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We are concerned about recovered loot, says Suswan
The Chairman, Appropriation Committee of the House of Representatives, Hon. Gabriel Suswan told KODILINYE OBIAGWU that in terms of performance, the 2005 budget will be better than 2004. He also spoke on government's economic reforms and the national conference. Excerpts
WHAT is the position of your committee on the issue of regulation of the prices of petroleum products?
We support it to the extent that it would have to be phased. If the whole thing was carefully planned, the agency that was saddled with this responsibility would not have got to this level. Unfortunately, they just decided that they should implement it and that became difficult for the people to take. If it were phased, the people would have to absorb it gradually, and would have adjusted to it. And that of course brings in the issue of refineries. So much money has being sunk into maintaining the refineries without results. There is nobody who will spend the kind of money that government has spent all this while on the refineries. It is unfortunate. We were at a conference in Washington and a colleague from Saudi jokingly said that when Nigeria was mentioned as an oil producing country, he said he thought Nigeria was an importer of oil, that was just an oil producer. It does not make sense. Individuals fed very fat on the refineries, and it is difficult for the government to go into the issue of maintenance.
There is this recurring question on the non-implementation of the budget by the executive as laid down by the House, what is the response of your committee to this?
In the first four years of this administration, we - executive and legislature - were largely testing each other, and most of the time we were confrontational. We were yet to understand what is budgeting. It is a technical thing, but most people thought it is just about adding figures. It is far from that; and we needed to understand the powers to appropriate. The whole thing was just some sort of misunderstanding between the two arms of government. It is different now. Some experienced members in the House who are in their second term have improved the way we are handling the national budgets. And then the crop of people on the executive, like the Minister of Finance and then the D-G in the Budget Office are people who know their acts. They have been able to dialogue with us and we understand one another. Confidence has been brought back into budget. The contentious issue now is Due Process. Most people now know that if you have Due Process certificate, there is money in the Bank for you. In terms of performance, structure, and the level of implementation, the performance of 2005 budget will be better than 2004. The performance of the 2003 budget was put at 23 per cent, but in the eight months into 2004, the performance is put at 50 per cent. We expect that the worst scenario will be a performance put at 70 per cent. The reason is that most people have not being able to cope with the requirements of Due Process, otherwise it would have performed up to 100 per cent, because the money is in the Central Bank. We have improved, and we will improve more and we will understand what budgeting is all about.
The calls for National Conference and the government looks disposed to a dialogue of sorts. The clamour has been sustained since 1999...what do you think about it?
When we allow few individuals to confuse the nation as has been the case in the past, then they can bring disaster to all of us. The future of this nation is in our hands, and if we appreciate the fact that a stable country enhances the future of our children then we would not allow selfish individuals to jeopardise what we are building. It is for us to educate Nigerians that it is better that we keep stable and move ahead, learn from our mistakes, forge ahead and make a better living in the future.
It has been said so often that you do not ask for a sovereign conference under a democratically elected government, because you already have an elected assembly of people, so what will be the criteria for the conference.
How would you assess the House of Representatives in responding to the needs of the people?
My hope is that we can make more provisions for security and poverty that effects this country. We can also address the issue of health and of course when you have healthy human beings in the nation, you have a healthy nation. I want to see that the welfare of our people is greatly improved and that is the feeling around the National Assembly.
How do you assess the economic reforms of the government?
Whenever there are extensive reforms by any country, it is always the same story. We will not allow ourselves get to the bottom like Ghana at one time, so it is better we start now. The sacrifices are very enormous on the people, but there is no way out. We need that sacrifice for our children to be better off. What the government is doing is for us not to fall to the bottom. The thrust of the 2005 budget tends to address most of these key areas necessary for the sacrifice. In other areas, there is the privatisation programme, which is the only way we can create jobs, because government cannot provide the jobs for the number of graduates we are producing. What we need is for government to provide the environment for the private sector to create jobs...
Some of these things are not new. Babangida started it and we resisted. Apparently, if he implemented them with a sincerity of purpose, we would not have reached this stage.
How would you assess the reception of Due Process and the initial performance of the House?
When Due Process came in, the initial resistance was because there was little understanding and appreciation of what it was. So we just thought that the President has found job for the boys. But we understand the system more now and appreciate it. The members of the National Assembly are getting to agree with the new ways of doing things. It is practically impossible to carry every person on board in a place where you have 469 members. You still have some pockets of misgivings. But with time, and once it is passed at the National Assembly as a legal instrument, then National Assembly members would work in consonance with the rest of the bill.
On the issue of loot recovery, where really is the loot in the last five years?
When you look at last year's budget, about N80 billion of that money was used in financing it. Any time all the money that have been recovered comes, it will be properly appropriated by the National Assembly. We are concerned about the recovered money.`
We were at a conference in Washington and a colleague from Saudi Arabia jokingly said that when Nigeria was mentioned as an oil producing country, he said he thought Nigeria was an importer of oil. It does not make sense. Individuals fed very fat on the refineries, and it is difficult for the government to go into the issue of maintenance.
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