Like governors, Wike wants lawmakers to grant him power to spend money without transparency

The Minister of Federal Capital Territory, FCT Nyesom Wike, has urged the House of Representatives to grant him the power to arbitrarily spend funds under the controversial “security vote” scheme.

Wike, who appeared before the House Committee on FCT on Monday to defend the N1.1 trillion budget of his ministry, said he would use the money to tackle insecurity.

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“As a governor, my director of SSS can meet me and say ‘We need to carry out an operation tonight’. We need N30 million to carry out that operation. I don’t need to meet the accountant, all I need to say is ‘go and take money there,” Wike told the lawmakers.

However, the lawmakers did not give the minister any commitment on the request.

The security vote is a controversial and corruption-ridden scheme often used by state governors to spend money arbitrarily without any form of transparency. According to anti-corruption advocates, the security vote has become a conduit for siphoning funds.

As insecurity becomes a norm in Abuja, Wike has come under heavy criticism. He is proposing a N1.14 trillion budget but N500 billion is expected to be sourced from commercial banks, while total internally generated revenue is projected to be N637 billion.

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On the expenditure side, the ministry is proposing to spend N726.3 billion on capital expenditure and N421 billion on recurrent expenditure. While the government is proposing N29 billion for the Abuja Light Rail Project, N117.3 billion is for the completion of ongoing projects.

Members of the committee made comments and asked questions after Mr Wike’ presentation.