The
embattled Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Babachir
Lawal, has finally appeared before the Senate Committee on Federal
Character and Inter-Governmental Affairs.
Babachir Lawal
Days after he failed to honour an initial invitation to defend his
office’s proposed budget for 2017, the Secretary to the Government of
the Federation (SGF), Babachir Lawal, finally appeared before the Senate
Committee on Federal Character and Inter-Governmental Affairs on
Monday.
According to Premium Times, the initial schedule for Lawal who had
been represented by the permanent secretary (general services), Office
of the SGF, Mohammaed Bukar, to defend his office’s proposed budget of
N9.88 billion was last Thursday.
The SGF's representative's appearance had been rejected by the
committee which insisted that Lawal must appear in person, and on Monday
when he eventually appeared, Lawal said his initial absence was a
result of the death of the wife of the Sports Minister.
However, his absence fueled suspicions that he took the decision as a result of his ongoing row with the Senate.
Recall that the Senate had last year, asked President Muhammadu
Buhari to relieve Lawal of his position and get him prosecuted after the
legislature accused him of breaching the country’s law and code of
conduct for public officers in handling of a “grass cutting” contract awarded by the Presidential Initiative for the North East, PINE, under his office.
Babachir later dismissed the Senate as saying “balderdash” and accused the lawmakers of desperation to “pull him down”.
During his appearance before the Tijani Kaura-led committee on
Monday, Lawal said that out of the N9.9 billion proposed for his office,
N3.4 billion was proposed for personnel costs, while N3.8billion was
proposed for overhead, representing a N2 billion increase from the 2016
provision.
He said the amount proposed for overhead was meant for activities
and programmes of other offices headed by various permanent secretaries
in his office, as well as funding of activities and programmes of
political office holders such as the special advisers and senior special
assistants to the president.
Lawal who added that N2.7 billion would go to capital projects, decried the provision for his office as inadequate.
Following questions from the Senators, he assured that funds to care of former leaders had been “sufficiently” budgeted.
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