THE Senate has urged the Federal Government to remit its statutory 1 per cent from the Federation Account into the coffers of the National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI) as prescribed by the extant laws.
This was raised during the sitting of the Senate Joint Committee on Finance and National Planning Stakeholders after Mohammed Haruna, Vice Chairman of NASENI submitted revenue projections of the agency for the Medium Term Expenditure Framework and Fiscal Strategy Paper from 2021 to 2023, earlier forwarded by President Muhammadu Buhari in July.
Haruna in his submissions lamented that the agency had never received the 1 per cent remittance from the Federation Account as provided for by the 2004 National Assembly Act.
The Act stipulates that NASENI shall draw from the Federation Account, 1 per cent revenue accruing to the Federal Treasury beginning from the year 2000 but the agency had never received any amount from the Federation Account as stipulated by the law, Haruna said.
Olamilekan Adeola, the Chairman Joint Committee,Finance and National Planning directed Ahmed Idris, the Accountant General of the Federation, to enforce the payment from September this year, and commence the disbursement of 1 per cent allocation from the Federation Account to NASENI.
“Therefore, since the AGF is here, please ensure that the Executive starts implementation of the law from September this year because NASENI has potentials to develop and industrialize the Nigerian economy through the core mandates given to it by the extant laws,” he said.
The mandate of NASENI is specifically in the area of capital goods, research, production and reverse engineering. It is the only Nigerian purpose-built agency designed to conduct developmental work in the areas of manufacturing and capable of coordinating the proliferation of technologies developed either within or outside of its Centers including patents obtained.
Source: ICIR
