Despite economic recession, biting hard times and attempt by President Muhmmadu Buhari’s government to borrow about $30billion to get things moving, a profligate Nigerian House of Representatives has taken delivery of 360 exotic cars, valued at N3.6billion, for its members.
The 28 were among the first batch of 50 cars supplied by the Kaduna-based Peugeot Automobile Nigeria Limited at a unit price of N10m. The House had allocated N3.6bn for the cars in the 2016 budget.
A National Assembly aide told the newspaper yesterday that the arrangement with Peugeot was that the company would supply the vehicles in batches because of the huge number of members involved.
“Fifty cars will be supplied in the first batch; 28 have already been delivered. That was last week.
“Twenty-two more in the first batch are expected to be delivered this week,” the source stated.
It is understood that all 360 House members, whether new or old, will still benefit from the luxury cars, officially known as ‘utility’ or ‘committee’ vehicles. So what happened to the cars given to old members before?
The Chairman, House Committee on Media and Public Affairs, Mr. Abdulrazak Namdas, confirmed that members had started taking delivery of the vehicles.
Namdas said the female lawmakers were the first in line to pick up their units, while the males would take their turn in subsequent batches.
Asked why the House would waste money on 360 exotic cars at a time the country was in recession, Namdas played down any reference to the cars as being “luxury.”
He said, “This issue of cars is long overdue. They are not for luxury but for committee and oversight duties.
“The 8th Assembly is nearing two years, yet members have no cars to carry out their duties.
“Ministers and other officials in the executive have long bought vehicles for official duties.
“At the state level, members of House of Assembly have cars to carry out basic functions.
“I think it is only fair that members of the National Assembly will have utility vehicles for their assignments.”
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