…. Suspended Chairman Defends His Action
A group, Kagarko Concerned Citizens For Transparency has petitioned the Kaduna State House of Assembly calling for the immediate and unconditional removal of the suspended Kagarko Local Government Council Chairman, Rabo Nasara to put an end to what it termed as crass, primitive, irredeemable and squandamania leadership style .
The petition was signed by the Group’s Chairman and Secretary, Abubakar Barde Awafa and Waziri Gaya and copied the State Governor, the Commissioner for Local Government, the Local Govt Legislative Council, the Commissioner of Police and EFCC.
In the petition which was also made available to the media, the group noted that the local government has been subjected to a dangerous downward slope in the last two years under the leadership of Rabo Nasara due to the high degree of corruption allegedly perpetrated by him.
According to the group, Kagarko Local Government is seriously sick and presently in the political and economic Intensive Care
Unit bleeding profusely like a fatal road accident victim hence the need for the State legislature to the needful without further delay.
Describing the situation as dangerous and unfortunate disaster befallen on the Kagarko LGA, the Concerned Citizens are of the strong believe that only the immediate final removal of the suspended Council Chairman and possible transfer of his cohorts would restore sanity at the local government.
The cohorts, the group emphasized, are the Head of Works, AT Finance, the Internal Auditor as well as the Director of Administration and Finance whom they believe were providing the Chairman the needed shield to fleece the local government.
The Concerned Citizens enumerated some of the alleged frauds by the Council Chairman as stated below and with an addendum -:
1. “The multi-million naira contracts inflations, fraudulent and multiple payments of many uncompleted projects scattered across the 10 Wards of Kagarko LGA. We cannot afford to have Rabo return to office as doing so will greatly further injure the local government.
2. ” Rabo Nasara has not been deducting retention fees for the capital projects he has been executing which we all know is contrary to Financial Memorandum and consequently, a corrupt way of depriving our local government from gaining revenue internally. In fact, we strongly believe that if he insist that he normally deducts retention fees then he is surely diverting the fees for his personal use.
3. ” Hon. Nasara Rabo has been in the business of executing Direct Labour far above the approved N500,000 limit for local government Chairmen and he does so without clearance from the Kaduna State Public Procurement Authority or the Ministry for Local Government Affairs. Mr. Speaker Sir, you may wish to know that most of the local government Chairmen use Direct Labour as a potent secret weapon to defraud government which can be hardly detected. Like the Auditor’s report rightly observed, carrying out Direct Labour to the tune of N80,329,000.00 without proper documentation and maintenance of projects financial records is the height of corruption which should not be condoned.
“The Chairmen or their representatives usually handle Direct Labour projects and these often run into millions of naira as is the case in Kagarko LGA. We refer you to the list of capital projects executed by the local government under Rabo Nasara in 2022/203 and 2023. These Direct Labour projects do not necessarily pass through the eagle eyes scrutiny and approval by the appropriate officers in the local government. Besides, the local government checkers are often afraid to thoroughly screen and query the papers for such projects. This is because they are often blackmailed or intimidated to turn blind eyes and “clear” the Direct Labour papers/vouchers for payments. We are speaking from informed position because we know the things that are transpiring in the local government after all, most of the staff of the Council are our school mates, relations and friends who often share these secrets with us.
“4. On the issue of the many uncompleted projects in the local government, there is the urgent need for a Projects Audit Committee to be set up which should be mandated to go round all the sites (villages) of the projects in Kagarko LGA for an on the site project verification. It is only then that Mr. Speaker and the honourable members will adequately appreciate the magnitude of fraud and corruption the suspended Chairman and his cohorts have committed against the good people of Kagarko. All the claims by the Chairman that he has completed most of those projects and also completed payments are lies.
“For instance, there are about four or more blocks of classrooms awarded along with the supply of chairs and desks in the same contract, but the chairs and desks were never supplied. What they did was to complete one block of the buildings, paint it and then take chairs and desks there, along with a cameraman who snapped the classrooms with the chairs and desks arranged inside the classroom. After the shot, they now use the same picture as sample for other sites where they are supposed to do the same job. That way, they have pictures to show unsuspecting auditors or Ministry officials who might want to go to each of the other schools for verifications. They often tell the visiting team that the schools are far away and that the areas are prone to insecurity. Such reports usually scare investigators from going to the schools.
“Again, Hon. Rabo Nasara lied that he has completed the Kagarko township road but a visit to Kagarko now will prove him wrong as the road is presently under construction. The acting Chairman, Hon. Mustapha Gidado recently re-awarded the contract for the Kagarko township road.
5. ” On the matter of electrification, there are many villages where Hon. Rabo Nasara claimed to have completed electrifications, but what is on ground is only a mounted transformer and polls with no single cable on the poll talk-less of having power supply in the area. In other cases, some individuals who have farms or companies in the area are the ones that donated transformers and polls and the Chairman is now claiming to be the one that provided them. A Chairman can only claim to have initiated and completed the electrification of a village if his administration is responsible for the job from start to finish. Anything contrary to this is fraud, criminal and corruption. That is what has happened in many places.
6. ” Mr. Speaker and the honourable members need to know that it is an unarguable fact that on 30th March 2023 the Chairman, Hon. Rabo Nasara held a Council/Management, Finance and General Purpose Committee, F&GPC and the meeting in his private residence at Bwari. In that sitting it was resolved that the local government will specifically contribute money to buy the Dnata Chiefdom a motor vehicle.
“The sum of N12m was appropriated/approve on that day and the explanation on the Council Extract for that appropriation/approval is “Contribution to Dnata Chiefdom for the Purchase of Motor Vehicle.” Attached is a photocopy of the Council Extract which is marked as Annexure ‘A’. Please see item number 6.
“We read in the media where the Hon. Rabo Nasara claimed that the sum of N12m appropriated/approved in that meeting was not for contribution to purchase a car for Dnata Chiefdom only. He told journalists that the N12m was shared to the four Chiefdoms in Kagarko LGA. That is a blatant lie!
“The truth is that the F&GPC approved the sum of N12m to purchase a car for the Dnata Gbagyi. However, only N4m was spent to purchase the car; a Mercedes Benz C350 and the difference of N8m was fraudulently diverted. Only the Chairman and his team can explain this. It is not a secret that His Royal Highness, the Dnata Gbagyi, Mr. Bitrus James is no longer using the car because since it was handed over to him around July this year, it has been giving him trouble.
7. ” It is also public knowledge that the suspended Chairman is in the habit of holding Council and Management, F&GPC meetings in his private residence at Bwari instead of holding such meetings in the local government secretariat. Often time, some statutory Council and Management members are not informed or invited and because they do not know about the meetings, they therefore cannot be in attendance. He however ensures that his core loyalists are notified about such meetings where they take major decisions which are binding on the members who were absent although not deliberately. This act is malicious, mischievous and calculatedly fraudulent. It is obviously not in the interest of good governance, but criminally detrimental to the overall development of the local government.
“Kagarko LGA is not the private company of Hon. Rabo Nasara, its management and administration must therefore be conducted in a transparent manner for all to see and all those who are statutorily supposed to participate must be given the right to do so. Government business should be transacted in government office and NOT in a private residence and outside the state. It is unacceptable, it should not be condoned, but be viewed with all the seriousness it deserves.
8. ” Hon. Rabo Nasara should be made to refund the sum of N5.5m withdrawn from the local government treasury which was approved by the F&GPC meeting of 30th March 2023 to sponsor four indigenes of Kagarko LGA to attend the X-Fest Africa Leadership Training and Business Innovation submit in Kigali, Rwanda. The Rwanda trip did not take place and nothing is heard about it.
“It is important we draw Mr. Speaker’s attention to the fact that the Area Auditor who exposed the nefarious activities of Hon. Rabo Nasara which brought about his suspension has been surreptitiously transferred for obvious reasons instead of being rewarded for a job well done. Let it be put on record that the Auditor’s action was correct when he raised the alarm of outrageous and untimely review of contracts sum and payment within two months.
“The fact is that he had stomached too much and had no option but to spew out the monumental corruption that was taking place to save the local government and himself from any accusation of conspiracy to defraud government. Certainly, the Auditor’s action of whistle blowing has greatly helped Kagarko LGA.
“We are aware that Rabo is presently working hard, bribing people everywhere to ensure that the Auditor’s report is discarded and committed to the trash can so that he can get a clean bill of health to be reinstated.
“Mr. Speaker, honourable members, the greatest disservice the Kaduna State House of Assembly will do to the good people of Kagarko LGA, to the APC, to Kaduna State and to democracy is to by any stroke of imagination contemplate the reinstatement of Hon. Rabo Nasara to office.
“Mr. Speaker, honourable members, we are counting on your August House to save Kagarko LGA and finally remove Hon. Rabo Nasara as the Chairman and ensure the immediate transfer of the members of his team of the local government which will pave way for a fresh team to be constituted that will assist the acting Chairman to move our local government forward at least, for the remaining period of the tenure. Anything short of this shall be unacceptable to the good people of Kagarko LGA.
Abubakar Barde Awafa
Chairman
Waziri Gaya
For Secretary
But reacting to the allegations, the suspended Chairman, Nasara Rabo said his hands are clean.
He told a medium, not Africa Prime News, that he got approval from relevant authorities for all the contracts he executed while in office as the LGA boss.
“I have the approval from relevant authorities of all the projects I executed during the period under review. I have all the documents. You can visit the local government secretariat and get the clearance of all the projects we executed. I have awarded over 100 projects in the local government area. There was direct labour headed by the Director of works. It is not binding on me to visit all projects on site as the local government Chairman”. Rabo said