Drama as Angry Reps Query Why Board Members of Sovereign Wealth Authority are Paid N250k Per Sitting Allowance

Members of the board of the Sovereign Wealth Authority who allegedly shortchanged the government have found themselves in a serious trouble.

Members of the House of Representatives (File Photo)

 

The House of Representatives Public Account Committee, PAC, has ordered that it should be furnished with all relevant vouchers concerning the N250,000 per sitting allowance of board members of Sovereign Wealth Authority, SWA within eight days.

 

This came to light during an investigative hearing last Friday, when panel members discovered that there were multiple entries of four sittings in just one day which was clearly a sign of malpractice.

 

This development did not go down well with the lawmakers who discovered that in some days, the board members sat four times, totalling N1 million sitting allowance per board member, Vanguard reports.

 

Responding to the query, the Managing Director of SWA, Mr Uche Ubosi, said: “It is the standard practice of sovereign wealth authorities world wide to pay sitting allowances to board members.’’

 

This angered the lawmakers who immediately declared that he should produce evidence of such payments where board members were paid as much as N1 million per day.

 

The lawmakers also queried the reason all the payment schedules were computer print outs and demanded for signed receipts and signed documents authorising such payments.

 

In his ruling, Chairman of PAC, Kingsley Chinda, PDP, Obio/Akpor Federal Constituency, Rivers, ordered that “all relevant documents, not photocopies, should be submitted to this committee within the next eight days.

“You are also expected to furnish this committee with concrete evidence of where authorities pay as much as N250,000 per sitting in other climes.’’

 

SWA board members appeared before the committee to answer queries raised by the Office of the Auditor-General to the Federation, AuGF, from 2010 through 2013.