Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project
(SERAP), Enough is Enough (EiE) and BudgIT have sent a joint Freedom of
Information (FoI) request to Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt. General Tukur Buratai,
requesting him to use his good offices and leadership position to urgently
provide information on the 2015, 2016 and 2017 budget implementation reports of
the Nigerian Army, including the amounts released (financial implications) and
expended in fiscal years aforementioned for the various operations the army
carried out.
The groups in a joint statement on Sunday also urged Buratai
to furnish them with the amounts released and expended in fiscal years mentioned
above for Operation Lafiya Dole, Operation Safe Haven, Operation Python Dance,
Operation Ruwan Wuta, Operation Delta Safe, Operation Mesa, Operation Harbin
Kunama, Operation Awatse, Operation Tsera Teku and Operation Crocodile Smile.
In the FoI request sent last week and signed by
Bamisope Adeyanju of SERAP, Seun Akinyemi of EiE and Atiku Samuel of BudgIT,
the groups said: “Transparency of the budget process and its implementation is
an essential condition to achieve good governance.
“The reports, if provided and published, will shed
light on military spending and put to rest once and for all the perceived lack
of transparency and accountability in the spending of military budgets, which
has been a subject of intense public debate and concern. The information being
requested does not come within the purview of the types of information exempted
from disclosure by the provisions of the FOI Act.
“The information requested for, apart from not
being exempted from disclosure under the FOI Act, would serve the national
interest, public welfare, public interest and peace, human rights, good
governance, transparency and accountability.”
The groups stated that if the requested information
was not provided within 14 days of the receipt and publication of the letter,
the organisations shall take all appropriate legal action under the FoI Act to
compel Buratai to comply with their request.
According to them, several billions of naira
allocated to the military to defend the country and protect its people have
neither contributed to improving the ability of Nigerian soldiers to fight Boko
Haram and other armed groups nor provided the much-needed security especially
for Nigerians in the Northeast of the country.
“By virtue of Section 1(1) of the Freedom of
Information (FoI) Act, 2011, we are entitled as of right to request for or gain
access to information, including information on 2015, 2016 and 2017 budget
implementation reports of the Nigerian Army, and the amounts released
(financial implications) and expended in fiscal years aforementioned for the
various operations listed, which have yielded no tangible result.
"Also, by virtue of Section 4(a) of the FOI Act,
when a person makes a request for information from a public official,
institution or agency, the public official, institution or agency to whom the
application is directed is under a binding legal obligation to provide the
applicant with the information requested for, except as otherwise provided by
the Act, within seven days after the application is received," the groups
demanded.
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