Agriculture Ministry Denies Spending N18.9 Billion On Bush Clearing Contracts During COVID-19 Lockdown
Agriculture Ministry Denies Spending N18.9 Billion On Bush Clearing Contracts During COVID-19 Lockdown
Claims that the Nigerian Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development paid N18.9 billion on a bush clearing contract during the COVID-19 lockdown have been refuted.
According to NAN, the Ministry made this announcement in a statement on Wednesday through its Director of Information in Abuja, Dr Joel Oruche.
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It claimed that it had only cleared 3,200 hectares of bush and prepared the soil in eight federation-wide states.
More Details
According to the ministry, it only spent N2.5 billion cleaning and preparing 3,200 hectares of land in eight federation states, including Osun, Ekiti, Edo, Cross River, Kaduna, Kwara, Plateau, and Ogun.
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Construction of rural roads in the nation’s six geopolitical zones was one of the additional projects completed during the COVID-19 period, according to the ministry. Additionally, it involves the registration and rehabilitation of farmers, the sampling and mapping of soil, and the outfitting of four national soil laboratories in Umudike, Ibadan, Kaduna, and Abuja.
“The ministry wishes to state that if the statement emanated from the House Public Account Committee, the committee must have been quoted out of context.
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“To put the record straight, however, the ministry at no time received any audit query to warrant summon by the committee,” Oruche said.
He added that the various projects were part of a stimulus package under the Agriculture for Food and Jobs Programme of the Federal Government to generate employment and grow the economy in order to mitigate the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
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What you should know
According to earlier media reports, the Public Account Committee of the House of Representatives decided to reveal the true identities of the owners of the businesses that received contracts from the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development for the clearing of bushes, preparation of the land, rehabilitation of the soil plant lab, and other services during the most recent COVID-19 lockdown of the nation, valued at N18.9 billion.
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