Covid-19: PTF is transparent, accountable — SGF

The Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) who is also the Chairman of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19, Boss Mustapha, has reiterated that transparency, governance, and accountability have been the core values of the PTF on COVID-19.

He made the disclosure at a media briefing organized by the PTF on COVID-19 in Abuja, Thursday.

Mustapha noted that since the inception of the Task Force, the members have been committed to ensuring that Nigeria’s COVID-19 response reflects these values, especially, in the face of all the scrutiny, mis and dis-information on the PTF’s activities.

According to him: “Since international best practices remain our hallmark, the PTF has been tracking donations and technical assistance received from individuals, groups, and various national and international organisations.

“These donations, alongside the disbursements across the federation, have been documented and are now open for everyone to see through the activation of these dashboards which are now accessible on the PTF website – www.statehouse.gov.ng/covid19/.”

He disclosed that two transparency dashboards of the COVID-19 response have been created.

The first, he explained, “is the Incidence and Response Tracker Dashboard developed by the Nigerian Economic Summit Group and the second is the COVID-19 Resource Tracking Dashboard developed by the United Nations Development Programme. Both dashboards corroborate our focus on a data-driven response which we have consistently maintained from the onset.

“The dashboards are transparent living and very interactive portals for all our resource mobilization activities, donations, needs, and disbursements.

“We will continue to collaborate with the private sector in creating models that ensure all our activities are easily accessible by the public in line with the Freedom of Information Act.”

He, however, applauded the PTF funding partner- the Africa Initiative for Governance (AIG), who, he said, ensured that these dashboards came to reality.

The PTF, the SGF vowed, will ensure transparency of the coordinated efforts and interventions of government and other partners on the fight to contain the pandemic in Nigeria.