Imported User:
The House of Representatives has denied any relationship with advertorials and news stories carried by some national newspapers alleging that the House of Representatives has taken a stand on the ongoing pension investigation being carried out by the House Committee on Pensions.
Addressing a press conference on the issue, yesterday, chairman Committee on Media and Public Affairs of the House, Hon. Zakari Mohammed said the committee had not submitted its report to the House for consideration yet and so could not have acted on it to take a stand, and added that the authors of the story and the advertorials were not known though he acknowledged that the letter published was a correspondence of the committee on Pensions aimed at helping their investigation.
Zakari also stated that the House of Representatives was working in tandem with the Senate when it comes to issues like the Pension probe and would therefore, not take a stand that will appear to discredit that which the Pension Committee of the Senate has taken.
He said, “We wish to disassociate ourselves from this publication and put it on record that we are trying to be on one page with the Senate as far as issues are concerned.
Those who have placed the advertorials, we don’t know their intention but we know there has been corruption in the sector. An attempt to try to divide our focus, we resent and reject it”.
Speaking on the letter, the lawmaker said it was actually written to the presidency by the committee but the advert was not placed by the House of Representatives or the Committee on Pensions as was conveyed in the publication.
“The letter was written by Pensions Committee, it was an internal memo, investigation is still ongoing and this is making it look like we as a House have taken a decision on it. It is a matter that is still ongoing.
“Someone somewhere wants to achieve certain aims and so, placed this advert”, he said.
He also explained that the chairman of the Pensions Committee was away in Sokoto State while his deputy was in Makurdi but affirmed that both of them had denied knowledge of the publication even as he added that the secretary of the committee also claimed ignorance of the adverts.
