By Sadiq Umar – The governor of Ekiti state, Ayodele Fayose Friday faulted the federal government’s claim that 36 states governors gave the approval to withdraw $1 billion from the Excess Crude Account to fight insurgency in north-east Nigeria.
Mr. Fayose said the decision was sole that of the federal government which according to him, it merely used the National Economic Council to legitimize.
“They went on to tell Nigerians that the decision was taken by governors of the 36 States, whereas, it was solely the idea of the federal government, which they used the arranged National Executive Council meeting to achieve,” said in a statement issued by his spokesman, Lere Olayinka.
At the end of the NEC meeting on Thursday, governor of Edo state, Godwin Obaseki, had said all the governors had agreed that the money should be taken from the excess crude account (ECA).
But Mr. Fayose has now dissociated himself from the decision, alleging that the All Progressives Congress (APC) had the plan to use the money to fund President Muhammadu Buhari’s re-election.
“For posterity sake, I wish to place it on record that I was not among the governors who approved the withdrawal of almost half of our savings in the Excess Crude Account, which belongs to the three tiers of government to fight an already defeated insurgency.
“Since they said they have defeated Boko Haram, what else do they need a whopping sum of $1 billion (over N360 billion) for; if not to fund the 2019 elections?
“The APC promised to wipe out Boko Haram within six months, now it is 31 months and what the APC government is wiping out is the economy of Nigeria and the means of livelihood of the people.”
He challenged the federal government to make available to Nigerians, how the money released by international donors for the fight against Boko Haram was spent.
“Even the Transparency International (TI) once said in its report that some top military officials in the country were feeding fat from the war against Boko Haram by creating fake contracts and laundering the proceeds in the United States, United Kingdom and elsewhere,” he said.
“Nigerians are miffed by the federal government’s idea of withdrawing $1 billion from the Excess Crude Account to fund an insurgency they said had been defeated.
Mr. Fayose said the ideal was solely that of the APC-led federal government foisted on NEC.
“The question is; how can the federal government alone spend almost half of the Excess Crude money that belongs to the three tiers of government (i.e. Federal Government, States and Local Councils)?
“The reality is that our treasury is daily being looted in readiness for the 2019 elections. Nigerians are therefore alerted to this lootings by the APC led federal government to amass huge fund for the 2019 elections under the pretence of fighting insurgency in the Northeast as well as other dubious means.”
