Ambode’s battles continue as Lagos Assembly threatens him with warrant of arrest

The Lagos State House of Assembly Thursday threatened to issue a warrant of arrest on the immediate past governor of the state, Akinwunmi Ambode and four of his commissioners over their failure to give a detailed account of what transpired when his administration procured 820 mass transit buses for the state.

The affected former commissioners are Kazeem Adeniji (Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice), Olusegun Banjo (Budget), Akinyemi Ashade ( Finance) and Wale Oluwo (Energy and Mineral Resources).

The House decision followed the presentation of two preliminary reports by two ad-hoc committees set up by the House to investigate the 820 buses purchased by the former governor and to appraise the 2019 mid-year budget.
Presenting the preliminary report of a nine-member committee put together by the lawmakers to probe the purchase of the buses, the Chairman of the Committee, Fatai Mojeed, said the panel discovered that due process was not followed in the purchase of the buses.

He said: “The former governor used the refund of the Paris Club for the purchase of the buses without the approval of the House. He did not inform the House before commencing the purchase of the buses.

“Over N48 billion was spent on the purchase of the buses and N22 billion were spent on import duties. 520 of the buses are still at the seaport.”

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According to him, the state Accountant General told the vommittee that she depended on the ex-governors approval for the purchase of the buses and that no payment voucher was made available to the committee.

He said the lawmakers also demanded the budget instrument used for the purchase, but to their chagrin, there was no budgetary provision for the process.

“They could not produce any newspaper where the purchase of the buses was advertised.

“The committee invited 20 stakeholders, 16 of them complied, while four of them refused against the constitutional provision,” the committee chairman added.

The Chairman of the Ad hoc Committee on Mid-year Budget Review, Gbolahan Yishawu, alleged that the affected commissioners shunned the panel invitation for a chat on their activities in the office.

He also claimed that Ambode gave some directives on spendings without the lawmakers’ approval.

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