The House of Representatives’ Committee on Finance has resolved to invite the Central Bank of Nigeria over an allegation by the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation that the apex bank collects charges on foreign exchange meant to be paid to Nigerian diplomats across the world.

The Accountant-General of the Federation, Ahmed Idris, made the allegation in Abuja on Tuesday while appearing before the committee to defend his office’s estimates in the 2022 Appropriation Bill.

Idris said, “We also have another leg of personnel costs, which, for the first time, is being introduced in the budget of our office, which is the foreign service personnel in all the Nigerian missions and embassies abroad, which is also N4.747bn. In total, we have N9.089bn as personnel costs budget.”

He noted that the foreign service element used to be with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, saying, “But with some administrative changes, this has now been shifted to our office. The Chairman of the committee, James Faleke, asked why the OAGF proposed to pay foreign attaches at the exchange rate of N425/$1 when the 2022 Appropriation Bill presented by the President, Muhammadu Buhari, was based on N410/$1.