Teddy Oscar, Abuja
Members of the House of Representatives on Thursday tasked the Federal Government to redouble its efforts, and ensure that the recurrent oil theft that is bedevilling the nation is permanently solved.
This is even as the House would from Friday embark on a 19-day break to allow members continue with their oversight functions and observe the upcoming Eid-el-Kabir.
In his weekly media chat with newsmen, Zakari Mohammed, chairman, House Committee on Media and Publicity, advised government to go beyond its policing-by-baton approach, and be more proactive with the use of technology.
“As per oil theft, leadership is not all about excuses. It is all about proffering solutions. I know that those that are involved in this unpatriotic act are not ghosts… they are (all) human beings, and government has the machinery to put it into goodwill and tackle oil bunkerers in the oil theft thing.
“For us at the House, we fail to agree that oil theft cannot be surmounted. We know that we have security operatives. Government has been empowered on that. There are budgetary provisions made for that.
“It is laughable for us to begin to talk about oil theft at this time and age because technology has moved in such a way that your pipelines can be censored in such a way that, if there is any leakage anywhere, or breakage, you will be alerted. We should move towards that. The world has gone beyond policing by baton. But you can sit in one place and still police so well with cameras. I think we should be more innovative rather than this one-point-one-man thing.
“We believe that the alternatives, the openings (to end oil theft) have not been explored enough to be able to tackle oil theft, and we at the House, we see that as economic sabotage. We’d expect that the relevant agencies step up to arrest oil theft. We are sick and tired of people talking about oil theft, oil theft… as if it is ghosts that are doing it. We should go beyond that.
“That is laughable, and I believe that we should get… if there are sanctions, Mr. President should not hesitate to apply the sanctions for those who are not doing their jobs. So, that’s the way I see it because as a parliament, we fail to agree that this oil theft cannot be surmounted.
“So much revenue is allegedly being lost. Who’s benefitting from that? Where’s the market for the oil theft? We should begin to work as a government to discourage that because, if we work that hard, I’m sure that we should find solutions, and we’ll be saving this country a lot of money that would be planned back to addressing our infrastructural deficits,” the lawmaker said.
Meanwhile, Mohammed has hinted that members would be performing their oversight functions until October 12, from which time they would be going for the Sallah break.
“We’ll come back on the 22nd. So, we have a ten-day break. What we have now is a working break because we have not been able to finish the oversight functions that we’ve done. We’ve told committees to bring up those reports, but it’s very obvious that we’ve not been able to cover enough grounds. So, it’s very, very expedient that the leadership, in its wisdom, decided that we should, at least continue with our oversight functions.
“I don’t want us to get it very wrong because one of the key components of the parliament is oversight function, lawmaking and representation, and oversight is integral because we are getting towards the budget year,” he explained.
