Foremost human right lawyer, Femi Falana, has called on the National Assembly to probe the unauthorised withdrawal made by President Muhammadu Buhari from the Excess Crude Account (ECA).
Reacting to the controversey surrounding the withdrawal of $496million to pay for Tucano aircrafts in the United States, Falana said the days of anticipatory approvals should be over in the country.
According to him, “Since 1999, anticipated approvals have been the order of the day.
“Presidents (Olusegun) Obasanjo, (Umaru) Yar’Adua and (Goodluck) Jonathan were alleged to have spent N1.5trillion without parliamentary approval. We thought that that era had gone for good.
“The National Assembly should investigate the withdrawal with a view to stopping the executive”.
A letter dated April 13 and transmitted to the National Assembly, shows that Buhari had already given anticipatory approval for the withdrawal of $496,374,470 (N151,394,421,355) from the ECA, for the purchase of the aircraft and was only seeking the inclusion of same in the 2018 Appropriation Bill that the National Assembly is currently finalising.
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