The Senate on Thursday called on the Federal Government to recover all monies borrowed from the Education Tax account by its department and agencies.
The senate said that the funds were needed to address the numerous infrastructural deficits in tertiary institutions in the country.
The call emanated from the consideration of a report of the Committee on Tertiary Institutions and TetFund on “Gross Mismanagement of Education Tax Fund’’.
The report, presented by Chairman of the committee, Sen. Jibrin Barau (Kano-APC), called for the inclusion of the National Assembly in the process of allocation and disbursement of funds belonging to Tetfund.
Barau said that special interventions were introduced to address critical needs for institutions in areas where their normal allocations could not address.
He noted that there was no institution in the country that had not benefited from the special interventions.
“We also found out that N273.93 billion was not transferred to TetFund project account in 2014.
“Rather, it was diverted to finance various expenditures, including the revitalisation of universities’ infrastructure on the approval of former President Goodluck Jonathan,’’ he said.
The lawmaker said that the diversion of the fund was possible because of the loophole in the Tetfund Act which allowed only the president to be the approving authority for the agency.
He said that the diversion violated section 82 (4) of the Constitution.
According to him, the section states that no monies shall be withdrawn from the Consolidated Revenue Fund or any other public fund of the Federation except in the manner prescribed by the National Assembly.
The lawmakers adopted the report and commended the committee for the job.
In his remarks, President of the Senate, Dr Bukola Saraki, said “the real area of concern in our revenue framework is the independent revenue, that is, revenue from organisations like this and expenditures from organisations like this.
“They are becoming larger than even government.
“Unless we ensure a transparent and proper way of oversight, we are going to run into problems.
“I think it is not just the educational tax fund, a lot of agencies and parastatals like it need close supervision in order for us to ensure that we block these leakages.’’ (NAN)