Resources spent N116 million to buy biros, letterhead and toners in one year, alleging “contravention of the Public Procurement Act 2017 by the Permanent Secretary.”
The Governors last week reportedly proposed to borrow around N17 trillion from the pension funds after receiving a briefing from the Kaduna State Governor, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, who is the Chairman of the National Economic Council Ad Hoc Committee on Leveraging Portion of Accumulated Pension Funds for Investment in the Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority.
Mandamus is a judicial remedy in the form of an order from a court to any government, subordinate court, corporation, or public authority, to do some specific act which that body is obliged under law to do, and which is in the nature of public duty.
The advice was contained in a letter dated November 21, 2020 and signed by SERAP’s Deputy Director, Kolawole Oluwadare, made available to the media on Sunday.
Justice Rilwan Aikawa of the Federal High Court in Ikoyi, Lagos last week ruled in favour of SERAP in a suit it brought against Okowa and UBEC.