PDP Calls For Investigations Into Alleged Fresh N10b NHIS Fraud

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to launch a total investigation into circumstances surrounding the alleged mismanagement of a fresh N10 billion perpetrated by officials of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS).

The party said Buhari owes a responsibility to Nigerians to make public those who authorized withdrawal of the supposed fund as well as those who benefited from it.

In a statement released on Monday by Kola Ologbondiyan, the party’s National Publicity Secretary, PDP said it was shocking that the NHIS money was siphoned through the Federal Government Treasury Single Account (TSA) in the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) which is under the direct supervision of the presidency.

“Nigerians can now see the level of debauchery associated with this administration. It is appalling that a government can be so depraved that it superintended over the stealing of money meant to provide healthcare for the citizens.

“We challenge the presidency to speak out on this report as well as similar reported sleazes that have (sic) occurred under its watch.

“Who in the presidency authorised the withdrawal of the money from the TSA and who are the beneficiaries thereof? “What has the presidency to say about revelations that it ordered the reinstatement of the indicted Executive Secretary of the NHIS, Prof. Yusuf Usman, to help conceal this illegal withdrawals and shield members of the presidency cabals involved in the deal? “Until and unless the presidency clears its name by investigating, exposing and prosecuting those involved, it must directly be held responsible for this wicked act against Nigerians, who daily suffer hunger, depravation and death owing to the corruption in the All Progressives Congress (APC) government,” the statement read in part.

The PDP also countered the submission by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, that the country is in safe hands.

Ologbondiyan, in a statement yesterday, said both the APC and the Buhari led administration had lost the support of average Nigerians and was only promoting propaganda.

“If an information minister who ought to give the correct state of affairs can announce that a government which collapsed the country’s once robust economy and plagued it with violence, ethnic division and political tension, is indeed a safe hand, then our country is in much more trouble under the APC.

“How can anybody say that the same presidency whose incompetence and bad policies are directly responsible for the unabated killings, massive unemployment and job losses, collapse of businesses and even the lingering fuel crisis which has brought untold hardship in the land is indeed a safe hand?

“This is a government under whose watch the country has become heavily polarised along dangerous fault lines and where citizens now live in fear and mutual suspicion; where citizens are slaughtered by the day by marauders; where hunger and strange diseases ravage the people due to its bad policies.

“The reasonable take-away from the statement of the minister is that this government has come to its wits end and has no solution for the troubles it caused the country.

“More so, the minister’s statement has further exposed the fact that this failed administration is not the least remorseful for the pain it has caused the people, which underpins its arrogance and disdain towards Nigerians.

“We however urge Nigerians not to despair as the repositioned PDP stands with them in the collective quest to end the misrule of the APC in 2019,” Ologbondiyan said.