Omonaijablog All is not yet clear on the procurement allegation leveled against the government of Lagos state, especially the office of the deputy governor, as documents stumbled upon by this medium reveals that the office has accused office of the procurement agency of not doing due diligence on the information provided on its website.
The leaked internal memo dated November 19 from the office of the deputy governor, and addressed to the Director General, Lagos State Public Procurement Agency, faulted the claims on the website over what is attributed to the deputy’s governor office on procurement.
Lagos State Deputy Gov., Obafemi Hamzat.
The memo signed by Director, Finance and Account, Tola Ekemode on behalf the Permanent Secretary in the office of the deputy governor described the procurement agency’s claim and the online story with the headline: ‘Open letter on selected public procurement by LASG in the period April – Sept 2023″, which has been trending since last weekend on social media as total misrepresentation of facts.
The leaked internal memo also described the open letter as untrue, mischievous, fake and unfounded.
The deputy governor’s office, however, urged the agency to take prompt action in addressing the issue by giving the general public a true account of what was approved for the Office of the Deputy Governor.
The memo addressed to PPA reads; “Our attention has been drawn to an online story with the Headline, “OPEN LETTER ON SELECTED PUBLIC PROCUREMENT BY LASG IN THE PERIOD APRIL TO SEPTEMBER 2023”.
According to the news item as reported on X (formerly twitter), the Office of the Deputy Governor was reported to have awarded the sum of =N=2,017,840,000 for the provision of supply items (rechargeable fans, rechargeable lights and fridges). It was also reported that the office spent =N=30,000,000 monthly for outreach to indigents by the Wife of the Deputy Governor and same amount for monthly empowerment programme by the Wife of the Deputy Governor.
The Office of the Deputy Governor wishes to state in unequivocal terms, for your immediate action and the attention of millions of readers that the report is untrue, mischievous, fake and unfounded.
We are compelled to write this letter due to the inaccuracies it conveyed; as the story was completely different and not a true reflection of what we have in our records.
It is important to state that, the office did get approval and awarded the provision of supply items (rechargeable fans, rechargeable lights and fridges) for the sum of =N=2,017,840 (Two Million, Seventeen Thousand, Eight Hundred and Forty Naira) and not the =N=2,017,840,000 (Two Billion, Seventeen Million, Eight Hundred and Forty Thousand Naira as reported on the website of your agency, Lagos State Public Procurement Agency, Lagos MEPB Q3 Budget Performance Review referenced by the X (formerly twitter) account.
In addition, the report that the office through the Wife of the Deputy Governor spent =N=30,000,000 monthly for outreach to indigents is inaccurate as the amount stated covered the whole year. It is =N=2,500,000 per month. Same for the Empowerment programme by the Wife of the Deputy Governor which is also =N=2,500,000 per month as against =N=30,000,000 monthly reported.
The above narrative is exactly what we have in our records and please, kindly find attached the approvals, the Letters of Award of the contract for your further necessary action.
Truth must be said, this is very sad and Mr. Deputy Governor has expressed his displeasure to this happening and will want your office to kindly address this by giving the public the true picture of events. This errors or inaccuracies exhibited by your data is capable of putting credibility at stake. One then wonder about the accuracies of the overall content on the site if the items concerning the Deputy Governor’s Office can be this inaccurate. It is therefore important that you look through the data and confirm the correctness or otherwise of all the details of the report as displayed on the website.
Please treat this with the required urgency and respond appropriately.
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