Senate’s N500 Million Broadcast Contract

WHILE the fire of the N628 million contract scandal, which ultimately consumed the erstwhile Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mrs. Olubunmi Etteh, and her deputy, Babangida Nguroje, was raging, there was an undercurrent of a similar scandal at the Senate. But the alleged contract scam at the upper chamber of the National Assembly did not assume a crisis dimension as it was nipped in the bud.

UPON the allegations that its leadership was involved in the mismanagement of about N3.4billion, including N500 million claimed to have been spent on live broadcast of the screening of ministerial nominees, the Senate Committee on Ethics, Privileges, and Public Petitions was mandated to investigate and go over the accounts so as to get to the roots of the matter.

ALL the allegations, except one, were, however, debunked by the Committee. The Committee’s report confirmed that the Senate approved N500 million for the live telecast of the screening of would-be ministers. The contract, it revealed, was awarded to two broadcast organisations. The Committee added that payment for this service was yet to be made, owing to paucity of funds in the Senate’s coffers. The Committee in unmistakable terms absolved the Senate President of any wrongdoing.   But there was a twist to the broadcast contract issue when the Senate’s spokesman, Senator Ayogu Eze, informed the public that the cost of the live telecast was N200 million; and that the contract was awarded to three media organisations and not N500 million to two television houses, as the Committee claimed in its report.

ALTHOUGH both the Committee and Senator Eze agreed that due process was followed in taking the decision to engage the services of the media houses and that the expenditure was transparent and legitimate, it is, however, curious that there is a monumental discrepancy between what the Senate Committee claimed was approved for the live telecast and what the leadership of the Senate acknowledged as the actual debt owed to the three media houses that covered the screening.  Since the decision to engage the services of the media organisations was allegedly taken by the whole Senate, could it be that the cost of the exercise was not discussed?  Or is it that no member of the Senate Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions was present at the closed session where the decision was taken? What manner of investigation did the Committee carry out, if it could not clear doubts on the disputed figures?

IT is not yet clear which of these two figures is accurate but the difference, N300million, is not a small amount that can be dismissed just like that. Assuming that the cost of the live telecast was indeed N200million, it is still a hefty sum in a clime where the majority of the citizens lack basic social amenities like water, electricity, good roads and functional hospitals. What is the benefit of the live broadcast to ordinary Nigerians? Politicians seem not to be perturbed by the incessant complaints about their profligacy and/or extravagance.

AGREED that the Senate’s decision to broadcast the screening live might have been informed by its desire to be transparent, in view of the allegations of bribery and corruption that blighted the integrity of the past Senate, but should it have to commit so much of taxpayers’ money to an exercise that should ordinarily be at the bottom of its priority list?  Besides, many of the broadcast houses, which were not officially contracted, still found it expedient to air the exercise live to their viewers. They recognised the fact that it was a public-interest exercise, which, as socially responsible organisations, they must not fail to participate in. In view of this, we consider the payment of N500 million (or is it N200 million?) for the live broadcast of the screening of would-be ministers to be a waste of scarce resources.

IN the developed societies, the broadcast media in certain instances buy the rights to broadcast some important programmes and events that they believe will interest their viewers. Why is the Senate paying for the coverage of an exercise that should ordinarily have been a daily run of the mill for the media? Maybe the Senate should as well pay the print media that also covered the screening and which gave a blow by blow account of the exercise to their readers. In fact, the Senate should pay all the media organisations that cover its proceedings on a daily basis.

THE African Independent Television (AIT), which undertook the live broadcast of the aborted 2006 constitutional amendment debate at the National Assembly, was never paid. In fact, the hawks then in the Presidency fought tooth and nail to stop the live coverage of the debate. But because the AIT knew that the third term agenda that formed the kernel of that debate would interest its viewers, it covered it at no cost to the National Assembly, even if at the risk to it as an organisation and its staff members.  

THE issue, therefore, is not about whether due process was followed or the expenditure was legitimate and transparent. What is being called into question is the propriety of engaging and paying that significant amount, which could have been used for the benefit of the suffering masses, to media organisations for the live telecast of a mere ministerial nominees’ screening. The live telecast, as well as payment for it, was absolutely unnecessary. The Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria should endeavour to refocus on its priorities. It should be too busy and serious to accommodate this kind of frivolity.