ENetSuD Drags FRIN to EFCC for alleged corruption on Idofian – Igbaja road *** says over ₦ 52 million embezzled on the road project
By Ahmed Ajikobi
A kwara based anti-corruption group, Elites Network for Sustainable Development (ENetSuD) has dragged the Forestry Research Institute of Nigeria (FRIN) in Ibadan to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) over a perceived case of corruption amounting to over 52 million naira on Idofian – Igbaja road.
The Project entitled ‘Biological Control and Asphalting of Idofian – Igbaja road in Kwara State’ was funded by the Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN) in year 2018 with budget code 2018ZIP320 under the FGN Constituency Project budget. It was executed by FRIN, who contracted it to XPL Solution Services Limited.
In year 2018, a sum of One Hundred and Seventy Million Naira (₦170,000,000) was appropriated for the project. However, the actual contract sum was One Hundred and Eight Million, Seven Hundred and Fifty-Four Thousand, Eight Hundred and Sixty-Three Naira (₦108,754,863), according to the documents provided to ENetSuD by FRIN following the Freedom of Information (FOI) request made by ENetSuD during its project tracking exercise.
The anti-corruption group found during the measurement and evaluation of the project by the Bill of Engineering Measurement and Evaluation (BEME) provided to it by FRIN, that the approved length of the road and thickness of the asphalt are 1.2 km and 40 mm respectively, but the contractor only executed 854 m and 26.25 mm respectively.
Moreover, about 9,505 m2 of asphalt was approved to be used for the asphalting work but only 6,747 m2 was measured on site as used by the contractor.
ENetSuD told EFCC that a sum of Forty-Six Million, Seven Hundred and Twenty-Three Thousand, Three Hundred and Eighty-Eight Naira (₦46,723,388) was spent on the Civil Engineering Works of the project instead of Ninety-Nine Million, Ninety-Four Thousand, Eight Hundred and Sixty-Three Naira (₦99,094,863) approved for the works in the BEME.
ENetSuD concluded that a sum of Fifty-Two Million, Three Hundred and Seventy-One Thousand, Four Hundred and Seventy-Five Naira (₦52,371,475) was not spent on the project by the contractor out of the contract sum, assuming the unspent amount under Bill 1 (Preliminaries / Project management and services) was not considered as the items under this could not be measured.
