The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Ekiti State has pleaded with the Debts Management Office (DMO) in the Federal Ministry of Finance to make another public clarification on the status of the state’s debts to put to rest inconsistent debt figures being presented by Governor Ayodele Fayose to the public to justify the non-payment of workers’ salaries and pensions after taking twenty months federal allocations and N9.6b bailout cash.
In a statement by its Publicity Secretary, Taiwo Olatunbosun, the party said this became imperative as the governor had been giving inconsistent figures on different occasions that had cast doubts on the integrity of the state’s financial application.
“In a programme he appeared on NTA recently, he put the deductions at N1.5 billion, but again few days later on AIT, he said the figure is N600m. We make bold to say that Fayose’s claim of N1. 2 billion deduction from Ekiti monthly allocation is total fallacy and Fayose’ s creation to justify his inability to pay workers’ salary.
“How he spent the bailout was not clear because he collected the bailout cash of N9.6b at the time Ekiti was owing only one month salary, which he falsely quoted at N2.6b and so how he spent N9.6 billion to pay a month salary remains unclear.
Accussing Fayose of deliberate and malicious misrepresentation of facts, he challenged him to produce in writing, the purported commendation he received from the EFCC and the ICPC over the N9.6 billion bailout fund he is yet to account for. Fayose is only lying against the anti-graft agencies one of which he has an outstanding case, to buy credibility for his government, Olatunbosun explained”
On Fayose’s claim that the Fayemi administration borrowed another N31billion commercial loan apart from the N25 billion bond, nothing could be farther from the truth. Olatunbosun challenged him to provide evidence of this loan and what it what used for as records are there in the office of the Account General if he is sure of his facts. The truth of the matter is that Fayose has resorted to blatant lies to cover up his many shady financial transactions and misapplication of state funds, Olatunbosun said.”
On Fayose’s allegation that the IGR of the state was never N600 million during the Fayemi administration, Olatunbosun referred him to the published audited accounts of the State signed by the then Auditor General instead of “persistent lies to cover up his financial recklessness which accounted for his inability to pay workers.”
Urging the governor to present the schedules of payments as he claimed for public scrutiny, Olatunbosun said it was not enough to deceive the public that he always presented federal allocation receipts to workers to see first hand the financial status of the state, adding that actual monthly receipts and myriads of unbearable taxes imposed on Ekiti people and pupils in primary schools did not support his claim of cash squeeze.
He said: “Fayose only wants to confuse Ekiti people with the ‘more you look, the less you see’ analysis of the financial position of the state that has become his trademark.
“The main reason he is opposed to TSA is because Ekiti books are not clean as we can see with the manipulation of figures he dishes out to the public and we will not be surprised if Fayose presents a different account entirely in his next press interview.
“The governor has refused to accede to workers’ demand asking him to explain how his wage bill still remains N2.6 billion that former Governor Kayode Fayemi was paying after the governor deleted the names of about 28,000 people that Fayemi engaged from the state’s wage bill in addition to the elimination of 500 ghosts workers that Fayose himself said he discovered.”
Insisting that Fayose’s explanation of reduced allocation is not enough to clear the air on the financial status of the state, Olatunbosun challenged the governor to avail the public the actual wage bill of the state, which the governor was alleged to have variously quoted at “N2.5b, N2.6b and above N2b”.
On his claim that he left N10 billion in Ekiti coffers during his aborted first tenure, he said this is a lie that has been debunked many times. “Fayose who is an advocate of governments not borrowing beyond their tenure and vowed on his inauguration in 2014 not to borrow kobo during his tenure, has already borrowed N19.6 billion which deduction is obviously beyond his tenure thus showing his insincerity and demagoguery,” Olatunbosun concluded.
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