Doris Ferdinand
The House of Representatives on Wednesday threatened to hand over the Acting Director-General Project Development Institute (PRODA), Mr Fabian Okonkwo to EFCC, ICPC, NFIU, Federal Civil Service over procurement deception and other offenses.
The chairman of the house committee on public procurement Hon Nassir Ali Ahmed disclosed this while responding to the Acting DG’s insincere reply to questions directed to him in an investigative public hearing.
The report presented to the house stated that PRODA issued award of contract and within a very short time made payment without informing Bureau of Public Procurement.
PRODA was then asked if they informed BPP of any cancellation of procurement process being coordinated in contract awarded based on the certificate of No Objection.
The Acting DG’s reply was in affirmative but when asked to provide the correspondence he replied in the negative.
This action provoked the law makers and the chairman in expressing his misgivings said:
“Let me tell you DG, when you see a bird dancing in the middle of the road, there is somebody in the bush that is beating the drum, in your case, we don’t know who is in the bush beating the drum, but we know that there is somebody in the bush that is beating the drum.
“The committee of public procurement and the parliament as a whole will make an example of you. I can assure you that every single penalty that is inside this public procurement act, you will face it; because I don’t think there has been any DG that has been sanctioned before, but I think you’ll be the first one.
“You need to understand that when you are appointed the DG in any capacity, it is not your personal business, it is the position of trust that has been given to you. You cannot sit down in your office and decide who gets what or who takes what, there is a process and that is why there is public procurement act.
“…and am very happy the board members of PRODA are here because they have heard with their own ears about the rot and what is happening in PRODA. I expect them to sit up and ensure that this kind of thing never ever happen again because a lot of time, we have issues where the board does not know where their power starts and where it ends.
“We will refer this case to the EFCC, ICPC, NFIU and the Federal Civil Service.”
