Ekiti State Governor, Mr Ayo Fayose has said that the state government will not pay outstanding pensions and gratuities because the state only got N9.6 billion out of the over N29 billion it applied for in the Federal Government’s bail-out funds.
Fayose who spoke on Monday in Ikogosi-Ekiti during the opening ceremony of a two-day retreat for commissioners, permanent secretaries and heads of agencies explained that out of the N5.6 billion applied for by the 16 local governments in the state, the FG only approved N991 million.
In a statement in Ado-Ekiti by his Chief Press Secretary, Idowu Adelusi, Fayose said “You people know that I don’t hide anything from you when allocations come. We applied for N29 billion from the bail-out fund. It was to cover the August and September 2014 salary arrears left by the Fayemi government, leave bonus, pensions, gratuities and others. But for reasons we don’t know yet, only N9.6 billion was for salaries, leaving other issues.
“The 16 local governments applied for N5.6 billion and we did all the necessary papers and presented them to the appropriate authorities, but only N991 million was approved. We were later told by the Central Bank of Nigeria that about 14 states had similar problem with the small amount approved for local governments. We have nothing to hide and people should appeal to the FG to release the money in full. We know it is loan that we will repay with nine per cent interest.”
He also added that the state is facing a decline in monthly allocations, he said “Last month we had a shortfall of N500 million and this month we have a shortfall of N600 million.”