By Bayo Alabira
Dutse
The ongoing faced-off between members of Jigawa state House of Assembly and the executive arm of government has reached an alarming rate of investigating the Governor on why the state property in Lagos was sold without their knowledge.
The feud heightened last week when members, while deliberating on the state’s liaison office situated on Ibrahim Waziri street, Ikoyi, Lagos, alleged that the selling of the state’s valuable assets without due process, must be investigated.
A member representing Dutse Constituency, Musa Sule, told Blueprint that the alleged sale of the property was a flagrant abuse of the law and due process, adding that the governor had contravened constitutional provisions.
Sule, who is also the Chairman, House Committee on Appropriation, expressed shock with the manner in which the alleged transaction took place without slight notice to the Assembly.
“The deputy governor, who is a lawyer, ought to have known that what they have done has clearly violated the provision of the constitution and I assure you that what they have done must be reversed, whether they like it or not.
“We are representing the people of the state and we would not fold our hands to let a few people toy with the sensibilities of the people, by selling our assets without duly consulting the legislature,” he warned.
He further argued that, the lawmakers were not in any way trying to undermine the power of the executive by embarking on fault finding mission but were doing their legislative oversight “in accordance with the provisions of the constitution which empower them to monitor the affairs of the executive and account for their stewardship.”
The state Assembly had earlier directed Governor Muhammed Badaru Abubakar to explain the rationale behind the procurement of school furniture being carried out in all the 27 local government areas of the state, which they argued was against the provisions of 2017 fiscal budget.
The state Assembly had argued that the present expenditure being carried out by the council chairmen under the directive of the governor ought to have been done either by the State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) or the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC).
The members pointed out that the expenditure was not captured in the 2017 budget, and wondered where the state drew the fund for the projects from, while a motion seeking that the House be mandated to institute investigative panel that will probe the matter was passed.
it was learnt that the governor held a crucial meeting yesterday afternoon with the aggrieved Assembly members in order to broker peace on the quagmire.
