Senate committee on Finance has invited Godwin Emefiele, Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), to give explanations on the exchange rates the bank used for key projects under the Presidential Infrastructure Development Fund (PIDF) that gulped N163.8 billion.
The projects are the Lagos –Ibadan Expressway, Second Niger Bridge, Abuja –Kano Expressway, East-West Road and the Mambilla Hydro Projects being funded by the Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority (NSIA).
The invite by the Senate followed a revelation by the Managing Director of NSIA, Mr. Uche Orji, that the contracts for the projects were denominated in naira and CBN exchange rate for the disbursed fund was N325 to a dollar instead of the official rate of N305.
According to Orji, NSIA in the third quarter of 2013 invested in critical sectors like healthcare, presidential fertilizer initiative, education, real estate, international financial instruments to the sum of $1billion.
He further revealed that in 2018, the Federal Government injected $650 million for the PIDF from which N163.8billion has so far been disbursed for the three projects from approved N672.4billion that was earmarked.
However, Senator Adeola insisted there was an urgent need for the CBN to interface with the committee to avail it of the contract documents of all the projects. The meeting is to hold on Monday, November 4.
“This committee will like to see the contract documents for these projects and why the exchange rate for the dollar to naira was at N325 to a dollar instead of the official rate of N305 in a government-to-government transaction for these key infrastructure projects.
“We are not indicting NSIA or conducting an investigation or probe of CBN, but we like to know the reason why this different rate was used,” Senator Adeola stated.
The Senator stressed further the need for more investment in diverse areas to grow the $1.5 billion Sovereign Wealth for its contributors which are the Federal Government, State Governments, Local Governments and FCT so as to reap the economic benefits.
Concurring with Adeola, Senator Ayo Akinyelure ( PDP, Ondo Central) has stated that NSIA may have been shortchanged in the CBN transactions and that the rate explains the seeming slow progress, delay and non-completion of the key projects.
