With few days to the end of the life of the current federal administration, a pro-democracy civil society group- HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA ((HURIWA) has charged the outgoing coordinating minister of the Economy and minister of Finance Dr (Mrs) Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala to publish the details of the Federal Allocations released to all federating units since June of last year.
HURIWA said it was imperative that the details of these humonguos allocations made to states and Local council areas all around Nigeria are disclosed in form of public information on the website of theFinance ministry especially from mid last year when the ministry unilaterally stopped disclosing the very details of these allocations.
The group in a statement made available to the media and jointly signed by the National Coordinator Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and the National Media Affairs Director Miss Zainab Yusuf stated that it was reliably informed by United States based researchers that the Finance ministry indeed stopped the publication of the details of the Federal Allocations to States and local councils since June of last year even as it says this shortcoming has adversely affected the advocacy campaigns of credible pro-transparency Non-governmental organisations in Nigeria and must be redressed by Mrs Okonjo-Iweala before she bows out on May 29th 2015.
HURIWA said the comprehensive financial releases to the component parts of the federation must be disclosed freely in the spirit of freedom of information Act of 2011 so Nigerians can fully hold their governors responsible for the poor situation of finances in most of the 36 states now.
Excerpts from the media statement are as follows: “When Mrs Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala first became Minister of Finance, she did something that revolutionized government accountability and citizen participation; she introduced the monthly publication of the detailed Federal Allocation to all tiers of government, in the major newspapers and on the Federal Ministry of Finance website”.
“While many considered it to be an exuberance of political naivety that would be quickly dispensed of by more sophisticated and seasoned political and administrative minds, Dr. Okonjo-Iwela stood her ground. Those pundits were wrong, she was right, and that singular action gave courage to Nigerians that indeed government could be held accountable when citizens became knowledgeable participants”.
“When in 2011 she became the Co-ordinating Minister of the Economy, Dr. Okonjo-Iweala reiterated her commitment to the continued publication of the data as a legacy of her commitment to Nigeria. The re-statement was a necessary testimony to the personal and professional sacrifices she was willing to make, especially in light of the numerous attacks to her person, from many who saw her return to Nigeria as being compromised, and nothing more than an adventure to ‘come and chop’ her share.”
“When sometime last year we received several complaints and requests from researchers and other interested citizens that the Minister was not living up to her words – that the Ministry was not publishing the detailed reports (by Federal Statutory Bodies, State and LGA) of the Monthly Allocations on its official website, we decided to take a wait and see approach, convinced that it was probably nothing more than a technical issue. It has been almost a year now, and so we decided to take a closer look and went onto the official website of the Ministry, and what we found was quite disturbing.”
“The last detailed allocation published on the site was for the FAAC Distribution made in May 2014, just over a years worth of data remains unpublished. A search for other months ( June 2014 to April 2014) returned an error message as seen by us from an image we now have inour file. This was not what we expected and we call on all those who have responsibility to publish these reports to do so, let the legacy of Dr. Okonjo-Iweala’s contribution to Nigeria’s fiscal development not die on her watch.”
“As the curtain draws on this administration and possibly on Dr. Okonjo-Iweala’s tenure as Minister of Finance of the Federal Republic of Nigeria; it would be rather unfortunate if she ended it all by not publishing the Allocations for the last year of her tenure in office.”
“Whether by omission or commission, neither of which history would care to differentiate, the Minister for Finance of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the Co-ordinating Minister of the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala should see to it that the story told about this adventure in government accountability is not that of the doubting pundits who said that it was only a matter of time, and the irony would be that it was with her own hands and implicit consent and inaction that it all finally came to an end”, HURIWA affirmed.