The Chairman of the House Committee on Civil Society and Donor Agencies, Eseme Eyibo, has alerted on security implications in the manner foreign donations are obtained and used in Nigeria. Talking with AZIMAZI MOMOH JIMOH, in Abuja, he listed the task ahead of the committee in checking the lack of co-ordination in the collection and implementation of grants in Nigeria. Excerpts:ALTHOUGH the Committee on Civil Society and Donor Agencies cannot be rated as 'juicy,' what are the tasks ahead of it'We measure committees based on capacity and objective. In that context, looking at the Committee on Donor Agencies and Civil Society, one is looking at the threshold of delivering governance. The present House initiated and adopted a Legislative Agenda, which is people driven. And here, we are talking of those things that would meet the collective aspirations of the people. As a Legislative House, we have a covenant with the people. In the last legislative session, we came up with issues within the contents of our constitutional responsibilities of oversight, appropriation and legislation. The oversight part came up with what was new then: the unspent funds. Now, because we want to make sure that the budget is not just a ritual, we sent it through a process where we evaluate its performance in the previous year. We also strengthened the institutions of government and there is a corresponding safety net in national planning.Today, we believe that if we are going to plug avenues for corruption in the national budget, we must refocus on grants and donations from international organisations, multi-nationals, etc. This requires thorough understanding of the matter and a strategic and symbiotic engagement. This to me makes the Committee the 'juiciest committee,' because it is all about protecting the interest of the people, ensuring proper representation.How 'juicy' is the committee then for the people'We normally hear in the international media of how much Nigeria has benefitted from development aids worth billions of US dollars. But many people do not pay attention to this. What we have realised is that there is an international racket in this. In Nigeria, we have realised that the aids that some donors claim they give to Nigeria are actually intended to provide tax reliefs for these organisations in their respective countries. That is one side of it. It is also intended to help them solve the problem of unemployment as their people come down here to work. Some of these people are unskilled workers who come here to look important. Of course they are paid back home and they all enjoy tax reliefs.Let me sketch another scenario. Some organisations donate $200 million for malaria intervention and 95 per cent of the fund is used to outsource malaria drugs and mosquito netting from other countries to Nigeria. Our question is what about Nigerian pharmaceutical companies' If they had such monies to produce mosquito nets and anti-malaria drugs, they would have the opportunity to employ pharmacists, doctors and this would grow the companies grow and strengthen our economy. But it is not so, sadly.In the Paris declaration, when you are donating or giving aid, the beneficiary should be on the driver's seat. But in Nigeria it is not so. Some donate directly. We have a National Planning Commission that is supposed to be a clearinghouse coordinating these donations, aids and grants. But in most cases, the data are not there and these people do not even know. This entire situation undermines our national planning.Also there are some of the non-governmental organisations (NGOs), community-based organisations or civil society organisations that may not even be working in the interest of Nigeria because these things are not co-ordinated.The major question before us is this: 'Who are the people behind some of these civil society organisations' What are they promoting' Who are the people behind them and their objectives' Are they promoting the interests of Nigeria or the interests of their principals' The issues at stake here are of importance to our national security. We could have a terrorist organisation receiving funds as an NGO or as a civil society and no one is monitoring it. There must be a template to profile these organisations. The committee has a very wide jurisdiction.Will there be any sort of legislative intervention from the Committee of the House on this'We are working on that. But beyond the issue of legislation, there is already an international declaration binding on all donors and beneficiaries and these things are observed in breach. Secondly, there is lack of co-ordination. The legislators are all out for oversight; the synonym of oversight in the bureaucracy is monitoring and evaluation. How many of the grants are monitored and evaluated' Some of them come in as aids but end up as loans.In some cases, because of the lack of co-ordination and non-compliance to international practice, we have a situation where for example two different organisations donate various sums for the same project. To cap it, a ministry could also budget for that same project. We now end up with one item funded by two interventions and also having it in the national budget. And this is corruption rears its head. Some people, I dare say a cartel must be benefiting from this duplication. We might actually not be capturing the scenario completely as of now, but we have a responsibility in the committee with the mandate of the House leadership to work out a synergy that will ensure that all the interventions aid our national planning and development under some visible organisation.Is the committee just viewing this in the context of the fight against corruption or in the context of specifically trying to come to terms with a subterranean corruption web in foreign donations'We are not going to fight anybody. What I am saying is that the donor agencies, the civil society organisations, community-based organisations, the MDAs and the legislature need to work together to chart a pathway that would be in accordance with the content of national planning. Anywhere in the world, when a private interest is in conflict with public interest, the public interest takes precedence. For example, how many of the people, like HIV patients, who are supposed to benefit from the foreign interventions in the case of donations relating to HIV drugs have access to the drugs' Some of these drugs have been found in the open market and at very high costs. Meanwhile, it will be reported in the international media that so much has been spent on intervention in HIV in Nigeria.In the case of malaria, the mosquito nets are on the streets for sale. And they were intended to be free. The anti-malaria drugs are also on the shelf of some pharmaceutical firms. Meanwhile, the Department For International Development (DFID) or any of the international organisations will document that they are aiding Nigeria on malaria prevention. And sadly, there is the scenario where 95 per cent of that money is used to source from Europe and Asia for drugs that can be produced in Nigeria. What happens to our manufacturing companies'You make it sound as if the concept of donor agencies is now a scam'There are donor agencies that are proactive and who mean well but unfortunately they do not follow the donations to the conclusion. The National Planning and the Federal Ministry of Finance are important in this matter. Whether it is a multi-lateral or a bi-lateral assistance, no one should fly in from wherever and say that they are giving a ministry technical assistance and it is not captured in the national planning threshold.Does the jurisdiction of the committee cover grants to state governments'States are parts of the Federation and there are cases where the National Planning Commission is intervening at the state level. There are the Universal Basic Education (UBE), Millennium Development Goal (MDG), and rural water sanitation projects among others. So once a project is coming in through national planning, if it is properly co-ordinated, we are supposed to be out there. We are going to look at the situations where these projects are done through this assistance. We want to see where those projects are so that we also help in giving a feed back to the donors through Parliament.Also worrisome is that there are people running churches and mosques as NGOs going abroad to source for funds and we don't know how much of national security is undermined. These things are not done this way in developed societies. No matter how altruistic a donor is, there must be a process for donation, and there is a process for implementation. We should be able to build a strong, sophisticated and proactive civil society community.There appear to be some disquiet over the constitution of standing committees of the House'It amounts to the issue of a mind diseased with corrupt tendencies when people begin to think about whether a committee is juicy or not. To the House leadership, I would say that no judge has ever scored 100 per cent judgment on anything. So you are bound to take decisions, which popularity will never be 100 per cent. There must be dissenting opinions here and there. But I expect that the leadership will be able to understand the exigencies of human nature and the culture of the Nigerian politics and accommodate. I want the leadership to build on the popularity and goodwill they have mustered in the House by making even those persons who were not convinced about the present leadership to join by playing a kind of family game where there is no exclusion. But on the whole, I expect the leadership to introduce some dispositions that would be able to create acceptability within the people because no leader can exist without the led. It must play its game to find itself in heaven, which is the heart of the followers.
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