By Joshua Egbodo
Abuja
The House of Representatives has asked the office of the Accountant General of the Federation (AGF) to furnish it with all documents relating to fund releases to the ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) for the 2014 budget.
The House which was considering the 2015 Budget Proposals has committed same to its Committees on Finance and Appropriation for further legislative actions.
The call for documentary details of fund releases to MDAs was fallout of a motion moved under matters of urgent public importance by Chairman of the Committee on Health, Hon. Ndudi Elumelu, who lamented that repeated efforts by his committee to obtain such details as they relate to the Ministry of Health and its agencies have been rebuffed by the relevant offices.
He revealed that the Committee wrote a reminder for its earlier letters on January 17 to the Office of Accountant General of the Federation on the same subject matter, being aware that the office of the AGF was in possession of documents relating to release of funds to Federal Ministry of Health and all agencies and departments under the said ministry from Jan-Dec, 2014.
He said: “Up till date, the Office of AGF has failed, refused and or neglected to respond to the request of the House Committee on Health in its letters dated January 5 and 17, 2015, respectively.
He added that lack of co-operation shown by the attitude of the office of AGF is terribly affecting the work of the Committee towards the consideration of the 2015 Budget proposal for the Federal Ministry of Health.
“If nothing is done by the House to ensure the production of the documents requested from the office of AGF.”
He said the Committee would not be able to conduct its oversight functions on Federal Ministry of Health, adding that the said Ministry might not receive any appropriation under the 2015 Budget.