Says U.S. security advice not newFiscal prudence tops Reps' agenda A TEMPLATE for the reduction of the cost of contracts is being prepared bythe Federal Government in response to the outcry against the wastage associated with government's projects.The Federal Executive Council (FEC) yesterday set up a presidential committee to work out this template.The council also approved a presidential directive from President Goodluck Jonathan, which mandated the Co-ordinating Minister of the Economy and Minister ofFinance and the Director General of the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP) to ensure that no contract comes to the council without an agreed and verifiable transition plan. This is to ensure that all projects are awarded and completed smoothly and on time.The meeting, presided over by President Goodluck Jonathan, has also stopped full payment to consultants, tying each payment to the performance of their projects.Besides, the House of Representatives has pledged commitment to ensure that only projects that would impact directly on the lives of the common man will be approved for the next fiscal year.It has also promised to eliminate wastage in the allocation of the nation's scarce resources to projects, which are never completed or executed at all.Minister of Information, Mr. Labaran Maku, told journalists at the end of the council meeting that the new measures being put in place were aimed at improving governance.The minister said that the Federal Government was 'doing everything necessary' to drastically control the growing insecurity in the country.Maku told journalists that great strides had been made in the battle to control the violent attacks 'against innocent citizens', appealing to Nigerians to understand that the way to fully control the insecurity was for them to cooperate with the security agencies.The minister also said that the information the United States (U.S.) passed to the public, which caused panic, was already known to the Nigerian security agencies and had taken care of it.Maku stated that though the U.S. government had a proper channel to pass the information to the Nigerian government, it chose to pass it through the media.He also counselled the opposition political parties to stop politicising the issue of insecurity, saying that 'it is the time for all of us to put heads together as a people to ensure that we overcome the threat of anti-state terror.'According to Maku, 'last year, Mr. President, after a lot of concern has been raised relating to the cost of projects, resolved that something should be done. And today (yesterday) in Council, the issue came up and Mr. President is concerned still that in spite of all the measures taken so far, we have not arrived at what we consider to be what will be universally appropriate valuation of projects in the public sector in Nigeria. Mr. President tabled this issue, which was discussed frankly at the Council meeting. The discussion was further informed by the Ibrahim Bunu report of the Presidential Assessment Committee, which we are still receiving. There are still concerns about the actual and exact cost of projects comparatively to surrounding countries and other places in the world where similar projects are executed.'Mr. President insisted something must be done further and we all agreed that one way of cutting the cost of governance and ensuring Nigerians get proper value for all the projects we execute in the country was to work out a further template that will guide all of us in terms of valuing the projects that we execute. Mr. President therefore directed the Co-ordinating Minister of the Economic Team to work along with other relevant stakeholders, both in public and private sector, to include international consultants to come up with what we believe should be the comparative template about cost of projects particularly civil engineering projects, including supplies executed in the country. This Mr. President believes will guide his administration to ensure that all the issues relating to criticism in the country in relation to cost of projects in the public sector will be remedied so that when we do things in the country, we can compare with other countries around us..'Also tied to this was the question of cost of consultancy tied to the projects. It was suggested today (yesterday) that in awarding contracts, it should be based on the volume of work done because, sometimes, when contracts are awarded and there are stoppages on the way, consultants demand payment on periods when no supervision took place. So, if payment of consultancies is tied to volume of work done, areas of waste and excess payment will be addressed.Again, Mr. President directed that this template be brought up and that BPP work together with the Co-ordinating Minister of the Economy and the construction companies to ensure we tidy up our consultancy procedure such that the consultant will be paid according to the volume of work. This was approved by Council and we are expecting the template and consultancy procedure to be submitted soon.'.Maku also stated that the issue of uncompleted projects took the front burner. He said: 'Another issue was that of uncompleted projects that has continued to be a source of concern to Mr. President and all Nigerians. He directed that for the period he is in power as President, he will want to see all the projects initiated and awarded by his administration completed on schedule, within the period of his administration. He directed the Co-ordinating Minister of the Economy as well as the BPP to ensure that no contract will come to Council without an agreed and verifiable transition plan to ensure all projects are awarded and completed smoothly and on time. The consequence of uncompleted projects is that money is tied down and Nigerians are not benefiting from the services that those projects are supposed to offer to the people of Nigeria. In addition to that, contractors keep coming up with augmentation plans once execution time plan for a project is exceeded.' The Chairman, House Committee on Media, Zakari Mohammed, disclosed during an interview in Abuja that the legislative agenda was aimed at fiscal conservatism and cutting down cost of governance in order to give the Nigerian electorate value for their money.According to him, 'the 2012 budget will not be business as usual' as 'it will be thoroughly scrutinised so as to produce a fiscal blueprint that is feasible and implementable.'I want to let Nigerians know that the House of Representatives under Speaker Aminu Tambuwal will not rubber stamp any budget proposal. We are going to be thorough; we will be scrupulous so that at the end of the day we shall have a budget that is implementable.'I also want to assure Nigerians that this House will not approve any bogus or white elephant project in the budget, that era has passed. It is not going to be business as usual. This is in line with the House legislative agenda.'According to him, the House has shown that it is prepared to do that by cutting down on its running cost. He explained that 'it is about fiscal conservatism. We are talking about cutting cost, checking wastages. We are talking about strengthening our oversight functions; we are talking about e-parliament. The legislative agenda is like a guide and that guide is the principle on which we are operating and cutting down on our running cost by 64 per cent, that is fiscal conservatism.'Zakari, however, lamented that for long the country has had budgets, which were not implemented thereby failing to improve the lot of the average Nigerian.'We have been having budgets that are poorly implemented. The recurrent expenditure is always higher than the capital expenditure but world over no budget works that way. We now want to cut down cost and at the same time revenues that are not being disclosed. We want to block those areas of leakages and plough them back for capital and sustainable development.'He assured that 'as soon as the budget is presented to the National Assembly, the House would swing into action for a speedy passage to create room for effective implementation', stressing that the earlier it was passed, the more time the executive would have to work with it.'I can assure you the Seventh Assembly House is poised to give the appropriation bill accelerated consideration but at the same time, study it critically to forestall the inclusion of anything that may not be implementable', he said.
Click here to read full news..
