by Ranti Joseph
Nasarawa government on Monday said it has secured N500 million bank facility to pay February salary due to the shortfall in statutory allocation from federation account.
Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Mohammed Musa Danazumi, made this known in Lafia while addressing the press at the Shendam road Government House.
He said the situation is compounded by the non-release of SURE-P funds since December 2014 which was hitherto used in augmenting shortfalls of local government salaries.
“On account of the downturn in the global price of oil, statutory allocation to states and local governments further dropped, while no releases were made in respect of SURE-P since December, 2014,″ Danazumi said.
He explained further that the decision to obtain a bank facility was reached after a stakeholders meeting comprising the Nigeria Union of Teachers (NUT), Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE) and three other sister bodies.
“The committee agreed that the banks be approached for temporary overdraft (TOD) to augment the shortfall to enable the payment of February, 2015 salaries of local government employees,” he added.
He also said that the state government needed N2.2billion to pay all categories of Local Councils, Development Areas employees including primary school teachers in the state.
“Sadly, only the sum of N1, 665, 548, 782.13 was received from the federation account as allocation to the thirteen local government areas of the state. This implies a shortfall of N522, 319, 973.96 in wage bill for February, 2015, ″ he stressed.
He further assured state and local government civil servants in the state that every worker would be paid their salaries before the end of the week, stressing that this is the first time, since assumption of office of Governor Umaru Tanko Almakura that government had to owe workers their salaries into another month.
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