Governors reject Nigerian govt’s plans to pay consultants $418m for Paris Club refund

The Chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum and Governor of Ekiti State, Kayode Fayemi, has said the Federal Government cannot commence its plans to make deductions from the federation account to pay consultants for the Paris Club Refund.

Fayemi explained that the state governors are not in support of the Federal Government’s decision, noting that a situation where the Federal Government makes arbitrary deductions without the input of state governors was wrong.
The governor made this remark on Tuesday while fielding questions from journalists at the 27th Nigerian Economic Summit in Abuja.

It would be recalled that the Federal Government had disclosed its plan to begin the deduction from the federation account for the payment of $418 million to private consultants who took part in the Paris Club Refund.

Read also: Fayemi threatens legal suit over accusations of bribery on $418m Paris Club refund

However, stakeholders criticized the planned move by the Federal Government, saying it would affect the recurrent expenditure of at least 33 states, making them unable to pay the salaries of their workers.

According to Fayemi, state governors have agreed not to collect any allocation from the Federation Allocation Account (FAAC) until the issues are resolved.

“We are dealing with the issue. we would find a resolution to it. As far as states are concerned, they do not accept that funds belonging to federation account could just be arbitrarily deducted without the input of the states, and that’s why we are insisting that until this is clarified, we would rather leave the money in the pool until we have all agreed on the direction,” the governor said.

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