Non remittance: Senate met Works Ministry, others behind closed doors.
The Senate on Tuesday in Abuja met behind closed doors with Ministers of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, Muazu Sambo on issues relating to non remittance of user charge from the price of petroleum products to the Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA).
The user charge from price of petroleum as stipulated in the Act establishing FERMA, is meant for rehabilitation of federal roads.
The National Daily reports that present at the meeting were the Managing Director of FERMA, Mr Nurudeen Rafindadi, Sen. Gershom Bassey, and management staff of Nigerian Downstream and Midstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) among others.
The meeting was occasioned by the report of the Committee on FERMA over an ealier motion raised by Sen. Gershom Bassey,on deplorable state of road network in the country and failure to remit user charge of petroleum price to FERMA as prescribed by the act.
In his remarks, before the closed session, Leader of Senate, Abdullahi Yahaya noted that ,when the committee came up with its report at plenary on the matter, Senate resolved that there was no need to legislate on the report, noting that it would be good to also hear the views of the Ministers for further clarifications.
“The cause of this meeting was to determine, why the implementation of the Act that stipulates some percentage of petroleum prices, has not be accrued to the FERMA, since the law was made in 2007 .
“And this have a very negative impact on the road sector network in this country.
“And if that amount of money is provided a lot of the challenges we have on the road sector will be solved.
“Many Nigerians do know the work the Federal Government is putting on construction of road.
“And so we are here to make sure that the issue is resolved,” Yahaya said.
National Daily reports that the Roads Maintenance Agency Act provides for the collection of five per cent user charge on pump price of petrol and diesel.
Specifically, section 14(h) of the Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (Amendment) Act 2007 provides that five per cent user’s charge on pump price of petrol, diesel and of which 40 per cent will accrue to FERMA and 60 per cent to be utilised by the established State Roads Maintenance Agencies”
In order to ensure transparency in the utilisation and disbursement of the said fund, Section 2 of the Act enjoins the Board to “cause the publication of its funds under section 14 (h) of this section to be utilized by the established State Roads Maintenance Agencies and its disbursement in the electronic and print media from time to time.”