By Ahmed Ajikobi
The Kwara State Ministry of Finance has responded to ENetSuD’s request for information concerning the proposed N35 Billion Bond approved for the Kwara State Government (KWSG) by the Kwara State House of Assembly.
This was contained in statement by The Elites Network for Sustainable Development (ENetSuD), an anti-corruption Civil Society Organizations which was made available to this medium.
The statement reads that,” in the response referenced F118/S.17/VOL.II/15, the Ministry told us that the Kwara State Proposed Bond has not been approved by the Security and Exchange Commission as at 4th June 2021 when the letter was written to us.
“Responding further, the Ministry told us that Section 39(1) of the 1999 Constitution that we referred to in our request does not give us the leverage to secure the specific information we requested for. The Ministry stated further that the Section relates to Freedom of Expression and the Press, not Freedom of Information.”
“It will be recalled that we wrote the Ministry to request information related to the detailed budget of the projects that the bond is proposed for (including the name of each project, the amount budgeted for each project, the contract sum of each project, the location of each project, and the executing Ministry, Department, and Agency of each project); the project codes, names of projects, and other information on the projects that the bond will be used for as contained in the approved 2021 budget.
“Other information sought by us include the proposed payment plan for the bond; the detailed information on any loan approved for the KWSG in the 2021 budget (aside from the bond); the debt profile of the KWSG, among others,” the statement added.
