The Office of the Secretary to
the Government of the Federation, OSGF, in 2017 appropriated and
claimed to have spent N65 million on its website.
Premium Times review of the 2017
budget performance of the OSGF revealed that N65 million was budgeted
for the already existing website while the office claimed that N64, 855,
875, the amount released, had been fully utilised.
Quoted as ‘OSGF WEBSITE,’ the budget performance record remarked that the ‘procurement process is ongoing.’
The office of the SGF is currently
occupied by Boss Mustapha who was appointed by President Muhammadu
Buhari in October 2017. The office was formerly occupied by Babachir
Lawal who was sacked after President Buhari adopted recommendations of a
report of a panel headed by the Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, which
investigated allegations against Mr. Lawal who was suspended for months.
PREMIUM TIMES could not ascertain which of the two government officials executed the project.
Appearing before the Senate committee
in January 2018 to defend the 2017 budget performance, Mr. Mustapha said
the office received 50 per cent of its appropriation for capital
projects.
“Performance for capital is N1.2
billion released as at end of December, 2017. It represents 50 per cent.
We are hoping that the National Assembly will extend the lifespan of
the budget so that we can handle other procurement processes.
Apparently, the fund release for the
website is one of those captured in Mr. Mustapha’s 50 per cent but the
cost and execution of the project left more to desire.
Spokesperson to Mr. Mustapha, Mohammed
Nakorji, when contacted, declined to answer PREMIUM TIMES’ questions on
how the fund was disbursed.
“I’m not an accountant please,” he snapped.
Meanwhile, technology experts say the claim was suspicious and impossible.
After a review of the website,
communications officer of Paradigm Initiative Nigeria, PIN, Sodiq Alabi
said the claim that N65 million was spent on the website looked ‘very
impossible.’
“We have reviewed the website, it is
simply shocking that N65 million was spent on the website. It’s
implausible,” he said. “OSGF must provide more details on what they did
with the money. The website has no special features to justify more than
a million naira budget.
“It doesn’t look like they are even
updating the website. The copyright is 2013. It looks very impossible
and suspicious. At least the SGF office should tell us what they did
with the money. They should tell us what they did with the money so that
Nigerian tax payers’ mind can be at rest.”
Cheta Nwanze, Head of Research, SBM Intelligence, after a review of the website, said the N65 million could never be justified.
He said, “The website was built using
the Joomla CMS, which is a free content management system. All of the
media is hosted on YouTube, which is an external server. It uses Google
Hosted Libraries for its content distribution. No way can it cost ₦65
million, unless I heard you wrong.”
He said the maximum cost for such a website would be $105 per month.
“Depending on the hosting package,
$100 per month can get you a very good hosting plan. If you insist on
using Google apps to host your emails and documents, that’s $5 per user
per month. So you can do the maths.”
Premium Times
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