FORMER Gombe State Governor Ibrahim Dankwambo has said his life was under threat for championing the introduction of Treasury Single Account (TSA).
Speaking at the public presentation and launch of a book, titled: Treasury Single Account Policy in Nigeria, written by the Director of Finance and Administration in the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Salawu Zubairu. The ex-governor said: “For people like me, we had to be given extra security, like they had to change our houses. We had to be accompanied by police because of the threats over the implementation of financial reforms.”
Dankwambo urged the Federal Government to strengthen Nigeria’s financial and treasury reforms.
Strengthening financial and treasury reforms, he said, should include documentation as well as giving legal backing to financial reforms initiatives so that politicians do not take them for granted.
The former governor advised the government to ensure that take do not advantage of the inherent loopholes for their gains.
Describing TSA reform as a laudable financial and treasury idea, Dankwambo, a one-time Accountant General of the Federation (AGF), urged treasury and finance officials in government establishments to come up with similar reforms.
He said: “I hope other reforms, similar reforms, will be documented this way. Going forward, for me, that has also experienced the other side of the country as a politician. Reforms can come and reforms can go. These reforms must be made into law so that we politicians, who come and go, will not just come and take all these reforms for granted and waste them.”
Dankwambo advised the incumbent AGF, Mr. Ahmed Idris, to ensure that existing finance Acts are reviewed so that politicians who “come and go” do not influence them.
