COVID-19: Group raises alarm over fake donations, diversion

Mahammad Bello, FACT, Minister

According to him, some state governors and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), administration have not seen the need to place their priorities right in the expense of resources coming in for the fight of this pandemic, it’s also important they disclose donations to their states.

While some governors have laid bare their income  and expenses especially donations, some have refused to come out clear and clean.

Kaduna state government he said set aside N500m which the health commissioner announced to the state and the world, thereby giving them first-hand information.

In Imo state, the governor only sent appreciation to donors, without saying the amount. Edo state, also the same, no disclosure on how much received.

He said, “a private bank gave a cheque of N500 million to the FCT minister as  a support, our agency engaged him on twitter on how he intends to utilise  The money, he said, N200 million will be given to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control(NCDC).

“They were mute about the N300 million, but they said they are going to grade the road to the NCDC centre, we asked whether the part of the N300 million will be used for road grading or there is a budget allocation for the road, give us specifics, they kept mute, this is quite unfortunate.”

Boss Mustapha, SGF

Lawal further challenged the government to be open for once and see if the citizens even the poor would not donate towards this emergency, stressing that this is not the time for secrecy but time to come open and engage the citizenry on various platforms.

The social activist who spoke as a guest speaker on a television programme in Abuja said he has launched the campaign to track all donations/ interventions for the fight against coronavirus.

He stated that the campaign is going on in seven African countries, he implored the Nigerian government to as well make her data available.

“Follow the Money” he said is launched with the purpose of digitally tracking donations made for the fight of COVID 19 to avoid a recurence of the past,- the Paris Club refund loan to the governors and FCT, the $1.5m world bank loan to states that has gone down the drains He stated that the campaign is going on in seven African countries, he implored the Nigerian government to as well make her data available.