By Paul Effiong, Abuja
National Assembly Joint Committee on Finance, yesterday set up a special panel to probe a shortfall of over N4 trillion revenue due to indiscriminate waivers by various agencies of government.
The joint committee which is co-chaired by Sen Sani Musa and Hon James Faleke had convinced a hearing to probe the revenue profiles of Ministries, Departments, and Agencies, MDAs, and Government-Owned Enterprises, GOEs, ahead of the 2025 budget.
Setting up of the probe panel was sequel to a motion moved during the investigative hearing by a member of the joint committee, Sen Adamu Aliero which was generally adopted.
It was gathered that the investigative hearing was to enable the Senate and House of Representatives Committees to develop accurate and realistic revenue projections for 2025.
Meanwhile, the Joint Committee on Finance also threatened to stop the Federal Government’s grant to the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board in the 2025 budget proposal.
During presentation, the panel also queried the JAMB Registrar, Ishaq Oloyede, questioning why the agency had to remite only N4 billion to the Consolidated Revenue Fund, while it got a grant of N6 billion from the Federal Government.
Again, the Committee equally queried why an agency that funds itself should be getting allocations from the Federal Government.
JAMB was also queried for other issues including allocating the sum of N1.1 billion for refreshments and meals in the 2025 budget proposal.
Oloyede attempted to make more clarification but was directed to come back in three days with a more comprehensive presentation.
The Committee also queried the Federal Road Safety Corps for not remitting the sum of N8 billion generated in 2024.
This followed the presentation by the Deputy Corps Marshal, representing the Corps Marshal, Shehu Mohammed, who said, though, they had a target of N10 billion, they generated N13 billion.
