By Doris Ferdinand
The House of Representatives on Wednesday querried the EFCC over what it termed unnecessary delay in the recruitment of new staffs as appropriated for 2020 budget.
chairman of the house committee on financial crime Hon. Abdullahi Ibrahim Dutse handed down the querry at a budget defence session with the leadership of the commission saying that the Acting effc chairman should nascetain If the proposed recruitment by the commission has been carried out.
According to him; “Am aware that last year you were to employ about 420 new staffs and I guess I want to believe that has not been done. Please I want to know if that employment has actually been effected.”
“And I remember also very well, it was because you people were going to employ more hands, that was why we jacked up the personnel cost to what it is, but here we are today that out of the Appropriated N24.9b, N21.3b has been released and only N17.6b has been utilized and that is to say, there is a short fall, I don’t know if you are still on the way of making these employment or you’re not.” He added.
The Acting Chairman EFCC, Muhammed Umar in his response stated that the process was ongoing untill the case of the dreaded covid-19 pandemic came up which forced the commission to put the process on hold which also was responsible for the balance of N4b, amount released for personnel.
The EFCC boss also reeled out some of the challenges the commission is facing which include the need to have special courts for corruption cases and poor budget releases. He appealed to the committee to ensure that appropriated funds are released for effective running of the commission.
He further bemoaned the non payment of 5% of recovered looted funds as the cost of collection which her sister agencies like Federal Inland Revenue is enjoying.
“The issue regarding 5% of recoveries to be given as the cost of collection, like that being given to FIRS and other revenue generatting organization, I don’t think that has been approved, so as a matter of fact, we have not gotten anything outside the budgetary allocation and the subsequent releases that was released to the commission. The issue of 5% was not really approved as far as we are concern.”
However, the committee chairman while addressing the issue stated that the committee can only endeavor to see to it that the commission’s approved budget is released especially capital allocation. .
The EFCC boss while clarifying the issue of unutilized released funds disclosed that procurement processes are cumbersome and is hopefully that it will be completed before the year ends. He also explained the reason behind the commission not establishing more offices.
He said; “It is important to equipped them more rather than establish more offices across the nation. We look at the viability first and foremost before looking on the possibility of establishing more offices.”
