By Ken Afor
Sequel to claims made by Rotimi Amaechi, former Minister of Transportation, that the sacked Managing Director of the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), Hadiza Bala-Usman, awarded a contract up to the tune of N2.8 billion, the latter has denied the allegation.
On Thursday when Amaechi spoke at TheNiche 2023 annual lecture, he criticized the former NPA boss for not addressing the corruption allegation that led to her resignation in her book, Stepping on Toes: My Odyssey at the Nigerian Ports Authority.”
According to the former Rivers State Governor, Bala-Usman approved a N2.8 billion contract above the N2.5 million limit, saying there are too many lies in her book.
Weighing in to the matter, Bala-Usman, Special Adviser to the President on Policy Coordination, in a statement issued on Saturday, October 28, denied Amaechi’s claims.
She said the list of offenses handed to her during the investigation by the Amaechi-led investigative panel contained no allegations at all.
The statement partly read: “Mr Amaechi in his rant alleged that I awarded a contract worth N2.8bn. This is false. I don’t know where the former minister got his N2.8bn figure from since this accusation was nowhere in the list of infractions conveyed to me in a query arising from the reports of the Administrative Panel of Inquiry he set up.”
According to her, the only issue in the query was the award of the contract for the procurement of emergency vehicles after the vandalism of the Marina building of the NPA headquarters in Lagos on October 21, 2020.
She said she responded to the inquiry and said there were no breaches of public procurement laws.
“My response to the query of the N1.2bn expenditure, I explained that we made the procurement under the provisions of Sections 43 (1) (a), (2), (3), and (4) of the Public Procurement Act, 2007 (PPA) which allows procuring entities to purchase items due to the emergency nature of the need and obtain the necessary approval upon conclusion of the procurement.
“The response to the query, including the approval obtained and the alleged inflation of the cost of the vehicles, are all detailed between pages 166- 171 of the book.”
She concluded saying the book contained questions and answers justifying her actions in response to allegations some people denied during her tenure.
The former NPA boss further said she was unaware of the 10 charges Amaechi claimed she was found guilty of by the commission.
She also spoke about waivers, which the FMOT’s query addressed in Item F. The query and my response explaining the circumstances and justifications for all the waivers granted by the NPA management are published on pages 171-175 of the book.
“He twisted the facts about Query C, which alleged the ‘unilateral execution of a supplemental agreement in respect of Lekki Deep Sea Port Concession Project published on pages 163-165 of the book.’
” I do not know what these 10 counts are because no one communicated any such indictments to me. But can I ask him whether these counts include the alleged non-remittance of the sum of N165bn non-remittance of operating surpluses to the Consolidated Revenue Fund for which he sought and obtained former President Muhammadu Buhari’s approval to investigate the accounts of the NPA and my ‘stepping aside from office?’
“Is it not true that this weighty allegation did not appear in the query that I received from the ministry after the conclusion of the work of the panel?” she said.
