Former governor of Anambra State, Peter Obi has said the cost of running government in Nigeria is unacceptable and too expensive.
The former governor said this on Tuesday while speaking at a symposium for governance and transparency organised by The Future Project in Lagos.
Obi said transparency in governance is fundamental and critical to a democratic nation.
He said, “The cost of running government is unacceptable and too expensive.
“We cannot continue to have one person in government with five vehicles.”
He added that, “Transparency is fundamental and critical to democracy.
“Government budget should be explicitly published, the price of each item should be well articulated.
“People should know why the government wants to buy items for 10 times the price.”
The former governor also noted that every local government in the country receive N100m monthly but there is no clear information as to how it is spent.
He said, “I don’t know what is happening in my local government. Every local government in the country receive N100m monthly but Nigerians don’t know how it is spent.”
Obi also added that same items and projects keep appearing in budgets yearly because they are never executed.
“Most times they don’t complete these projects, instead the funds are diverted to other things.
“There are too many roadblocks that encourage padding of state budgets and inflation of government spending.
“When I was governor, they inflated price of rims of papers from N750 to N15000 but i rejected it.”
