Information Minister Lai Mohammed has defended himself over the document that has gone viral on the net that he made a N13 million loan request to the Nigerian Broadcasting Commission (NBC) to travel to China.

He said that those who put the letter on the Internet “are making a mountain out of a mole hill.”

He added that what happened shows decadence in the civil service such that an inter-departmental memo like that would be leaked to the public.

He explained what happened in an interview on Radio Continental: “Nigeria was invited to the International Conference on Tourism. A memo was raised to National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) for special advisers, directors, other key officials and I to attend the conference. In fact, I have a personal Invitation from the Information Minister of China.

“So, we decided to obtain a loan from NBC, one of the parastatals of our ministry, a loan which will be paid back, of course. I am surprised that this has become a subject in the public domain.”