NALDA paid N9.44bn of 2024 constituency project money without valuation certificates, audit says; the 2026 Act gives it N51.28bn for capital

The Auditor-General for the Federation says the National Agricultural Land Development Authority (NALDA) paid N9,438,803,865.51 to contractors from constituency project funds in 2024 without the papers that show how much work had been done. In a query on page 546 of the 2024 Annual Report on Non-compliance (Vol. II), the auditors write that there was "no evidence of Interim Valuation Certificates or detailed valuation breakdowns attached to the payment vouchers to show the extent of work executed". Under "Management's Responses" the report records two words: "No response." The same chapter puts NALDA's 2024 constituency contracts at N17,932,303,859.54. That is more than the N13,572,023,869 the 2024 Appropriation Act, as first published, gave the authority for all its capital spending. The 2026 Act gives NALDA N51,275,704,886 for capital, and 76 of its 190 capital lines name a federal constituency or a senatorial district.

An interim valuation certificate is the document a works contract is normally paid against: the value of what has been built is measured against the bill of quantities and certified before each stage payment. The query quotes paragraph 88.6 of a 2008 procedures manual, "Payment for works contracts will normally be made against Payment Certificates approved in strict accordance with the terms of the Contract", and a 2019 Treasury circular listing the papers that must go with government contract payments. The auditors found that the payments "were made to contractors from Constituency Projects Funds without supporting documents". They list the risks as "Payment for jobs not executed" and "Loss of government funds". Those are risks the auditors name, not findings that any job was left undone. The report asks the authority's Executive Secretary to account for the sum to the Public Accounts Committees of the National Assembly, and to recover it and remit it to the Treasury.

The query is one of nine in the NALDA chapter, which covers 1 January to 31 December 2024 and runs from page 540 to page 550. The first two set out how the constituency contracts were let. Contracts worth N14,704,662,287.79 "were awarded for the procurement of works and services under the 2024 Constituency Projects without evidence of open competitive bidding". The authority had sought approval to use selective tendering, but the auditors found no evidence that the request "was based on genuine urgency relating to sustainable food production and seasonal agricultural activities", noting that the projects "arose through routine planning, budgeting, and appropriation processes". The second query gives the total awarded under the 2024 constituency projects, N17,932,303,859.54, and says 58 contracts worth N10,747,603,575.28 were split "into various components to fall within the approval threshold of the Authority". On those figures, 82.0 per cent of the constituency contract value was let without evidence of open bidding, and 59.9 per cent sat in contracts the auditors say were split.

Most of the other queries also concern constituency money. Constituency contracts worth N3,651,544,959.38 went to 17 contractors, some with no evidence of registration with the Bureau of Public Procurement or the Corporate Affairs Commission. Contracts worth N1,016,834,893.49, paid from capital and constituency funds, went to 11 contractors, some with no evidence of valid interim registration reports or tax clearance certificates; in some cases, the report says, the tax certificates "covered periods predating the incorporation dates of the companies". Four contractors were awarded and paid N853,169,662.50 from constituency funds for street lights, and an audit survey of market prices put the overvaluation at N600,545,000.00, or 70.4 per cent of what was paid. N499,975,721.00 went to five contractors from the authority's Zonal Intervention Fund with no payment vouchers produced, and N248,021,681.41 went to four contractors for training and empowerment with no attendance registers or certificates on file. The same contracts can fall under more than one query, so the nine sums cannot be added into a single total, and Vero Record has not done so.

For eight of the nine queries the report records "No response" from NALDA. The one it answered concerned N339,501,266.70 paid into the personal accounts of four staff "for warehousing purposes". The authority said the payees, most of them new staff, were not yet listed as employees payable on the government's GIFMIS payment platform, so they could not be paid there; that their enrolment was in process; and that it had attached bank statements "showing the disbursement of the various amounts to the final beneficiaries". The auditors called the response unsatisfactory. The four payments the report lists, N89,740,107.03, N65,325,476.00, N92,097,230.00 and N92,347,453.67, add to N339,510,266.70, which is N9,000 more than the total the query states.

The 2024 Appropriation Act lists NALDA under the Presidency, code 0111056001. On page 1 it gives the authority N142,442,960 for personnel, N532,572,234 for overheads and N13,572,023,869 for capital, a total of N14,247,039,063. The N17,932,303,859.54 of constituency contracts in the audit is N4,360,279,990.54 more than that capital vote and N3,685,264,796.54 more than the whole allocation. The documents do not explain the gap. The Budget Office said on 7 January 2026 that the 2024 and 2025 Acts had been repealed and re-enacted; contracts awarded in 2024 may be paid from later releases; and the audit does not say which appropriation the constituency money came from. Vero Record read only the 2024 Act as first published, not the re-enacted Act or any supplementary appropriation, so the comparison shows scale. It does not show that NALDA committed more than it was voted.

The 2024 Act's project list for the authority, on pages 23 to 25, already carried lines well away from its farms. Page 25 lists N229,500,000 for solar street lights in Bassambiri, Bayelsa State; two comprehensive primary health centres in Wurno and Kware local government areas of Sokoto State at N184,031,554 each; N193,811,310 for dormitories and the renovation of classrooms at a boarding primary school in Jabo, Sokoto State; and two lines of N186,300,000 each for solar street lights in Kware local government area.

The 2026 Act gives NALDA N73,313,714,068: N274,752,974 for personnel, N21,763,256,208 for overheads and N51,275,704,886 for capital (page 1). The capital vote is 3.8 times the 2024 figure, and the whole allocation 5.1 times. Half of the overhead is a single line of N11,000,000,000 for "farming operations" in NALDA clusters and partner farms (page 22). The project list on pages 23 to 32 has 190 lines, and they add to N51,275,704,886, exactly the capital total. Of those lines, 44 name a federal constituency and 32 a senatorial district or zone; together the 76 lines come to N15,150,500,000, or 29.5 per cent of the capital vote.

Some of the 2026 lines have no evident tie to land development. Three are for a mini stadium in Kindiyo, in the Balanga/Billiri federal constituency of Gombe State: N420,000,000 on page 24, then N400,000,000 for "phase 2" and N350,000,000 for a mini stadium and hostel on page 31, N1,170,000,000 in all. Three lines for building churches and mosques and supporting religious groups or leaders in Gombe State come to N1,200,000,000 (N350,000,000 on page 25, N500,000,000 and N350,000,000 on page 31). Page 27 carries N1,050,000,000 for an MRI machine at a medical diagnostics centre in Minna, and page 29 has four lines worth N4,100,000,000 for classrooms and a computer-based test centre at Government Science College, Iyin Ekiti. The Act does not call any of these constituency projects and does not say who proposed them.

The record has limits that cut the other way. The audit records missing papers, not missing work: it does not say that any street light, road or building was not delivered, it does not name the contractors or list the projects behind the totals, and it does not allege that anyone took money. "No response" means the authority did not answer the queries during the audit; it does not show that valuation certificates or bidding records do not exist. NALDA did seek approval before using selective tendering, and where it did reply, on the staff accounts, it offered bank statements that the report does not reproduce. Vero Record did not obtain comment from NALDA for this report.

Set side by side, the two sets of documents show this. The Auditor-General says that in 2024 NALDA paid N9,438,803,865.51 of constituency project money without the certificates that measure work done, after letting N14,704,662,287.79 of constituency contracts without evidence of open bidding, and that it did not answer either query. The 2026 Act then gave the same authority a capital vote 3.8 times larger, with N15,150,500,000 in lines that name constituencies and senatorial districts. The report recommends that the N9.44 billion be accounted for to the Public Accounts Committees and recovered. Whether the committees have taken up the query is not in the documents.

What this rests on

Office of the Auditor-General for the Federation, 2024 Annual Report on Non-compliance (Vol. II), National Agricultural Land Development Authority, Abuja, Issues 1 to 9, report pp.540 to 550 (PDF pp.105 to 115), period 1 January to 31 December 2024, read from the page images. 2024 Appropriation Act as first published, p.1 (Presidency summary, PDF p.31) and NALDA project list pp.23 to 25 (PDF pp.53 to 55), scanned pages read as images. 2026 Appropriation Act, p.1 (Presidency summary) and NALDA line items and projects pp.21 to 32. Budget Office of the Federation statement of 7 January 2026 on the repeal and re-enactment of the 2024 and 2025 Acts. Arithmetic re-done: Issue 6 N9,438,803,865.51 (heading and body agree; the recommendation spells the figure 'Nine million, four hundred and thirty eight million', a wording slip, while its numerals match). N14,704,662,287.79 / N17,932,303,859.54 = 82.0%; N10,747,603,575.28 / N17,932,303,859.54 = 59.9%. Street lights N600,545,000.00 / N853,169,662.50 = 70.4%. Issue 9: N89,740,107.03 + N65,325,476.00 + N92,097,230.00 + N92,347,453.67 = N339,510,266.70, against N339,501,266.70 stated, a difference of N9,000.00. The nine query sums are not added because contracts overlap between queries (a simple sum would be N41,247,493,250.56). 2024 Act: N142,442,960 + N532,572,234 + N13,572,023,869 = N14,247,039,063; N17,932,303,859.54 - N13,572,023,869 = N4,360,279,990.54; N17,932,303,859.54 - N14,247,039,063 = N3,685,264,796.54. 2026 Act: N274,752,974 + N21,763,256,208 = N22,038,009,182 recurrent; + N51,275,704,886 = N73,313,714,068; N51,275,704,886 / N13,572,023,869 = 3.78; N73,313,714,068 / N14,247,039,063 = 5.15; N11,000,000,000 / N21,763,256,208 = 50.5% of overhead. The 190 project lines on pp.23 to 32 add to N51,275,704,886. Lines naming a federal constituency: 44, N7,660,500,000; naming a senatorial district or zone: 32, N7,490,000,000; no line names both; 76 lines, N15,150,500,000 = 29.5% of capital. Mini stadium N420,000,000 + N400,000,000 + N350,000,000 = N1,170,000,000. Churches and mosques N350,000,000 + N500,000,000 + N350,000,000 = N1,200,000,000. Iyin Ekiti N1,500,000,000 + N950,000,000 + N900,000,000 + N750,000,000 = N4,100,000,000.

What this does not establish

Whether any project paid for without valuation certificates was not executed, or was executed in part; the audit records missing documents, not missing work. Which contractors and which projects make up the queried totals; the report does not list them. Which appropriation funded the N17,932,303,859.54 of 2024 constituency contracts, and why it exceeds the N13,572,023,869 capital vote in the 2024 Act as first published; the re-enacted 2024 Act and any 2024 supplementary appropriation were not examined. Whether NALDA holds the valuation certificates, bidding records or vouchers and did not produce them, or holds none; who approved its request to use selective tendering. Whether the Public Accounts Committees have heard the queries or whether any sum has been recovered. Who proposed the constituency-named lines in the 2024 and 2026 Acts; the Acts do not say. Comment from NALDA was not obtained. An audit query is not a finding of wrongdoing, and nothing in this report suggests that any person committed a crime.