As stakeholders today Wed converge on Abuja to review a draft legislation on the establishment for regulation of Ecological Fund to address challenges arising from that area, they have been urged to always consider it’s impact and devastation on the country’s natural environment, food production and national security in their delebrations.
The charge came from the Speaker House of Representatives Hon Femi Gbajabiamila when he declared open a Public Hearing on an Act astablishing the regulation of the Fund to address ecological challenges, particularly erosion, landslide, desertification, floods, oil spillage, draught and related conditions.
Gbajabiamila noted that Nigeria with a total landscape of 983,213 square kilometres, occupied by over 200 million people, there is dire need for laws to manage the interaction of the population with the environment which had left indelible mark on the landscape and ecosystem.
In a presentation at the Public Hearing, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation SGF Mr. Boss Mustapha under whose office the current Ecological Fund operates from, frowned at the establishment of s Governing Council in the proposed bill.
He was of the opinion this would replicate what he termed the ‘erstwhile bogus’ National Council on Ecological Problems NCEP, adding that the number of membership makes the project selection, procurement and execution of projects cumbersome and problematic.
He submitted that if the bill is passed into law as proposed, it will impede on President Mohamodu Buhari’s power to use the fund for emergencies, if the Fund was reverted to the National Assembly for appropriations and approvals.
The Ecological Fund as presently constitutes is not subject to the process of appropriation by the National Assembly, thus giving the President the flexibility to apply it to ecological emergencies.
Responding, Chairman House Committee on Ecological Fund Rep Ibrahim Isiaka (APC, Ogun) said in actual fact the fund was not intended as an emergency intervention into any disaster, but purely ecological matters.
He gave an assurance that while the committee was not out to change the fund’s original operational procedures, it was glaring that a review to was necessary to make it more effective and in conformity with financial regulations of the land.
Rep Ibrahim gave the total outflows distributed to Federal, States, FCT, the 774 local government Areas and the Agencies of government from the ecological fund from January to September 2020 as N54.9b and urged States Assembly not to shirk in their constitutional responsibilies of oversighting allocations to the 36 States of the Federation as well as the 774 local governments who are equal beneficiaries of the Fund.
The committee chairman pointed attention to agencies like NEMA the North East Development Commission NEDC that have refused till date to render account of their shares of the fund to the committee, despite collecting budgetary allocations, he issued an end if the year deadline for them to comply or risk suspension from further access to the Ecological Fund. ###ENDS.
