The Delta State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, on Monday signed the state’s 2013 Appropriation Bill into law with a vow to weed out ghost workers and unqualified staff from the state civil service system.
Uduaghan signed the total budget size of N472,006,772,172 as passed by the state House of Assembly last month.
A breakdown of the budget shows that the state is expected to spend N315,602,989,563 for capital projects, representing 67 per cent, while recurrent expenditure is expected to gulp N156,403,782, 607, representing 33 per cent of the budget.
Uduaghan promised to prudently fund projects to accelerate the execution of policies and programmes in order to improve the living standard of the people.
He also promised to place more emphasis on capital expenditure so as to consolidate the massive infrastructure development drive in the state.
His words: “We want to do more of capital projects and spend less on recurrent expenditure.
“This is a big challenge.
“We are setting up structures that will weed out all ghost workers.
“Indeed, we reduced recurrent to 33 per cent and increased capital to 67 per cent.
“For this year, we are setting up structures that would ensure that we weed out every ghost worker and I mean it.
“We will weed out every ghost worker still in the system.
“We are going back to our biometrics.
“It is also in our interest that we weed out workers that are not qualified from the system.
“Just sometime last year, we sent a name to the House of Assembly for confirmation as member of the DSIEC Board but it was unfortunate that somebody who had retired as a principal did not even have a secondary school certificate.
“That tells you the kind of people we have in the service.”
The governor announced that the state would work hard to improve Internally Generated Revenue, emphasising that the goal was to ensure that Internally Generated Revenue would take care of salaries and emoluments while the state’s share of the Federal Account would take care of capital expenditure.
Other signed into law on Monday were the Delta State Multi-Door Court House Bill and the Delta State Engineering Project Monitoring and Control Board Bill.
Uduaghan said that the Multi Door Court House Bill would promote alternative Dispute Resolution in the state, quicken the dispensation of justice and provide alternative mechanism for the resolution of disputes.
He also said that the Delta State Engineering Project Monitoring and Control Board Bill would ensure that standards are maintained in the design and execution of engineering projects in the state.
He explained that the Board had become necessary given the rate of project failures and building collapse in the country.
He promised that the Board would monitor and control the design and execution of Engineering Projects in the State with a view to ensure that standards are met.
His words: “The establishment of a body called Delta State Engineering Monitoring and Control board became necessary to help regulate, monitor, control and uphold standard in the design and execution of engineering projects across the state especially with the spate of building collapse in the country.”
Speaking earlier, while presenting the bills, the Speaker of the House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Victor Ochei, said that the House, in keeping with the constitution, has passed and approved the 2013 Appropriation Bill and the two other Bills sent to the governor for his assent.
According to the speaker: “The House of Assembly has done its job.
“The 2013 appropriation Bill has been deliberated on and duly passed.
“There are also two other bills to be signed along with it.”
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