The Nigerian Senators’ Forum on Thursday decried
the high cost of running government activities, saying there was an
urgent need to reverse the trend.
The forum, which comprises former and serving senators, met in Lagos and said there was a high rate of poverty in the country despite that government activities gulped a lot of money.
In a communiqué issued after the meeting, the lawmakers said the Federal Government should immediately reduce the huge number of political appointees as this had been responsible for huge financial resources committed to paying political office holders.
The forum also blamed the decay of infrastructure across the country on corruption among public office holders.
The senators said the larger percentage of the national budget was spent on recurrent expenditure, making the execution of development projects impossible.
The forum said the constitution of a national conference had become imperative in order to evolve a new constitution to replace the 1999 Constitution and called for the entrenchment of true federalism as opposed to what it called “unitary system of government that is being practised.
“There is the need to fashion a new constitution because the present constitution was inherited from the military. Greater progress can only be made when there is true federalism,” the communiqué said.
South-West Vice-Chairman of the forum, Senator Omololu Meroyi, who noted that the role of the forum would neither be sectional nor partisan, said, “We owe it a sacred duty to express views and correct situations that might arise in the course of events that may adversely affect our nation or that may portend evil to our people.”
By Kemi Obasola Courtesy Of: Punch
The forum, which comprises former and serving senators, met in Lagos and said there was a high rate of poverty in the country despite that government activities gulped a lot of money.
In a communiqué issued after the meeting, the lawmakers said the Federal Government should immediately reduce the huge number of political appointees as this had been responsible for huge financial resources committed to paying political office holders.
The forum also blamed the decay of infrastructure across the country on corruption among public office holders.
The senators said the larger percentage of the national budget was spent on recurrent expenditure, making the execution of development projects impossible.
The forum said the constitution of a national conference had become imperative in order to evolve a new constitution to replace the 1999 Constitution and called for the entrenchment of true federalism as opposed to what it called “unitary system of government that is being practised.
“There is the need to fashion a new constitution because the present constitution was inherited from the military. Greater progress can only be made when there is true federalism,” the communiqué said.
South-West Vice-Chairman of the forum, Senator Omololu Meroyi, who noted that the role of the forum would neither be sectional nor partisan, said, “We owe it a sacred duty to express views and correct situations that might arise in the course of events that may adversely affect our nation or that may portend evil to our people.”
By Kemi Obasola Courtesy Of: Punch
No comments:
Post a Comment