Kaduna State House of Assembly on Tuesday suspended all activities of the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment Programme in the state after it discovered that about N560m was unaccounted for from the fund for 2012.
The House, in a unanimous decision during its plenary, also passed-a-vote-of- no confidence in the former State Commissioner for Finance, Dr. John Ayuba, over his inability to furnish the House with the details of the SURE-P activities in the state.
Governor Muktar Yero, as the deputy governor of the state, was the chairman of the SURE-P before the death of the former governor Patrick Yakowa, who died in a helicopter crash in Bayelsa state on December 15, 2012,
Not satisfied by the implementation of the programme in the state, the House raised an 11-man Adhoc Committee to investigate how the programme was implemented last year.
The committee, led by its chairman, Mr. Kantiok Ishaku, on Tuesday presented the report to the House, which was adopted.
The document, obtained by our correspondent, indicated that the actual receipts by the Kaduna State Government of its share of Revenue from subsidy reduction for the year 2012 was N2.24bn at a monthly rate of N280.398m from May to December, 2012,
It added, however, that between January to March, there was no receipts for the said months neither was there any mention of receipts for April.
The report said, "However, a lump of N560m was said to have been received. All efforts by the Implementation Committee of the SURE-P and the ad-hoc committee of this honourable House to get the actual records of this expenditure from the Commissioner of Finance proved abortive."
It said while the Commissioner for Finance reported a 100 per cent payment of supplies of 700 tricycles, the Special Adviser, Due Process, queried the rational behind the 100 per cent payment before Due Process Certification was issued.
The report said of the five sector approved for the intervention of SURE-P in the state, only transportation had been touched and that many of the vehicles and tri-cycles bought were not given to the beneficiaries but dumped in various government offices.
The report also accused the SURE-P handlers in the state for overspending the capital fund of N105m by N10m without approval from the State House of Assembly.
However, dismissing the report, the former Finance Commissioner and now Commissioner of Water Resources, Dr. John Ayuba, said he was surprised by the report.
He said, "I am surprise about this development because I have never had any inking that I had an issue with the House of Assembly when I was Commissioner for Finance."
The Punch