Sokoto to give bailout funds to LGAs – Tambuwal

Governor Aminu Tambuwal of Sokoto State has promised to provide special intervention funds to the 23 Local Government Areas in the state to improve the living standard of people at the grassroots.
Tambuwal made the promise when members of the state chapter of the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria and stakeholders of the All Progressives Congress visited him in Sokoto.
Tambuwal said: “I do not have a personal treasury, all resources accruing to the state government and the local governments belong to the people.
“The funds belong to all of us, including generations yet unborn and would be spent for the common good of the entire people of the state.
“The state government will surely rise to your rescue, to enable you provide the needed social services to the people of the state.”
The governor explained that the state government had been topping the monthly allocations of the 23 Local Government Areas to enable them pay their workers salaries.
This, he said, was due to the fluctuating allocations of local governments from the federation account and the country’s present economic challenges.
Tambuwal, however, blamed the country`s present economy challenges to misrule of bad leadership in the past.
Tambuwal lamented: “When we raised alarm then, we were tagged as antagonists and political opponents, but now we have been vindicated.
“Nigeria and Nigerians should not have been thrown into the current misery, if the nation had been cautious and saved for the rainy day.”
Tambuwal warned Local Government Chairmen in the state against turning their councils into salary collection points only and acts of truancy, adding that they should remain close to the people.
He urged chairmen as equal partners to collaborate with the state government to ensure the socio-economic development of the state.
The ALGON Chairman, Alhaji Aminu Ibrahim, had earlier requested for a bailout to enable Local Government Areas in the state meet their financial obligations.