The Connected Development (CODE), a civil society organisation (CSO), has said its “Follow The Money” initiative has tracked an estimate of $113.6m, in budgeted sums for projects, across 181 communities in over 25 states of the federation since 2012 of its establishment.
The Chief Executive Officer of CODE, Mr. Hamzat B. Lawal said this yesterday in Abuja at the seventh anniversary of the establishment of the organisation.
He said that the fund that it tracked were those budgeted for community projects and that their action has improved over four million rural lives.
He said the organisation has been able to save the government of over N15bn because of the leakages that it has been able to block with the initiative and that the initiative has been established beyond the borders of Nigeria.
“The Follow The Money initiative is now established in Malawi, Cameroon, Kenya, Liberia, Gambia, Zimbabwe as well as Nigeria. We are also collaborating with the Economic Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) to track government-funded projects,” he said.
He said the Acting Chairman of EFCC, Ibrahim Magu, has promised to provide government and security protection for their personnel during the discharge of their duties.
He said that Magu also promised to create a Follow The Money Desk at the EFCC office in Abuja where the organisation can easily access the EFCC.
Lawal said Follow The Money has been able to monitor about $27m fund released to The Gambia by the European Union; $10,000 released for provision of facilities in a Kenyan Slum and efforts on sexual and reproductive health fund in Malawi.
Also, the CODE Community Engagement Manager, Busayo Motunrayo, said the Follow The Money challenge required citizens to go into their communities and track government-funded projects.
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