Senate questions Ajaokuta Steel Company on N4.2bn personnel cost

The Senate has expressed concern over the N4.2 billion allocated in the 2024 budget for personnel costs at Ajaokuta Steel Company Limited, questioning the unverifiability of the workers.

This issue arose during an investigative hearing on alleged corruption and inefficiency at Ajaokuta Steel Company and the National Iron Ore Mining Company from 2002 to the present, conducted by a Senate ad hoc committee.

Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, the committee’s deputy chairman, challenged the sole administrator of the company, Summaila Abdul Akaba, to account for the number of workers receiving salaries from the allocated N4.2 billion.

Natasha said: “The sole administrator of Ajaokuta Steel Company, I have a good question for you, being an indigene from the area, very worried about the state of the company and passionate about its revival, the sum of N4.2 billion was appropriated for personnel cost in 2024, but from several visitations I’ve made to the complex, hardly were 10 people sighted to be around or doing anything. So, who are the workers collecting monthly salaries from the appropriated N4.2 billion?

“Statistically, if N300,000 is paid monthly to 14, 000 people per month for a year, you get N4.2 billion or N500,000 to 8,400 workers per month in a year. Where are the 14, 000 or 8,400 workers in Ajaokuta, the appropriated N4.2 billion is being spent on ?”

But in an embarrassment-saving move, the Minority Whip of the Senate, who is also a member of the committee, Senator Osita Ngwu (PDP, Enugu West), prevented the sole administrator from responding to Natasha’s poser.

Senator Ngwu interjected, “Please don’t let us indict ourselves because the said appropriation was approved by the National Assembly.”

In his closing remarks at the investigative hearing, the chairman of the ad hoc committee, Senator Adeniyi Adegbonmire (APC, Ondo Central), said presentations and submissions made by various stakeholders would be thoroughly looked into by the committee for a solution report on Ajaokuta Steel Company to the Senate.

Key stakeholders at the investigative hearing include the permanent secretary of the Ministry of Mines and Steel Development, a director from the Central Bank of Nigeria, a director from the Bureau of Public Enterprises, BPE, Nigerian Society of Engineers, and Steel and Engineering Union Workers of Nigeria, among others.