The governor of Edo State, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, yesterday said the administration of former President, Goodluck Jonathan illegally refused to transfer funds remitted to it by the Nigerian Liquified Natural Gas, NLNG, into the federation account.
He said that with the renewed transparency being returned to the system by President Muhammadu Buhari, Edo State would have gotten N10 billion consecutively in four years of the Jonathan administration.
The governor stated this while speaking with journalists after meeting with President Buhari at the presidential villa, Abuja.
He regretted that his state lost N10billion under the former accounting order of Jonathan and former Finance Minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.
According to him, Nigerians have always been happy with President Buhari because he had been very clear from day one on his campaign promises “about putting an end to impunity and fragrant disobedience of law and order”.
Oshiomhole further explained that the NLNG was not just starting to remit, as it had been doing that every year plus taxes paid by Shell, amounting to about $500 million.
He added that the $500 million added to the amount of $1.6 billion from NLNG was what totalled to the amount of $2.1 billion that was shared last week.
While noting that the remitted NLNG funds were not been transferred to the federation account, Oshiomhole said: “For example, all the noise that have been generated over what happened last week, there was nothing extraordinary.
“What was extraordinary is that the NLNG has over the years been remitting funds to the federal government. But the federal government illegally refused to transfer these funds to the consolidated revenue fund which belongs to the three tiers of government.
“All that President Buhari has done is in line with his commitments to ensuring that all funds and monies accruing to the federation account are so remitted. He has directed the CBN to transfer the funds to the consolidated account.
“And our commissioners along with federal officials met last week to share those funds in line with the revenue allocation formula. If this money had come under the last president, it will have gone the same way as in previous years.
“If what we got last week courtesy of this renewed commitment to transparency; if we had gotten this these past four years consecutively, we would have made about N10 billion. So, by the same token, Edo State government had lost N10 billion under President Goodluck Jonathan and under Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.
“And this is the point we have been making when analysts just talk about states. They do not really probe the specifics and because the federal voice is always louder and people make assumptions that certain people are not likely to do certain things.
“The truth is that so much was not paid to the federation account and that explains the huge gap. That was why in some of my statements, I said it is not just question of drop in price but it is also the denial of a lot of revenue that ought to have accrued into the federation account. So, no state has gotten a dime from what we called bail out or Excess Crude Account”.
On calls for minimum wage increase, Oshiomhole regretted that general, workers in the country are poorly paid.
He said: “Let me be very clear, I believe the Nigerian worker is under paid. Paricularly in the public sector. If you look at the wage trend now, you will find out that what a graduate of level 8, step 2 in the public service earns, if the same young man is to get a job in an oil company or some subsection of the public section, his pay will be much more.
“If a worker is confronted with endless rise in costs of living and his wages are stagnant, obviously whether you know it or not, he is already experiencing pressures on his living standard.
“If you look at the minimum wage when it was fixed, the exchange rate was about N140 to a dollar, so N18,000 is about $130 a month. Now at N200 per dollar, N18,000 is about $90 and so you can see the only beneficiary in this kind of inflationary environment are those who have fixed assets like building because the more your naira is devalued, the higher the nominal value of your assets”.
Oshiomhole however boasted that his state government is not indebted to any worker, noting that Edo is up to date in its salary obligations.
“We are up to date in our allowances. I believe that some states have made a lot of progress in the area of internally generated revenue. But also some states are better placed to make more money or raise more money from internally generated revenue.
“For example, if you have the luck of number of industries being located in your state, now the fact of those location of those businesses means that you have people and organizations that are taxable.
“Now, if you are in a state where the private sector is completely absent, no matter how hard you look inward, you are not likely to find much. So we have to appreciate sometimes when people make this that state should look inward”.
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