Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) caucus in the House of Representatives has described the Federal Government’s 774,000 job scheme as politically motivated and unsustainable.
In a statement by its leader, Kingsley Chinda, yesterday, it admonished members to ignore letters from the government requesting senators and members of the House to nominate 30 and 25 beneficiaries respectively from their councils.
Chinda noted that the N52 billion the government has earmarked for the programme in the 774 local government areas, if judiciously utilised, is enough to set up viable industries in each local government area.
According to him, the correspondence requesting lawmakers to nominate beneficiaries of the public works scheme is “a condemnable attempt to bribe and hoodwink the institution of the National Assembly into complicity in the misapplication of Nigeria’s scarce resources for the implementation of a questionable, misguided, absurd and arguably unlawful scheme that alarmingly intends to expend N52 billion under the guise of ‘creating employment’ for only three months.”
He added that while the PDP lawmakers supported the creation of gainful and sustainable employment for the large army of unemployed Nigerians, it was illogical for government to expend such enormous resources for a “transient” employment scheme.
“Elementary division of the approved programme budget of N52 billion by 774 LGAs implies expenditure of N67.184 million (about $150,000) in each LGA, which if applied judiciously and transparently will suffice for the establishment of a viable Industry in each LGA.
“From the estimated sum of N67.184 million intended to be expended in each LGA of Nigeria, N1million per Small and Medium scale Enterprise (SME) can be utilised for the creation and development of 67 SMEs per LGA, which will engage in viable and lucrative businesses in the agriculture, mining and other value chains that in most instances would be peculiar to each individual LGA and create gainful employment for up to three or more poor Nigerians per SME.
“The creation and development of 67 SMEs in each LGA will provide at least 134 actual sustainable jobs per LGA and 103,716 nationwide. The impact on Nigeria’s economy and GDP will be astronomical and will set Nigeria on the path to economic growth and development.”
However, leader of the House of Representatives, Alhassan Ado-Doguwa, has said recent directive to chairmen of standing and ad-hoc committees to halt all their activities, including ongoing probes into activities of some Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs), was not intended to scuttle the investigations.
Ado-Doguwa stated this in a statement, yesterday, in reaction to allegations by the PDP that the directive was a ploy by the House leadership to frustrate the probes.
The opposition party had accused Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila of frustrating corruption investigations after the House announced the suspension of all activities of its committees on August 19.
PDP in a statement claimed the decision to suspend the sitting of the various probe committees was “ a deliberate design to cover the stench of corruption oozing out of the APC administration.”
But the House leader said the allegation had exposed PDP’s ‘plot’ to cause crisis in the polity by using some of its members in the parliament to cause friction between the executive and legislative arm of governments.
“It is worthy of note also, that it has never been the practice or tradition of the House to continue with indoor committee engagements while on annual recess as it is obtainable in the developed democracies like U.S., who are right now enjoying their summer recess, especially now that we are being faced with a global health emergency due to COVID-19 pandemic.
“It will be of interest to the PDP that the investigations the House is currently undertaking, including the Chinese loans cover the 16 years the PDP was in power when most of the loans were obtained. So, maybe they should be thanking the House leadership for covering up their misdeeds. Hence, making reference to the recent $500 billion China loan by the PDP spokesman, which has already been approved by the National Assembly through a transparent and formal request, was either a deliberate misrepresentation of facts or an utter ignorance of the history.