Despite sanctioning the approval, the Senate on Tuesday, February 20, resolved to probe the N30 trillion Ways and Means loan obtained by the administration of former president Muhammadu Buhari from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
The upper chamber has, as a result, constituted an ad hoc committee to interrogate disbursement and usage of the loan.
The resolution was sequel to a report of the Joint Senate Committee on Banking, Insurance and Other Financial Institutions, Finance, National Planning, Agriculture, and Appropriation presented during the plenary.
The Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, announced the resolution after most senators supported it through voice votes.
Chairman of the joint committee, Abdullahi Abubakar, who presented the report, explained that the current economic hardship was caused as a result of the violation of the ways and means of debt.
Abubakar, a Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) senator representing Kebbi North, advised the Federal Government to settle the N30 trillion debt.
The lawmaker also urged the CBN to ensure repayment of various intervention programmes and loans to reduce the money supply.
Ways and Means is a loan facility through which the Central Bank of Nigeria finances the Federal Government’s budget shortfalls.
During the plenary, the lawmakers blamed the leadership of the immediate past Senate led by Ahmad Lawan for approving such huge advances for the Federal Government.
In his defence, the immediate past Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, said his leadership approved a total of N23 trillion for the ways and means and not N30 trillion.
“What the 9th National Assembly approved or rectified in terms of ways and means was not 29 or 30 trillion. It was 22 trillion, but there was 819 billion to address very serious infrastructure dilapidation across the country.
“So, it was not 30 trillion. It was 22 trillion, and then, of course, the one we had made it almost 23 trillion. If we have ways and means that is 30 trillion today, that means something happened between then and now, and it is for the National Assembly to find out what happened,” Lawan said.
He, however, urged his colleagues to investigate the approval and disbursement of funds under the ways and means.
“If there were expenditures done wrongfully in contradiction to the provision of the Constitution, the National Assembly can look at the expenditures, and if sanctions are needed for unlawful, wrong, or unauthorised expenditures, the National Assembly can provide the sanctions.
“Nobody in this chamber should suggest that we shouldn’t look into anything that we feel is in the public interest, but let me say this very clearly: what Nigerians want today is food and security. How are we going to provide food for Nigerians and protect their lives?”.
