HIGHLIGHT
Yemi Osinbajo said he will remain in his current official residence provided to him by government known as Aguda House.
Acting President, Yemi Osinbajo
Acting President Yemi Osinbajo Sunday said that he would remain in the present official residence provided to him by government known as Aguda House.
The Acting President made the statement in clarification of rumour that the administration was spending huge sums to complete a new official residence for the Vice President.
Osinbajo, in a statement by his Senior Special Assistant on media and publicity Laolu Akande, said the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari had not made budgetary provision in the 2016 and 2017 fiscal year to complete on-going works at the new official residence of the Vice President.
Akande said the project was started by the immediate past administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan and has not been considered a priority by the present government.
According to Laolu, the current Vice President Osinbajo has expressed his preference for the existing residence, called Aguda House, to the new complex.
He said: “The incumbent Vice-President, Yemi Osinbajo, has said publicly that he considers Aguda House, which he currently occupies, a befitting official residence for the Vice President and sufficient for his needs.”
Akande, who said that the new project was started in 2010, noted that “the project has never featured in the two budget proposals of the Buhari administration, neither in the 2016 nor the 2017 spending plan”.
“We like to clarify that the proposed plan of the immediate past administration to build a new official residence for the occupant of the Office of the Vice President, including the controversial gatehouse preceded this administration.
“Any suggestion, therefore, that this project benefits our administration or that it reflects our spending style or preferences is not only misleading but blatantly false,’’ he explained.
Akande stressed that while the project was about 85 per cent complete, the Federal Government, in the circumstances, would decide at the appropriate time, the best use for the 14 buildings already on the project site.
