House Of Reps Holds First Reading For Three Bills Sponsored By Wale Raji (See Details)

Member of House of Representatives, Wale Raji

Eko Hot Blog reports that at least three bills sponsored by Rep. Wale Raji of Epe Federal Constituency have come up for the first reading.

The bills came up for first reading during plenary on Tuesday, October 31, 2023.

The first of the three bills is the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps Act (Amendment) Bill, 2023 (HB.768).

The bill is aimed at providing security services for school children/students.

If the bill becomes law, it will charge the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) with a new responsibility of securing students in schools.

Rep. Raji introduced the bill amid threats of kidnapping to schoolchildren in some parts of Nigeria.

The second bill sponsored by the lawmaker is the Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act (Amendment) Bill, 2023 (HB.769).

The bill is aimed at removing spouses of office holders from the list of persons required to declare assets.

The third and last bill, which scaled through first reading on the House floor on Tuesday, is the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (Alteration) Bill, 2023 (HB.770).

If this bill becomes law, it will mandate agencies of both federal and state government to submit an audited financial statement within a prescribed timeframe.

This bill is aimed at addressing concerns that many government agencies don’t audit their accounts or submit their financial statements.

In the 2016 annual report of the Auditor-General for the Federation (AuGF), the former AuGF, Mr Anthony Ayine, disclosed that a total of 65 agencies of government had never submitted their financial statements for audit purposes in line with the provisions of Financial Regulations 321.

The audit report said that despite the provisions of Financial Regulation 321(v), which enjoined the chief executive officers of statutory corporations to submit both the audited accounts and management report to the AuGF not later than May 31 of the following year of account, many of them never obeyed that provision.

For instance, the report stated 323 agencies defaulted in 2016, while 2015 and 2014 had 215 and 148 defaulters.

In the 2018 audit report of the AuGF, Ayine revealed that as at April 2018, 109 Agencies had not submitted their audited financial statements beyond 2013, 76 Agencies last submitted for the 2010 financial year while 65 Agencies had never submitted any account since inception.

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Philip Ibitoye

Philip Ibitoye is a journalist who boasts more than five years of experience reporting the news. He is an Editor at Eko Hot Blog.