Senate Tackles Police Trust Fund Over N550m Office Renovation, Furniture Purchase

• Demands relevant documents next week

BY EDMOND ODOK – Members of the Senate Public Account Committee have expressed displeasure over claims by the Police Trust Fund (PTF) that a whopping N500 million has been spent on renovating an office and procuring furniture from the total sum of N3.2 billion it received from the Service Wide Votes.

The Police Trust Fund, which appeared before the Committee on Thursday to explain details of spending around its Service Wide Votes, shocked the Senators with submissions on their expenditure profile for the year so far.

Led by its Executive Secretary, Abdullaahi Bala, the PTF’s management team, while appearing before the committee, was requested to offer explanations on expenditure entries that were clearly conflicting.

Drawing their attention to page seven of the document submitted to the Committee on the Service Wide Votes, the lawmakers demanded clarifications on how N550 million was spent on the same office with different line items.

A member of the committee, Senator Michael Nnachi had referred the Executive Secretary to page seven of the document, where the same project was given different line items.

The contentious line items are Office furniture and equipment – N200 million; Renovation and partition – N100 million; and Office Rehabilitation – N250 million.

In his explanation, the PTF’s Executive Secretary said the office was given to them by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

However, not impressed by the PTF’s submissions on the expenditure, the Acting chairman, who is also the vice chairman of the committee, Senator Ibrahim Hadejia, directed the Fund to appear before the Committee by Thursday next week with all the relevant documents related to the contracts on the renovation and rehabilitation.

Also requesting that the PTF’s Procurement Officer be available at the Committee’s next sitting, Senator Hadejia said; “Get your details, come with procurement documents and procurement officer before us by next week Thursday”.

The Senate Committee is also expected to engage other agencies and ministries on their expenditure profiles next week.