Former President Olusegun Obasanjo says there is no need to investigate the allegations and counter-allegations of the 2016 budget padding in the National Assembly.
Obasanjo said the country should rather get men of integrity in the federal parliament.
The ex-president was speaking to State House reporters on Monday shortly after meeting behind closed-doors wirh President Muhammadu Buhari.
NewsWireNGR recalls that Lawmaker, Abdulmumin Jibrin, the Former House Chairman of the Committee on Appropriation had called on the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Yakubu Dogara to resign.
“My inability to admit into the budget almost N30bn personal requests from Mr. Speaker & the 3 other principal officers also became an issue. The four of them met & took that decision.In addition to billions of wasteful projects running over 20bn they allocated to their constituencies”. Jibrin wrote via his verified twitter account..
Jibrin made this assertion in a series of tweets on his Twitter timeline accusing Dogara and other leaders of the Lower Chamber of corruption and essentially making an attempt to stuff the 2016 Budget.
According to Jibrin, Speaker Dogara; Deputy Speaker Lasun, Whip Doguwa; and Miinority Leader, Leo Ogor were intimidated by his “independent disposition”.
On his part, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, in his reactions on Thursday said he would not engage his former ally and House member from Kano State, Abdulmumin Jibrin, in political mudslinging.
Mr. Dogara was responding to a deluge of requests from Nigerians online who asked him to respond to allegations of high-level corruption leveled by Mr. Jibrin against him and other principal officers.
Mr. Jibrin was sacked as chairman of House Committee on Appropriation on Wednesday.
In a lengthy statement Thursday, he accused the speaker of attempting to insert questionable projects worth N40 billion into the 2016 budget.
“I won’t respond to jokes. I’m not a mud wrestler,” Mr. Dogara said in response to a tweet from a Twitter user, Comrade Abdallah, late Thursday. He said he would no longer comment on the matter in public.
“I owe a word on the subject to my friends on this platform. The rest would be dealt with by the Institution.”
