Friday, October 20, 2017

Abuja – The ad-hoc committee set up by the Senate to look into the activities of National Hajj Commission (NAHCON) and the National Christian Pilgrims Board in this year’s pilgrimage exercise, Thursday, threatened to issue warrant of arrest against the Chairman of NAHCON, Alhaji Abdullahi Muktar.

The NAHCON boss, according to the Committee, has refused to honour three different invitations sent to him to appear before it for explanations on alleged extortions of pilgrims in the Hajj exercise and exorbitant hajj fees generally.

Briefing the press on the impending warrant of arrest against the NAHCON boss, the Chairman of the committee, Senator Adamu Aliero said the NAHCON chairman is by his behaviour, serving as a stumbling block to the committee as far as the assignment given to it by the Senate is concerned by not honouring any of the invitations sent to him since 7th of August this year.

See also: NAHCON Moves 9,300 Pilgrims To Mecca

According to Aliero, “In July, the very month the Committee was set up by the Senate, an invitation letter was sent to the NAHCON boss to furnish us with required information on the Hajj exercise as regards total money to be spent by the commission, fees being charged per pilgrim etc, but complained that such information could not be supplied then due to preparation on the impending hajj exercise then.

“After that, on July 7th this year, a letter of invitation to appear before the Committee with required documents was sent to him but refused to honour without any explanations, the same behaviour he repeated when a similar letter dated 14th August was sent to him

“Consequently with the 2017 Hajj exercise over for close to two months now and the NAHCON chairman failing to honour the invitation of the committee and forwarding to it required documents for the assigned investigation, the committee will definitely invoke relevant section of the 1999 constitution to compel his appearance.”

He, however, explained that a fresh letter of invitation would be sent to the NAHCON boss before invocation of the constitutional provisions that will enforce his appearance before the committee.

Some of the documents expected from the NAHCON boss by the committee are copies of the commission’s 2017 appropriation Act, details of funding, details of IGR, details of contracts awarded, names and addresses of banks, audited accounts of the commission etc.

Source: http://independent.ng/2017-hajj-senate-threatens-nahcon-boss-warrant-arrest/