Who approved Oduah’s N225m bulletproof car purchase?

The controversy surrounding the purchase of two armoured BMW 760 Li cars for N225m for the use of the Minister of Aviation, Ms. Stella Oduah, deepened on Sunday, with conflicting information on who gave approval for the transaction.

While some sources alleged that President Goodluck Jonathan might have approved the purchase of the vehicles for the minister by the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, our correspondents could not get an independent confirmation from the Presidency as the officials chose to

It was gathered that neither the minister nor the NCAA could have singlehandedly approved the transaction without recourse to other approving authorities.

A highly placed source said the Ministerial Tenders’ Board might have given approval for the contract, instead of the Bureau of Public Procurement, which is responsible for scrutinising and verifying the cost of public procurement contracts.

Usually, the BPP monitors the prices of tendered items and keep a national database of standard prices.

However, a top official of BPP, who spoke to one of our correspondents on the condition of anonymity, said the purchase did not need to pass through the BPP process because the amount involved was not up to the N250m benchmark, except the Aviation ministry elected to subject it to the process.

The source said, “It is not all procurement that comes to the BPP. They don’t have to go through BPP at that level to purchase the vehicles except they so elected. That level of purchase can be handled by the Ministerial Tenders’ Board.

“What the BPP can do on procurements that do not pass through it is to audit them. However, I don’t think that this particular procurement needs to be subjected to an audit process.”

The Director-General, BPP, Mr. Emeka Eze, was, however, evasive when the issue was raised with him on Sunday, saying that he could not confirm whether the purchase of the vehicles was subjected to the agency’s due process.

“I am not in the office and I don’t have information on it with me. You know that we have over 500 agencies that we oversee. So, on a Sunday like this, I will not have all the information except I am in the office,” he said.

An online news agency, Eagelonline.com, quoted the Chief Executive Officer, Armouring LLC, Mr. Dave Simmons, as saying that the price of both cars, including the cost of purchase, armouring and delivery to Nigeria, could not have been more than N76m.

An online news medium, SaharaReporters, had last week reported that the minister forced one of the parastatals under her, the NCAA, to buy two bulletproof cars for her use.

It was reported that the armoured BMW cars, valued at about N127m each, were delivered to the minister in August.

Documents obtained by the medium showed that the transaction for the purchase of the vehicles started in June.

After initial denials, the Special Assistant (Media) to the Minister of Aviation, Mr. Joe Obi, who confirmed the development exclusively to our correspondent on Wednesday, said the vehicles were purchased to protect the minister from some external threats.

He said, “Yes, it is true that some security vehicles were procured for the use of the office of the honourable minister in response to the clear and imminent threat to her personal security and life following the bold steps she took to reposition the sector.

“When she came on board as the minister, she inherited a lot of baggage in terms of the concession and lease agreements in the sector, which were clearly not in the interest of the government and people of Nigeria.

“And so, she took bold steps and some of these agreements were reviewed and some were terminated, and these moves disturbed some entrenched interests in the sector, and within this period, she began to receive some imminent threats to her life; therefore, the need for the vehicles.

“It should be noted that these vehicles are not personal vehicles and were not procured in the name of the honourable minister; they are utility vehicles and are for the office of the minister, and if she leaves the office, she will not be taking the vehicles along with her.”

However, on Friday, the Director-General, NCAA, Capt. Fola Akinkuotu, said the cars would be used to convey international dignitaries who came to the country on official visits.

He said aviation was a global industry and the NCAA, as the regulator of the industry in the country, very often played host to dignitaries from international civil aviation bodies.

He said it was customary to convey the minister and the visiting foreign dignitaries in security vehicles whenever they were in Nigeria.

 “It must be noted that during such visitations, the security of members of the delegation is the sole responsibility of the host country. The vehicles are, therefore, in the pool of the NCAA for these special assignments and are available at the NCAA office and can be shown to you,” Akinkuotu said.

He announced on Friday that the agency was searching for the person who allegedly leaked the information concerning the purchase of the vehicles to the media, because the Federal Government was concerned about how the information got to the public domain, noting that whoever leaked it had committed a criminal offence.