By Victor Christopher
A Civil Society Organisation, Resource Centre for Human Rights and Civic Education CHRICED on Thursday launched a bold anti-corruption campaign to track some abandoned projects in Kano State.
The move, according to CHRICED, was to get rid of corruption by ensuring transparency and accountability as well as holding legislators responsible and accountable on constituency projects in the state.
The Executive Director of CHRICED, Comrade Dr. Ibrahim Zikirullahi disclosed this at a press briefing during the launching of a new phase of CHRICED’s project tagged: Community Driven Anti-Corruption Initiative in Kano State.
Comrade Zikirullahi said part of the lineup activities for the one year project was to train youths and media practitioners on public contract procurement processes and projects tracking.
He explained that the beneficiaries would be selected from the three Senatorial Zones of the state.
“After the training, the participants will be given project documents obtained from the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission ICPC where the selected constituents and youths can check the status of constituency projects in their locality.” He said.
The Executive Director noted that after tracking the unimplemented or abandoned projects, the youths would be guided on how to petition relevant government agencies to expose the possible sharp practice.
Zikirullahi further frowned at the poor outcomes of most of the constituency projects in the country due to corruption and nonchalant attitude of constituted authorities, hence causing waste of scarce public resources.
“The initiative aims to deepen citizens’ interest in government spending and curb corrupt practices in the implementation of constituency projects in Kano.
“The Chatham House Report between 1960 and 1999 indicates that about “$400b was taken from Nigeria’s public accounts”.
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“The report further says between 2005 and 2014, approximately $182b was lost due to illicit financial flows. He said.
He noted that CHRICED was also partnering with the ICPC, Economy and Financial Crime Commission EFCC and the Kano State Anti-Corruption Agency to investigating the procedures aiding corruption in public institutions.
Also speaking, the Executive Director of War Against Injustice, Comrade Umar Ibrahim Umar stressed that “tracking constituency projects would ensure quality, timely delivery and prevent corruption”.
Comrade Umar, who commended CHRICED for launching the new phase of the project, stressed that to halt corruption in the country, concerted efforts are needed for the sake of good governance.