Coalition of civil societies monitoring recovered assets has raised concern over the non-utilisation of the $50million recovered from the former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Madueke.
It also raised concern over the unutilised $954,000 recovered from the former Governor of Bayelsa State,Diepreye Alamieyeseigha
Also of concern to the CSOs is that one year after the Galactica restitution agreement for the repatriation of $52.88m linked to the former Minister was signed and assigned for the Distributed Access through Renewable Energy Scale-Up (DARES) project, the project has yet to commence, and the location of the repatriated fund has not been declared.
They also expressed concern that three years after the $954,000 recovered from the former Governor of Bayelsa State was repatriated back into the country to fund development of Primary Health Care centres in the state, the state government was still in the procurement process of selecting theNGOs that would monitor the implementation of the project.
Speaking during a two-day town hall meeting on the utilisation of recovered assets and presentation of accountability reports, the Executive Director of the African Network for Economic and Environmental Justice, David Ugolor, affirmed that their findings had shown that none of the projects had commenced.
He stated that with the support of the United Kingdom Foreign Commonwealth Development Office (FCDO), ANEEJ had worked closely with CSOs in Bayelsa State to visit the PHC designated to receive the money recovered from Alamieyeseigha, but they found out that the health centres were yet to be developed.
Ugolor also mentioned that the Nigerian Rural Electrification Agency had not been forthcoming in providing information on the whereabouts of $50million provided for the expansion of renewable energy.
Applauding the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for its efforts in recovering proceeds of crimes, he stressed that recovery alone was not enough, as citizens asked questionson how the funds were used. Who benefits from its utilisation?
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