Lawmakers
Wade Into Property Sale
Obiora Ani, Abuja
The
Senate has ordered the immediate arrest of members of the
management of Transnational Corporation, Transcorp, over an
alleged procurement of a property in Lagos, below the reserved
price.
Chairman, Senate Committee on Housing and Urban Development,
Senator Ikechukwu Obiora, issued the bench warrant at an
investigative hearing on the sale of federal government houses
and lands.
The Transcorp management is also being summoned for what the
Senate described as, ’’ Flagrant disregard of summons.’’
Senator Obiora said Transcorp, a multi-national company in
Nigeria, paid Three Hundred and Seventy Five Million Naira on a
property for which the reserve price was Three Hundred and
Seventy Seven Million Naira.
The committee has appointed six firms to audit government
accounts in banks across the country, where revenues from the
sale of some government property were lodged.
The senate committee alleged that the government had been short
changed by banks in terms of interests accruing from the
revenues.
Billions of Naira was realised from the sale of government’s
non-essential houses in Nigeria in Years 2005 and 2006.
The committee has named some notable Nigerians who were
allocated houses without a formal application.
The list contains names of some former military chiefs,
politicians, diplomats and senior civil servants in the
government of former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
Among them are: former chairman of the Board of Nigerian Ports
Authority, Chief Olabode George, who is currently under
incarceration for fraudulent activities, the former Minister of
Works, Senator Adeseye Ogunlewe and the immediate past Minister
of Foreign Affairs and current Nigerian Ambassador to the United
Nations, Professor Joy Ogwu.
They were alleged to have been sold the government property
without recourse to due process.
Yinka
