A civil society group, Coalition Of South East Youth Leaders (COSEYL) has alleged that the reported daily school feeding at the cost of N679 million is a ploy by individuals in the Presidency to milk the country dry, saying it laughable.
The group said it is unbelievable to assume that the Federal government spends a whopping N13.5 billion monthly on school children at a moment when they are at home, insisting that it is a program designed to loot the nation’s treasury.
In a release jointly signed by Hon. Goodluck Egwu Ibem, the President General and Comrade Kanice Igwe, the Secretary General of the group, it called on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to investigate the claim and bring to book anyone involved in looting the nation’s resources.
“The purported spending of N679 million daily on feeding school children during the lockdown when the schools are not in session is a fraud perpetrated by some persons in the Presidency to liquidate the economy of Nigeria. It is laughable for anyone to come out in broad daylight to say that the federal government is spending N13.5 billion monthly to feed school that are at home.
“One is meant to believe that the essence of the entire lockdown is to enable some corrupt persons to loot and defraud the government of money meant for feeding school children. Even the most corrupt countries in the world will never come up to say that they are spending money on school children that are not in session.
“The recent looting spree has exposed the primary aim of the school feeding programme. The founders of the programme introduce it just to loot the treasury and now that the school are closed, the looting and fraud must go on . To them they must remain focused in their objective which is looting.
“We demand for immediate probe and prosecution of those who are looting our collective wealth in the name of feeding school children. The perpetrators of this wicked plan wants to ensure that Nigeria is brought to its knees. No sane country will allow such broad daylight robbery to stand.
“We call on the Economic and Financial Crime Commission, EFCC, whose duties is to probe matters of corruption to move in immediately to arrest and prosecute all those involved in this unholy dirty dealing.
“This is not the time for selective prosecution by EFCC were only persons from the South East or Christians are prosecuted while Muslims and Fulanis are allowed to work free after committing huge fraud that can grand the economy.
“Enough of this insult on Nigerians. Nigeria is too big for a selected few to be playing with it. This huge corruption must not be swept under the carpet. The must be a thorough investigation and probe of this high level corruption. It has never happened anywhere in the world were a government will claim to spend money on feeding school that are not in session. Are they now feeding spirit school children? We need to know if ghosts and spirits are they ones they are feeding when the same FG made it very clear that everyone should stay at home and remain indoors.
“The time to unravel this great fraud is now. We are watching.” it says.