Former Lagos state governor Babatunde Raji Fashola said he did not sign a cheque in his eight years in office. He said his commissioners didn’t sign either as it was “an institutional thing”.
Fashola said this on Wednesday while facing the senate for confirmation as minister.
In the last two weeks, President Muhammadu Buhari has sent a total of 36 nominees to the senate for confirmation as ministers in his cabinet.
Fashola who was reacting to a question if he indeed spent a total of N300 million to build a website (N78 million) and sink boreholes said: “I have never signed a cheque as a governor. My commissioners never signed cheques. It’s an institutional thing.
Nobody can award a contract outside benchmark price. There is a procurement process.”
On his position on loyalty to political godfathers, Fashola said: “I have remained loyal to all the courses I signed onto.”
He said testing of one’s loyalty was a tricky issue and concluded by saying: “may your loyalty never be tested” drawing analogy from a woman who needed a kidney transplant but was refused one by her own children.
Fashola also called for the discentralisation of police for optimum capacity utilization such that states will now have the ability to enforce laws passed by their assemblies.
He also called for competition by states in the generation of internal revenue and that the federal government should allow the states to keep as much of their taxes collected.
