JUST IN: Termites Ate Vouchers Of Our N17.1bn Spending – NSTIF

Nigeria Social Insurance Trust Fund (NSITF) has said termites have eaten most of the vouchers containing details of how the N17.158 billion yet to be accounted for was spent.

Gatekeepers News reports that the agency’s management disclosed this to the senate committee on public accounts on Friday.

The N17.158 billion, as stated in the 2018 audit report, was the total amount of money transferred by NSITF from its Skye Bank and First Bank accounts into various untraceable accounts belonging to individuals and companies from January to December 2013.

In 2018, the auditor-general’s office raised 50 different queries bordering on alleged misappropriation of funds by management of the agency, which is under probe by the Senate committee on Public Accounts.

Specifically, on the N17.158billion unsubstantiated transfers made by NSITF , the query reads: “Management of NSITF as shown in statements of Account No. 1750011691 with Skye bank plc, for the period 1st January, 2013 to 20th December, 2013, and Statements of Account No.2001754610 with First Bank Plc for the period 7th January, 2013 to 28th February, 2013, transferred amounts totalling N 17,158,883,034.69billion to some persons and companies from these accounts.

“However, payment vouchers relating to the transfers together with their supporting documents were not provided for audit. Consequently, the purpose(s) for the transfers could not be authenticated.

“These are in violation of financial rule 601 which states that, ‘All payment entries in the cashbook/accounts shall be vouched for on one of the prescribed treasury forms. Vouchers shall be made out in favour of the person or persons to whom the money is actually due.

“Under no circumstances shall a cheque be raised, or cash paid for services for which a voucher has not been raised.”

However, the present and past management of the NSITF could not offer any satisfactory explanations for the undocumented multiple transfers.

In 2013, the officers in charge of the agency told the committee that they left documents like vouchers behind.

The Managing Director of NSITF, Michael Akabogu, however, said that no documents of such were in their kitty.

“The container the said documents were kept by past management has not only been beaten by rains over the years but even possibly being eaten up by termites,” Akabogu said.

“As directed by this committee, I told the past management officers about the need for them to help us out in answering this query with necessary documents which have not been made available for us.”

In his defence, Umar Munir Abubakar, the Managing Director of NSITF from 2010 to 2016, said that he was unaware of the query and had no explanations for it since the audit was not carried out during his tenure.

On the other hand, Adebayo Somefun, who was the head of the agency from May 2017 to July 2020, said that those in the account section should be able to trace the documents which the current General Manager of finance alleged to have been locked up in an abandoned container within the premises of the agency in Abuja.

Irked by the submissions of the past and present NSITF officials, Mathew Urhoghide, chairman of the committee, ordered them to reappear before the committee with all the requested evidential documents unfailingly on Thursday, September 22, 2022.