CEM REPORT, INFRASTRUCTURE | Upon completion of the fourth phase of the constituency and executive projects tracking exercise earlier in the year the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) has said it will kick off phase five.
The anti-graft agency says it will commence the fifth phase on Tuesday, November 8th.
In a statement, over the weekend the agency noted that the exercise will involve 712 government-funded projects across several states in the six geopolitical zones.
The agency listed the states to be; Kaduna, Jigawa, Sokoto, Katsina, Kwara, Niger, Kogi, Cross River, Delta, Rivers, Ogun, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, Anambra, Enugu, Abia, Borno, Bauchi, and Gombe.
The statement noted that the exercise would be prosecuted by ICPC in collaboration with relevant stakeholders such as the Budget Office of the Federation, Office of the Accountant General of the Federation, Office of the Auditor-General of the Federation, Bureau of Public Procurement, Nigerian Institute of Quantity Surveyors, the Media and Civil Society Organisations that constitute the steering committee.
The agency noted that the objective of phase five was to investigate fraudulent procurement practices in the award of contracts for the selected projects across the country in line with other tracking exercises carried out by ICPC since 2019.
“It aims to ensure that all government-funded projects are executed fully to their specifications and to make recoveries where the project costs are inflated by contractors or are poorly executed.”
According to the statement the commission had in the 4th phase of the exercise, successfully tracked 538 projects across nine focal areas of health, education, power, water resources, works, housing, agriculture, transport and environment.
The exercise was conducted in 19 states across the six geopolitical zones and the FCT including Lagos, Ogun, Ekiti, Enugu, Ebonyi, Akwa-Ibom, Rivers, Edo, Delta, Nasarawa, Plateau, Benue, Adamawa, Yobe, Taraba, Borno and FCT.
“Some of the findings from the Phase four exercise include the discovery of N7.1 billion worth of padded projects, some contractors who had abandoned project sites being compelled to return to different sites to complete N10.9 billion worth of projects, while N6.8 billion worth of recoveries (cash and assets) have been made so far.
“Also, 109 out of the 543 selected projects in phase four, amounting to N1,176,867,800 were found to have been inserted, which effectively turned them into zonal intervention projects. Intelligence revealed that the insertions were done by both legislators and some members of the executive arm of the government in the budget-making process.
“Though phase four was intended to focus solely on executive projects, it, however, became another exercise in constituency projects tracking because of the quantum of budget padding found amongst the selected projects.”
The exercise known as constituency and executive projects tracking exercise tracks the execution of projects in Ministries Departments and Agencies (MDAs) and the National Assembly
