Unremitted Revenues:CACOL Seeks Sanction Against Defaulting MDAs

 The Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership (CACOL) has advocated the need for anti-corruption agencies to prosecute officials of  Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs) found wanting  for not remitting the agencies funds to the federation account.

The group also recommended that  Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs) that fail to remit their funds to the federation account should not receive appropriation in subsequent year’s budget and the various anti-corruption agencies in the country should be called upon to investigate the whereabouts of the money in question.

 Debo Adeniran, the Executive Director of the group gave the advice in Lagos against the recent bid by the Senate to probe revenues being remitted by the Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) between 2014 and 2020 and the payment of one per cent stamp duty on all contracts awarded by them within the same period.

He said:“This is no doubt, in line with our previous calls for the audit law and other useful legislation that are already begging for speedy consideration and passage in the National Assembly for ages to be accorded due attention so that the fight against official corruption could become a thing of the past in the country.”

He supported the action of the lawmakers to launch the investigation into unremitted revenues by the MDA and expressed that it was disheartening  that some MDAs were yet to remit over N2 trillion to the Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF) of the Federal Government between 2014 and 2020.

The disclosure, which he stated was made by Chairman, Senate Committee on Finance, Senator Solomon Adeola (APC- Lagos), in a statement by Kayode Odunaro, his Media Adviser recently, was very unpatriotic and smirks of corruption.

He said: “We have said it over and over again that it is disheartening and demoralising how most of the MDAs flagrantly disregard the directives of the National Assembly and the country’s Auditor-General (AuGF) on submission of audited accounts for necessary vetting and scrutiny because there is a lacuna in our Constitution that has made it expedient for them to tactically evade such order with no fear of backlash or any sanction whatsoever for such impunity.

“We want to commend the Senate Committee on Finance for investigating and bringing this issue to public knowledge.Over the years, we have been at the forefront of championing calls for the legislature to take full charge of their oversight functions especially in situations where public funds were misappropriated.

“With the advancement in technology today, most of the looting or financial manipulations would be effectively prevented and detected ab initio if we focused more on prevention and greater accountability and independence of organs saddled with oversight and embrace e-governance as a matter of urgency”.