Lagos - Dr Christopher Kolade, the Chairman, Subsidy Re-investment and
Empowerment Programme (SURE-P), says he will not quit the plum job, in
spite of criticisms.
Kolade, who made the announcement on Friday in Lagos at media luncheon,
said that the committee was inaugurated to ensure better welfare for
Nigerians.
"I will continue to work for Nigerians and we will not abdicate this country to anybody and nobody will take my integrity away.
"I will not quit, if you attack me, I will defend myself. The National
Assembly and the SURE-P Committee and everybody are supposed to be
working for Nigerians not individuals," he said.
Kolade said that the committee members would continue to ensure probity, transparency and accountability.
He noted that the total budget for running SURE-P activities was one
billion naira and not N2.2 billion as reported in some dailies.
Kolade explained that N220 million was spent on secretarial activities
this year out of the one billion naira allocated to the committee.
The chairman noted that funds allocated to the committee for project
execution was N180 billion, representing 42 per cent of the partial
subsidy removal.
He said that the remaining 54 per cent goes to the state and Local
Governments, stressing that the Federal Government had predetermined the
projects to be executed by the committee before its inauguration.
"At inauguration, all that will happen this year has been predetermined
and the members lack the power to choose projects," he said.
He, however, assured that the committee's major agenda was to make life better for ordinary Nigerians.
Prof. Kunle Ade-Wahab, a member of the committee, said that the
committee had carried some interventions in roads, transportation and
youth empowerment.
Ade-Wahab said that the committee had also invested in the health care
sector through the mother and child initiative to reduce mortality rate.