Ogun State House of Assembly says it is not satisfied with the explanations given by the immediate past Managing Director of the State Property and Investment Corporation (OPIC), Barr. Jide Odusolu, on the manner he ran the Corporation between 2015 and 2019, given the 25 infractions noted in the audited accounts.
The Chairman, House Committee on Public Accounts and Anti-corruptions, Hon. Musefiu Lamidi, made the remarks during an engagement between members of the House Committee and former Managing Director as well as some members of the current management of the Corporation at the Assembly Complex, Oke-Mosan, Abeokuta.
According to Hon. Lamidi, the Corporation merged the cost of lands and buildings which contravenes the provisions of the accounting standard, while the five Star Hotel, Ikeja, under it, did not have any physical existence but only on paper and the sum of N45, 025, 064.00 was spent to obtain title documents on the landed property, just as the premium of non-current assets for 2015- 2016 were not paid as and when due.
He also noted that the Corporation under Odusolu was just updating its fixed assets register at the period of the audit exercise, while the "depreciation policy of 20 percent on computer equipment did not reflect the volatility on computer technology” hence may have led to the understatement of depreciation amount in the financial statements, the Committee classified some housing projects meant for sales like "Orange Valley, MTR, OPIC Estate and others as Stock in Trade”
The Committee further disclosed that the rent income of OPIC Plaza, Ikeja, was not made available for examination during the 2016 audit exercise, with no traceable records of interactions between the Agbara Estate and the billing section of the Corporation on the reconciliation of rent income generated.
Condemning the operations of 21 bank accounts by the organisation, out of which nine were inactive, the lawmakers also sought explanations on the basis for the agency in the period under review to have kept 27 accounts with only 11 banks amounting to N117, 792,132.99 active, while the remaining 16 accounts amounting to N608,226,371.69 were embargoed.
They observed that the audit report revealed that for 2019 after generating an income (including subventions and grants) of N3, 817, 778, 776.65 and expending a total of N1,197,182,579.27, the balance is N2,620,596,187.38, adding that the expected bank balance as year-end 2018 of N2, 564, 398, 282.51 brought the expected balance to N5,184,994,469.89 available to the agency.
In view of the above, considering the 2019 bank balance sheets submitted to the lawmakers as N726, 018,504.68 which represents an unaccounted balance of N4,458,975,965.21 needed to be accounted for, expressing that funds expended on MITROS Residences, Abeokuta, were not appropriated for in line with best budgeting practices by the State, hence the need to avail the committee with documents in support of all cost lines and revenue on the properties between January 2015 and February, 2020.
Responding, Odusolu, who outlined some of the housing projects carried out by the Corporation under his purview, appreciated the lawmakers for the opportunity to clarify issues during the period under review.
The former M.D. posited that the Corporation needed to be run like an independent business enterprise, which should be devoid of the public service scrutiny, rules and processes; the position which runs contrary to the extant laws that any State owned investment or organisation should always be subjected to public scrutiny in line with the constitution according to the lawmakers.
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