The federal government has accused the United Kingdom of being unjust, unfair, punitive, indefensible and discriminatory in its decision to impose a travel ban on Nigeria due to the few cases of COVID-19 Omicron variant discovered in the country.

Addressing a press conference in Abuja on Monday the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed stated that the step taken by the UK government in reaching its harsh decision on Nigeria was grossly unscientific as Nigeria does not feature in the red list of any country.

The Minister left a clear hint that the Presidential Steering Committee (PSC) will take a retaliatory decision on the matter soon.

The United Kingdom on Saturday banned all flights from Nigeria following the discovery of three cases of the Omicron Variant in the country.

The federal government’s position is coming on the heels of a similar travel ban on the country by Canadian government after detecting the variant from travellers who landed in the country from Nigeria.

The federal government on Wednesday last week confirmed three cases of the Omicron variant in the country, but they were all from travellers from South Africa and not cases that originated from Nigeria, fuelling the federal government’s anger against the UK government and other countries that have imposed travel ban on Nigeria.

“As you are aware, Britain has put Nigeria on its red list and banned foreign travels from our country. This is as a result of the discovery of Covid-19 cases, Omicron variant, in Nigeria. Britain now joins other countries, including Canada, which have taken a similar action against Nigeria over Omicron.

“Let me say straight away that it’s up to the Presidential Steering Committee (PSC) to respond to this action by the British government and others, and I have no doubt that the Committee will respond appropriately.

“However, as the Spokesman for the Federal Government, I can say, without mincing words, that the decision by the British government to put Nigeria on the red list, just because of less than two dozen cases of Omicron which, by the way, did not originate in Nigeria, is unjust, unfair, punitive, indefensible and discriminatory. The decision is also not driven by science.

“We sincerely hope the British government will immediately review the decision to put Nigeria on its red list and rescind it immediately. Nigeria has handled the Covid-19 pandemic with utmost responsibility and based on science, and has rightly earned global accolades for its efforts.

“Nigeria does not belong on any country’s red list,” the minister said.

Meanwhile the House of Representatives’ Committee on Public Accounts is investigating the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control for paying part of the N9billion it received as special intervention fund from the Federal
Government on COVID-19 into personal accounts of some members of its
staff.
As the committee grilled the Director-General of the NCDC, Dr Ifedayo Adetifa, over the centre’s spending on Friday, he disclosed
to the committee that the federal government, between March and December 2020, released to the NCDC N620million; March 2020 to March
2021, N5billion; and January 2021 to September 2021, N3.49bn.
Chairman of the committee, Oluwole Oke, however, raised the alarm over some irregularities in the disbursement of the funds, noting that some of the money were paid into the private accounts of some staff
members.
Oke cited two examples in 2020 where the sum of N3.95million was paid to one Kemisalo Odimayo for the establishment of an additional sample collection space and another sum of N792,000 to one Musa Sokodabo for the construction of isolation and treatment centres in some states.
Adetifa, however, referred the query to NCDC’s procurement officer, Dania Augustus, who said money was usually paid into the account of
any staff member who raised a memo for any expenditure.
Augustus also said it was considered necessary to pay into the private accounts at the time due the urgency of the COVID-19 response.
“Musa is a desk officer; that is to say he raises memos on issues and treats files and all that. What usually happens is that whoever raises
a memo for an activity, when payment is to be made, so that accounts can track record of payment, the initiator of that memo, his name is usually used,” he said.
Members of the committee, however, faulted the process as violating procurement laws.
Oke particularly stated that there was no justification for paying such an amount of money to any worker directly.

Consequently, the committee demanded all relevant records on how the funds were expended at the next hearing.
Adetifa explained that the N9billion was used for renovation and construction of infectious diseases, treatment and isolation centres
across Abuja and some states as well as construction of treatment of isolation and treatment centres, procurement of medical and laboratory equipment and logistics and supply chain.
Other items of expenditure, he said, were recruitment of ad hoc staff and human resource support, procurement of lab supplies, response operations at national and state emergency operations centres, deployment of rapid response teams for outbreak investigation and response, training of health care workers on case management and
surveillance, media and risk communications and tax, among others.