A House committee has cited Water Resources Minister Joseph Utsev over the ministry’s role in selling off assets of river basin authorities.
The ad hoc committee, chaired by House Majority Leader Julius Ihonvbere (APC, Edo), issued the call on Monday during an interaction with some CEOs of the River Basin Development Authorities (RBDAs). Nigeria has 12 river basin authorities.
The committee is investigating the illegal alienation of some government properties between 2010 and 2022, and the non-remittance of the proceeds obtained from the sale of the assets to the Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF).
The committee asked the minister, who just took office on August 21, to appear before the panel after RBDA’s CEOs told the committee that the sales of the assets were carried out by the Ministry of Water Resources.
Adeniyi Aremu, director general of the Lower Niger basin, informed lawmakers that the basins were not involved in the sales, but were done at the ministerial level.
Therefore, Ihonvbere ruled that the minister must appear before the committee to explain the process of selling the assets.
The committee also summoned the heads of the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), the Nigerian Maritime Authority and Security Agency (NIMASA), the Nigerian Railways Corporation (NRC) and the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS). The agencies were scheduled to appear before the committee, but did not appear.
Ihonvbere said that he was not satisfied with the explanation of the CEOs and demanded more documents from them.
“I want to assure you for now that we are not very satisfied, and that is that you did not preside over this process.
“We will require you to return after we deduct some of those documents directly from the ministry on behalf of your agencies,” he said.
He also disapproved of the agencies’ attitude and threatened that the committee would invoke its powers to compel the agencies to appear.
“There is a tendency in this country for these agencies to think they can operate above the law. Not with this House of Representatives. It is not possible,” he stated.
The resolution to launch the investigation followed the adoption of a motion introduced by Oluwole Oke (PDP, Osun) in July during plenary.