The Subsidy Re-investment Empowerment Programme (SURE-P) has called on three major transport operators to re-pay the N2.95 billion they received under its Public Mass Transit Fund (PMTF) loans revolving scheme.
Dr Fatima Adamu, SURE-P Convener for Mass Transit Sub-Committee, made the appeal in an interview on Monday in Lagos. He said that the three transport companies owed SURE-P N2.2 billion, N400 million and N350 million, respectively.
According to her, the Federal Government made the PMTF loans interest free to allow operators to pay back on time and also accommodate more Nigerians in the Scheme Two of the of the revolving loans scheme.
Adamu urged the transport operators to support the Federal Government’s efforts aimed at ameliorating intra-city and inter-states transportation by reducing their charges.
She said that SURE-P, had through the Infrastructure Bank Plc, the fund managers for the Scheme Two, acquired 1,500 buses.
The convener said that the new buses would provide job opportunities for 6,000 people at the rate of four people per bus.
Adamu also said that the Federal Government disbursed N8.9 billion in the first phase of the scheme which ended in December 2012.
She said since the inception of the SURE-P mass transits initiative in January 2013, only about N2 billion had been spent out of the N6.1 billion earmarked for the Scheme Two of the programme.
“We are ready to take the matter to court because SURE-P money is Nigeria’s money.
“We are entrusted with that money so I consider it as my money.
“It is because we consider it as Nigerian money, that is why we made it interest free so that more people can benefit from it.
“That is also why we are expecting them also to reduce the cost of transportation for Nigerians to benefit from it.
“I am appealing to the operators to subsidise the transportation cost in the country because if they had gone to bank they would get interest rates lower than 20 per cent,” she said.
(NAN)
