By Gloria Ikibah
The Budget Office of the Federation has told the House of Representatives that although the Presidential Foreign Investment Promotion Council (PFIPC) was allocated N1.32 billion in the 2026 Appropriation Act, not a single kobo was released to the organisation because it failed to meet the legal conditions required for public expenditure.
The clarification came on Friday when the Director-General of the Budget Office, Tanimu Yakubu, appeared before the House of Representatives Ad-Hoc Committee investigating the alleged unlawful establishment and funding of the PFIPC.
The committee is probing how the council found its way into the federal budget despite growing evidence that it was never legally established by the Federal Government.
Defending the Budget Office’s actions, Yakubu maintained that the agency neither created the council nor approved its establishment, recruitment, staffing or salaries. He said its responsibility was limited to assessing the financial implications of approvals forwarded by the relevant government authorities.
He disclosed that although the council requested N3.8 billion for personnel costs, the Budget Office rejected the figure and carried out its own independent assessment using the approved staff strength and the salary structure prescribed for public servants.
He said: “The Budget Office did not create the council. It did not assign its budget code. It did not approve its establishment. It did not grant its recruitment waiver. It received official instruments and did what the law required of it. It measured their fiscal effect.
“That estimate did not form the basis of the Budget Office’s recommendation. The Budget Office rejected it and made an independent calculation. That calculation produced N802,978,783. This was not a concession to the council. It was the Budget Office’s own fiscal proposal.”
Yakubu explained that the proposed personnel allocation never translated into actual spending because the Budget Office did not issue the financial clearance required before recruitment, enrolment on the government payroll and payment of salaries.
He emphasised that although personnel costs accounted for about 61.63 per cent of the council’s total appropriation, the funds remained untouched.
“There was therefore no financial clearance. There was no lawful recruitment. There was no payroll enrolment. There was no salary payment.
“Not one naira of the personnel provision has been drawn. There is no personnel expenditure to recover because no expenditure ever occurred”, he added.
The Director-General also told lawmakers that the N200 million earmarked for overheads was never accessed because treasury warrants and cash backing were not issued.
Similarly, he said the N300 million capital allocation remained on paper as the procurement process never reached the stage where public funds could legally be spent.
According to him, the financial safeguards of government worked exactly as intended by preventing unauthorised expenditure before any money left the treasury.
“No procurement reached the point at which expenditure would arise. No Ministerial Tenders Board approved a transaction. No Certificate of No Objection was issued. No treasury warrant followed. No treasury cash-backing followed.
“The law did not recover money after it had gone. It prevented the expenditure before it began”, Yakubu noted.
During the hearing, members of the committee questioned the legal basis upon which the Budget Office made provisions for the council after examining what they described as a purported Act establishing the PFIPC.
A committee member, Rep. Abubakar Fulata, argued that the document lacked the essential features of a valid Act of Parliament, including a gazette number, the signature of the Clerk to the National Assembly and presidential assent.
He also faulted government agencies for failing to verify the authenticity of the document before acting on it.
“The purported Act is very clear. It is not genuine because it did not carry the gazette number, it did not have the signature of the Clerk of the National Assembly and it did not carry the signature of Mr. President”, he stated.
In response, Yakubu insisted the Budget Office relied solely on official establishment approvals, recruitment waivers and directives from the National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission in calculating personnel costs.
“We do not rely on any instrument to calculate personnel costs other than the establishment authorisation and the directives of the National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission”, he stressed.
Chairman of the Ad-Hoc Committee, Rep. Yusuf Gagdi, said the evidence before the panel indicated that the Budget Office acted based on documents presented by the appropriate government institutions, which were only later discovered to be forged.
Gagdi said the investigation had now shifted from the Budget Office to uncovering how forged documents entered official government channels.
“The question is whether the Budget Office allocated budget to this agency without the agency satisfying the requirements. The answer, based on the documents before us, is no. I repeat, no.
“The agency satisfied all the requirements the Budget Office needed before allocating a budget. The issue now is whether those documents were genuine. That is what this committee is investigating”, he noted.
He disclosed that the Accountant-General of the Federation has been invited to appear before the committee on Monday to explain how the council obtained its budget code, while other agencies will also be questioned as the investigation enters its final stage.
“By the special grace of God, we will conclude our findings and finish by next week”, he added.
The House constituted the ad-hoc committee following allegations surrounding the operations of the Presidential Foreign Investment Promotion Council, which reportedly appeared in official government records and the 2026 Appropriation Act despite questions over its legal status.
The panel is expected to determine how the council gained official recognition, identify those responsible and recommend measures to prevent similar occurrences within the public service.
