And President Buhari Approves N713.7b For All States To Pay Workers
Deputy, Mrs. Titi Laoye-Tomori (3rd left), Speaker, State of Osun
House of Assembly, Hon. Najeem Salam (2nd left), Secretary to the
State Government, Alhaji Moshood Adeoti (right), President, North
America Based of Egbe Omo Yoruba, Agba-Akin Bolu Omodele (2nd right),
during the delegation visit to the Governor in his Office, at
Government Secretariat, Abere, Osogbo
Cash-strapped states got a breather when President Muhammadu Buhari approved the release of N713.7billion intervention funds for them to pay workers’ salaries.
Special adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, said in a statement that the relief package was from funded partly from the “dividend paid to the Federation Account by the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas Company (NLNG).”
Adesina explained that the Central Bank would also provide intervention fund “that will offer financing to the states, ranging from N250 Billion to N300 Billion. This will be a soft loan available to states for the purposes of paying backlog of salaries.”
Also included relief package according to Adesian was “a debt relief programme designed by the Debt Management Office, which will help states restructure their commercial loans currently put at over N660 Billion, and extend the life span of such loans while reducing their debt-servicing expenditures.”
The presidential spokesman said that at no time did President Buhari approved drawing funds for the relief package from the remaining balance in the Excess Crude Account or “the “liquidation” of the account as some media outlets have wrongly reported.”
“No such decision has been taken or approved by President Buhari, and last week’s meeting of the National Economic Council clearly concluded that the Excess Crude Account should be left untouched at this time,” Adesina said.
Media reports last month indicated that about 12 of the 36 states of the federation owed their workers about N110b
They are: Rivers, Oyo, Ekiti, Kwara, Kogi, Ondo, Osun, Plateau, Benue and Bauchi states.
However, informed sources said the Finance Ministry and the CBN may have pegged the amount needed to settle all the outstanding public workers salaries at about N250billion.
It was, however, gathered that President Buhari advised governors at the NEC session to be prudent in managing state resources.
A governor said: “The President has done his best to assist us to take off properly. The ball is in our court to abide by his counsel to be prudent.
“Some of the measures we are looking at include appreciable reduction of security votes, stoppage of chartered flights and pegging the high cost of maintaining Government House to a low benchmark.
“With our experience in the last one month, we do not need a soothsayer to teach us to cut our coat according to our size.”
