Buhari’s Aide Exposes Senate President, Speaker; Calls Them Selfish

By Gideon Njoku

The romance between the leadership of the National Assembly and the Presidency seems to have gone sour.

The gloves are out. What Nigerians see are rough tackles. There is mutual suspicion. And, distrust reigns.

Mrs Mariam Uwais, Presidential Adviser on

Social Investment Programmes, has accused both the Senate President, Dr Ahmed Lawan and Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajamialina of selfishness.

Uwais, a renowned Lawyer, wife of a former Chief Justice of Nigeria, was reacting to strong criticisms by both men, asking for transparency, and account in the execution of the transfer of funds to alleviate poverty amongst the very poor, and especially in the era of COVID-I9.

The eye brows raised by the Lawmakers seems to have put the $500m World Bank support for Conditional Cash Transfer in trouble.

But the Presidency, speaking through Uwais attributed the eye brows raised to the inability of certain members of the National Assembly to include “their personally selected candidates”  as beneficiaries for the National Social Investment Programmes (NSIPs).

Uwais insists that this failure is: “largely why the programme has come under attack by Senate President, Sen. Ahmed Lawan and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila.”

Buhari’s Special Adviser  the President alleged this in a statement she  released  in response to the  attacks on the operations of the NSIP by  Lawan and  Gbajamialina.

Taking on the issues raised  by the lawmakers on the selection of beneficiaries, Mrs Uwais said “the demand for the inclusion of candidates to the NSR from the NASS has been a recurring issue from the inception of the NSIPs.

“My role and singular focus has simply been to comply with the terms of Agreement and the MoU entered into by the Federal Government of Nigeria, as well as to establish an objective, efficient and transparent process for uplifting the poor out of poverty through structures and mechanisms that are credible and sustainable.

“I have consistently reminded both NASS Committee Chairmen on Poverty Alleviation that there is no social protection programme in the world in which politicians are responsible for selecting the beneficiaries of cash transfers. All successful social protection programmes extract their beneficiaries from an objective community platform, if only to ensure that the poorest of the poor are supported out of poverty in an inclusive community driven and timely manner.”

And on the consequence of politicizing the selection process as requested by the National Assembly, she  said the demands of the lawmakers is a breach of the financing agreement entered into with the World Bank.

Uwais:“The process for objective identification of poor and vulnerable households is as provided in the Financing Agreement (F.A) signed between Nigeria and the World Bank, for which purpose the World Bank IDA Credit and the recovered funds from the Abacha family are being utilised.

“It should be noted that any departure from the process would place at risk the accessibility to the IDA Credit and the recovered funds from the Abacha family.

“The National Cash Transfer Programme derives all the cash transfer beneficiaries from a National Social Register (NSR), comprising State Social Registers that are developed and hosted by the State Ministries of Panning of each State,”

Uwais also described as untrue and regrettable claims by the Lawmakers that information about the NSIPs was not accessible to the National Assembly.