The House of Representatives will hold an emergency session tomorrow to discuss the bribery allegations levelled against members of the house committee on fuel subsidy probe. A statement signed by the Clerk to the House Mohammed S. Omolori yesterday said all members are to reconvene for plenary session at 10am prompt.A ranking member who does not want to be named told Daily Trust that the leadership has decided to relief the eight-member probe panel headed by Lawan of the job of probing the subsidy fraud. Consequently, a motion on the matter would be brought up for consideration.The lawmaker also said the House will resolve to ask the executive arm of government to immediately implement the report of the probe panel which uncovered fraud in subsidy management amounting to about N2 trillion.'We will not allow N100 bribery allegations to distract attention from the main issue on ground. And that is the prosecution of all those indicted and recovery of about N2 trillion naira. Therefore, we will request that the Federal government commences immediate implementation of the report which has been with them for about two months now,' the lawmaker said.The House had proceeded on one week recess on June 6th and was billed to resume June 18, 2012. A source close to the leaders said the House cannot afford to wait until June 18 because of the injury the accusation has caused the House.Daily Trust heard that the body of Principal Officers had held a three-hour marathon meeting at the residence of Speaker Aminu Waziri Tambuwal yesterday morning, where they discussed the allegations against Rep. Farouk and his colleagues on the ad hoc committee.On whether the Farouk would be handed suspension, the legislator said the matter was discussed in the meeting chaired by Tambuwal yesterday but it was resolved that doing so will amount to pronouncing him guilty, which is prejudicial.'We are not happy with the way the executive is handling this matter as they are using it to avoid implementing this report and we will resist it,' he said.Otedola had admitted to giving $600,000 bribe to Farouk in the wake of submission of the report in late April this year.Farouk, however, denied the allegations in a statement on Sunday, but on Monday turned out to say he collected the money as evidence to be tendered to the House.It would be recalled that on Sunday January 8, 2012, the House held an emergency session over the removal of fuel subsidy by the Federal Government on 1st January, 2012; during which an investigation into the management of petroleum subsidy was instituted, and Farouk was appointed to chair the committee.The panel was also mandated by the House to monitor the implementation of fuel subsidy regime in Nigeria. The report submitted on April 18, 2012 and adopted by the House was therefore in fulfilment of the first mandate given to Farouk and his colleagues. Daily Trust learnt that a new committee will be appointed to complete Farouk's job.
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