Ondo State Government weekend debunked insinuations that it received a bail out from the Federal government to pay outstanding workers salary.
Instead the state said it only received N2.2b accrued to it from taxes, being part of June allocation from the Federation account.
The state government however put its monthly wage bill at N4b.
Commissioner for Information, Kayode Akinmade and his Finance counterpart, Chief Yele Ogundipe said this at a joint briefing in Akure.
Ogundipe said that the bailout proposal presented to the President at a recent meeting by state governors was yet to bear a fruit as modalities on it are still being worked out.
The two Commissioners made the clarification following the controversies the said bail out is generating across the country and the agitations by workers.
Ogundipe said the governors recently met with President Muhamadu Buhari over the lingering issue of default in payment of salary and other contractual obligation.
According to him “one of the things that was decided on was that the Federal Government will find a way to bail out the states in terms of loan and the fund in the excess crude account could also be considered for sharing.
Ogundipe said “I can tell you that so far, no concrete action has been taken in that direction, notwithstanding the fact that all across the nation and in particular in Ondo, most people have read in the newspapers and heard that the Federal government distributed over N720b to assist the states in the payment of salaries on Monday”
” I was present at the Monday meeting and i can confirm to you that what happened was that the taxes paid by the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) was distributed among the three tiers of government in proportion of the revenue allocation formulae ” he submitted
Source: Vanguard
