President Muhammadu Buhari has said that the biting economy of the country has led to two-third of Nigerian governments unable to pay salaries of workers, despite the bailout funds loaned to them by the federal government.
This is even as Aliko Dangote, foremost Nigerian businessman, has advised the federal government to stop giving bailout to states, saying bailouts funds was making state governors to be lazy and unable to put on their thinking caps.
Speaking in Abuja on Thursday, April 28, 2016, the president said that the current situation undermines the bailout given to the states, the harsh economy is still posing difficulty to the states as they are finding it difficult to pay salaries to their workers.
In the meeting with the governors, President Buhari expressed worry that state government workers are passing through hard times and their families following the inability of governors to pay their wages.
Against the counsel of Dangote, the president said the federal government will make more funds available to the states by expediting action on refunds due to the states for the maintenance of federal roads and other expenses incurred on behalf of the federal government.
President Buhari also said that he will establish an inter-ministerial committee to study a Fiscal Restructuring Plan for the federation which was presented to him by the governors.
The president said that the committee will review the plan to improve the finances of state governments and make recommendations on how proposals in the plan should be dealt with by the presidency, the Federal Executive Council and the National Assembly through legislation.
He urged the governors, however, to understand that while he was ready to do all within his powers to help the states overcome their current financial challenges, the federal government also has funding problems of its own to contend with.
“You all know the problems we have found ourselves in. You have to bear with us,” he told them.
The chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum, Governor Abdulaziz Yari of Zamfara State and the Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State, who chaired the committee that worked on the Fiscal Restructuring Plan, asked the Federal Government to do more to help the states financially.
