Senate President Ahmad Lawan has reacted to reports of lawmakers at the National Assembly receiving $10million bribe to ensure three per cent goes to host communities in the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) recently signed into law by President Muhammadu Buhari.
The report said Mr Lawan and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, received $2million each with a balance of $6million to be shared among lawmakers at the red and green chambers.
It added that some of the lawmakers were aggrieved over the paltry some of the money they received from the fund and vowed to protest it when they resume from annual recess next month.
Addressing State House Correspondents on Monday after a closed-door meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari, Mr Lawan said though the allegations contained therein were funny, there was no truth in the report.
“People say anything or everything about the President, about the administration, about members of National Assembly, they call us names and this is part of the intangible dividends of democracy,” the top lawmaker said. “But we are determined to ensure that the space is wide open for everybody to say whatever he wants to say.
“…Recently somebody said 10 million dollars was given to the Speaker and the Senate President to give to members of the National Assembly to pass three per cent host community development fund.
“That is funny, but also very serious.
“I really want to take this opportunity to take exceptions to those kinds of unwarranted, false and fake information being fed to the Nigerian public and the danger people will face with this is you cause unnecessary damage to the reputation of people,” he added.
