The Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele
Fayose, has said the state got only N9.6bn out of the over N29bn it
applied for in the Federal Government’s bailout loan for states.
The governor, who could not ascribe any
reason for the shortfall, also said the 16 local governments in the
state got N991m out of the N5.6bn they applied for.
Fayose spoke on Monday in Ikogosi-Ekiti
during the opening ceremony of a two-day retreat for commissioners,
permanent secretaries and heads of agencies.
The governor, according to a statement
in Ado-Ekiti by his Chief Press Secretary, Idowu Adelusi, said the
clarification was necessary due to insinuations that the state
government did not want to pay pension arrears and gratuities of
retirees.
“You
people know that I don’t hide anything from you when allocations come.
We applied for N29bn from the bailout fund. It is to cover the August
and September 2014 salary arrears left by the Fayemi government – leave
bonus, pensions, gratuities and others. But for reasons we don’t know
yet, the Federal Government only approved N9.6bbn for salaries, leaving
other issues.
“The 16 local governments applied for
N5.6bn and we did all the necessary papers and presented them to the
appropriate authorities, but only N991m was approved. We were later told
by the Central Bank of Nigeria that about 14 states had a similar
problem with the small amount approved for local governments.
“I have since written to them to rectify
the situation and I hope they will do that quickly. It is only the
Federal Government that can explain why they only approved one item,
salary, out of the many items we presented to them on the workers’
issue. We have nothing to hide and people should appeal to the Federal
Government to release the money in full. We know it is a loan that we
will repay with nine per cent interest,” he said.
The governor also explained that the state had experienced a sharp decline in monthly allocations in recent time.
“Last month, we had a shortfall of
N500m, and this month, we have a shortfall of N600m. The economy is
dwindling and in bad shape and the Federal Government must do something
about it urgently,” he noted.
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