The Federal Government has earmarked a sum of N500 million for the construction of official quarters for the vice president in the 2015 budget.
About N2 billion is expecte to be expended on the construction of the residential quarters and guest houses of the presiding officers of the National Assembly, which has got to an advanced stage while N27.192 billion will be spent was pencilled down for the construction of residential quarters for other lawmakers.
The beneficiaries are the Senate President and his Deputy as well as the Speaker of the House of Representatives and his Deputy.
The contract sum for the project, which has two components, was disclosed by the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Sen. Bala Mohammed, when his ministry appeared before the House Committee on FCT to defend its 2015 budget.
The minister said: “The project entails the provision of residences for presiding officers of the National Assembly, which comprises main building, ADCs house, guest house, staff quarters, gate house, banquet hall, chapel, mosque and power house.
“The sum of N1.5 billion was appropriated for this project in the 2014 fiscal year, while the sum of N164,290,688.40 was actually released.
“The total sum of N11,815,127,972.42 has been paid to date with a balance of N15,377,649,658.44 required to complete the project.
“Also, the contract for the Vice President’s residence, which was awarded in 2009 at the sum of N7.065 billion last year, the sum of N1 billion was appropriated for it while the sum of N248, 760 million was accessed.”
“The project has attained 75 per cent completion.
Mohammed further said, “the total sum paid to date on this project is N6.215 billion with the sum of N850,178 as amount required to complete the project.”
Other projects in the pipeline are the completion of Roads B6, B12 and Circle Road within the Central Area in Abuja, construction of Usuma dam and Gurara road; and the provision of engineering infrastructure to Kyami district.
The minister complained that the N12 billion budget ceiling given to the FCT by the Budget Office of the Federation will not allow it “to operate even at minimum capacity, let alone providing a world class infrastructure in the FCT.”
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