House: Nigeria Missions Abroad Operate in Dilapidated Buildings

The House of Representatives has lamented that many of the country’s Missions abroad are operating in dilapidated buildings and rented properties with long unpaid rents and unpaid utility bills due to paucity of funds.

The Chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Hon. Yusuf Yakubu, at the plenary on Tuesday moved the motion of urgent national importance on the need for the House to save the country from embarrassment emanating from Missions abroad by evaluating the status of the Missions and acting promptly.

He said the condition of the country's Missions abroad has become a sad caricature of what they should be and a laughing stock in the eyes of the world

Yakubu stressed that these Missions could neither attract any Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) into country nor possess what it takes to address the yearning of the country's citizens abroad.

The chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs expressed concerned that the zero-budgetary allocation for capital expenditure for the country's over 100 Missions abroad in the last few years might have taken quite a toll on their performance.

The lawmaker, who decried the abandonment of the country's Missions abroad, said it was also part of the statutory mandate of the House to, among other responsibilities, make annual budgetary provisions for all the aforementioned Missions and to undertake oversight functions on them.

Yakubu said: "There was an alleged eviction of staff in DR Congo due to what we were told was the non-payment of recertification fee in respect of the property housing the Nigerian Mission in that country. Another was the invasion of our Mission in Dakar, Senegal, by a group of hoodlums, and the breaking of car windscreens and vandalising of other properties belonging to a Nigerian Mission by a Nigerian or a group that was said to be aggrieved with services at the Mission.

"Many of the Missions abroad operate from dilapidated buildings and rented properties with long unpaid rents and unpaid utility bills, poor and moribund communication infrastructure, dingy furniture, no utility cars and sometimes with no cars for the Ambassador/High Commissioner to even fly the official flag of our country in their places of assignment, and we worried about the above in the face of the fact that so much funds are generated as revenue through visa and passport issuance, but none of these goes into the coffers of any of the Missions."

The House, therefore, called on the federal government to allow each of the Missions abroad partake of the revenue generated from activities within its domains, which include visa and passport issuance fees among others, adding that this would no doubts enhance the work environment of the Missions and make for a positive change in their outlook.

It also called on the federal government to adequately provide funds for the Missions in order to take care of their capital expenditure every year, adding that the government should encourage the strict implementation of the Smart Mission concept in all of its missions abroad.