No Bailout Yet For States – Ondo Govt

The Ondo State government has debunked insinuations that it received financial bailout from the Federal Government to pay outstanding workers’ salary. It said, rather, that it only received N2.2 billion that accrued to it from taxes, being part of the June allocation from the Federation Account, even as it put its monthly wage bill at about N4 billion. At a media briefing addressed by the Commissioner for Information, Kayode Akinmade, and his Finance counterpart, Yele Ogundipe, in Akure Friday, the state government disclosed that the bailout proposal presented to the President at a recent meeting of state governors was yet to yield fruit as modalities are still being worked out. Making clarifications on the bailout issue, the Finance Commissioner said, following the meeting between President Muhammadu Buhari and the state governors over the lingering issue of unpaid salary of government workers and other contractual obligations, one of the things that was decided on was that the Federal Government would find a way to bail out the states in the form of loans and the fund in the excess crude account could also be considered; however, nothing concrete has been done in these regards. “I can tell you that, so far, no concrete action has been taken in that direction, notwithstanding the fact that all across the nation and in particular in Ondo, most people have read in the newspapers and heard that the Federal Government distributed over N720 billion to assist the states in the payment of salaries on Monday,” he said. The Finance Commissioner explained that nothing of such happened at the said meeting: “I was present at the Monday meeting and I can confirm to you that what happened was that the tax paid by the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) was distributed among the three tiers of government in proportion of the revenue allocation formulae,” he submitted. Ogundipe said that what was distributed was N359 billion and less 4 per cent collection taxes due to the Federal Inland Revenue Service as against the N720 billion claim. According to the commissioner, the net figure was N344.99 billion, out of which the Federal Government got 52.68 per cent, amounting to about  N152 billion; states got 26 per cent, which amounted to N92 billion for the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, while local governments got 20 per cent, which amounted to N71 billion. He explained that Ondo State got only N2.2 billion and the local government areas in the state got N1.6 billion, bringing the state’s total package to N3.8 billion. “But in Ondo State the government does not interfere with the allocation and distribution of fund by the local governments, so what actually came to us as a state was N2.2 billion and our salary bill in a month is N4 billion, so this is not the bailout that the President meant. This is not the bailout that our people are looking forward to. This is just part of the money that should have been shared with our allocation figures in June,” he said.