Cross River: Activist Chides Assembly Public Accounts Committee for Frustrating Government's Efforts To Stem Criminal Logging
By Mark IDRAH
An activist and constitutional lawyer, Okoi Obono-Obla, has chided the chairman of the Cross River State House of Assembly (CRHA) committee on Public Accounts, Hon. Bryan Odey (Yala 1) for working against the interest of Cross River Government's effort to stem the tides of illegal logging by unscrupulous persons.
Barr. Obla, whoy made his position on the issue clear in a public statement, titled, "The Public Accounts of the Cross River State House of Assembly As a Clog in the progress of Cross River State and Conductive Pipe to Deny Revenue to the State," stated that instead of working in tandem with the executive arm of government checkmate the reaping bare of our rich forests by some criminal syndicates and gangs, the committee members rather employ their constitutional role to frustrate efforts of the executive arm in this direction.
He warned that they should realize that "outside the precinct of the House of Assembly, they don't have any constitutional immunity to excuse them from criminal responsibility for their acts of subversion of the financial laws of this country.
"How can the Public Accounts Committee of the Cross River State House of Assembly under the guise of oversight functions employ so-called ad hoc staff to frustrate the efforts of the executive branch of government to put a stop to the illegal logging and harvesting of the rain forest in Cross River State that is now facing existential threat and resulting in the threat of the fundamental and environmental right of more than five million people in the State?"
Obla shudder at such despicable and mindless graft exhibited and perpetrated by the representatives of the people to the extent that trucks that honestly paid revenue to the government of Cross River State are siezed by the same staff of the Public Accounts Committee who collude with criminals syndicates and gangs to mindlessly deforest our rain forest.
According to him, these so-called staff of the Public Accounts Committee are the ones colluding with criminal syndicates and gangs that have mindlessly and ruthlessly cut down the forest and perpetrated money laundering and other criminal activities.
Obono Obla stated emphatically that the right of oversight functions conferred on the House of Assembly by the 1999 Constitution should not be employ for selfish end or self-aggrandizement employing the the instrument of corruption to the disadvantage of the overall majority of the people.
"The oversight jurisdiction conferred on the House of Assembly by the Constitution of the Federal Republic Nigeria, 1999 should not be used as a subterfuge and guise to subvert the law, perpetrate corruption, and as a spanner in the wheel of progress of the State, but as an instrument to deepen good governance."
Calls put across to the chairman of the Cross River State House of Assembly (CRHA) committee on Public Accounts, Hon. Bryan Odey (LP) (Yala 1) were not returned as at the time of going to press.
