The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt. Hon. Yakubu Dogara has advocated for a stoppage of sponsorship of bills seeking the establishment of new government agencies.
Dogara said this at a public hearing organised by the House Committee on Information and National Orientation, Ethics and values.
The Speaker said this while delivering his opening remarks at a public hearing organised by the House Committee on Information and National Orientation, Ethics and values.
Dogara explained that at a time the country is grappling with the effects of economic recession, it will be a waste of government funds to start financing establishing new agencies when existing ones can be made to undertake more functions.
In his words: “As a parliament, we must weigh very carefully the cost of setting up new Government Agencies especially during this period of economic recession. Sometimes instead of establishing new agencies we may just amend the laws setting up similar existing agencies by incorporating the mandate of the new agencies in the old one. This is because to set up a new bureaucracy with complement of Directors, offices, equipment may be unnecessary.”
The public hearing was aimed at collectively analysing the content of the four bills that have passed second reading at plenary and subsequently referred to the Committee for further legislative action, namely;
(1) A Bill for an Act to Amend the National Broadcasting Commission Act (HB 168)
(2) A Bill for an Act to Provide for the Regulation and Conduct of Broadcasting Profession in Nigeria (HB 150)
(3) A Bill for an Act to Repeal Nigerian Films Corporation and Re-enact the Nigerian films Commission (HB 584)
(4) A Bill for an Act to Establish the National Agency for Ethics and Values (HB 519).