The Presidency has denied receiving N11.01 billion for the State House Clinic, Presidential Villa, Abuja, for the period of 2015, 2016 and 2017.
The denial was made in a statement issued on Sunday by the Deputy Director, Information, at the Presidential Villa, Mr. Attah Esa.
In the statement, the Permanent Secretary, State House, Jalal A. Arabi, was quoted as saying that the money received for both capital and recurrent expenditures were far below the amount said to have been budget for.
He said contrary to report that N3.2 billion was released for upgrade and provision of necessary drugs and equipment in the 2017 budget, nothing was allocated or received as capital allocation for the State House for the period.
The statement reads in part: “The attention of the Presidency has been drawn to recent media reports suggesting that the State House Medical Centre had received N11.01billion as appropriation for the period 2015-2017.
“According to the Permanent Secretary, State House, Jalal A. Arabi, contrary to the above claims, out of the total Capital Appropriation of N2,941,062,044.00 and Recurrent Appropriation of N465,935,358.00 for the period under reference, only the sum of N969,681,821.53 (representing 32.97%) for Capital and N225,575,200.60 (representing 48.41%) for Recurrent was actually released.
“Arabi also said it may interest the public to know that there was zero capital allocation for the Medical Centre in 2017, while out of the N331,730,211.00 being recurrent appropriation for 2017, the actual amount released up to September was N91,370,053.60 (representing only 27.54%).
“The Permanent Secretary emphasised that the above figures are verifiable from the Ministries of Finance, Budget and National Planning.”
Arabi also explained that during the three-year period under review and despite the shortfalls between budgetary provisions and actual releases, the Medical Centre continued to provide free services to the over 10,000 registered patients annually.
He added too that the clinic had continued to execute on-going projects.
Arabi gave insight into the scope of the medical centre’s clientele, stressing that apart from the Presidency, other beneficiaries of the free services included political appointees, the military, para-military, other security agencies, members of the National Assembly, and the general public.
“Considering the unrestricted patronage base and free services of the State House Clinic, coupled with the funding hiccups and periodic receipts, it may not be far-fetched to notice gaps between demand and supply of medical equipment and consumables at certain stages of the budget circle,” Arabi stated.
Controversy has greeted the activities at the State House Medical Centre in the past one week over alleged lack of drugs and equipment.
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The controversy prompted the House of Representatives to resolve to investigate the medical centre.
The situation became alarming when it was alleged that the medical centre had been allocated N11.01billion within a period of three years – 2015 to 2017.
The resolution of the legislator followed a motion to that effect and moved by Henry Archibong (PDP, Akwa Ibom).
The motion was titled “Need to investigate the deplorable condition of the State House Clinic and the alleged deductions from the salaries and allowances of the medical staff.”
In the debate, Archibong alleged that the clinic had been receiving annual budgetary allocations to procure equipment to function optimally.
He said in the 2015, 2016 and 2017 Appropriation Acts, the clinic was allocated the sums of N3.94 billion, N3.87 billion and N3.2 billion respectively for upgrade and provision of necessary drugs and equipment.
He complained that despite the huge budgetary allocations, the clinic lacked necessary facilities such as syringes, drugs and equipment needed to save lives, as observed by the wife of the President, Mrs. Aisha Buhari recently.
Mrs. Buhari had lamented publicly during a stakeholders’ meeting her inability to access even the simplest drugs at the State House Clinic.
The terms of reference of the committee of the House of Representatives was to probe the deplorable condition of the clinic and the alleged deductions from the salaries and allowances of the medical staff and report back within three weeks.
