REVEALED: How N600m Sure-P funds for tourism were misappropriated

The culture and tourism sector, which was comatose for many years, got a major financial boost between 2013 and 2014 with the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and National Orientation receiving the sum of N350 million from the Subsidy Reinvestment Programme (SURE-P) to construct, rehabilitate and restore select tourism sites in the country.

The idea, The Nation gathered, was to make more local and foreign tourists visit the sites so they can serve as revenue sources for government. Additional sum of N250 million was later released to the ministry to bring the total sum to N600 million.

Following the gesture from the Federal Government, the ministry reportedly told former President Goodluck Jonathan at a tourism stakeholders’ meeting held at the Presidential Villa, Abuja in January 2014 that it had achieved 100 per cent completion of the projects. Nothing, however, could be further from the truth.

The Nation correspondent’s visit to some of the project sites showed that many of the projects the funds were meant for were never done, while the few that were done were not executed according to the contract details.

The Nation, August 4, 2018

 

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