‘Former Plateau governor, Jang got N525bn in 8 years, left N222bn debt behind’

AUGUST 12, 2015

The transition committee in Plateau state, has said that former governor of the state, Jonah Jang, got N525.35bn as statutory allocations from the federation account in eight years, but left a debt of N222.3bn at the end of his tenure on May 29, 2015.

Chairman of the Lalong/Tyoden Transition Committee in Plateau State, Prof. Sonni Tyoden, revealed that in his handing over notes, Jang said he left a debt of  N103.9bn as of May, 2015, but findings by the committee revealed that he spent N747.65bn in eight years.

Tyoden, deputy governor of the state, presented the the report of his committee to Governor Simon Lalong at the new Government House, Little Rayfield on Tuesday.

“From our findings, we wish to observe that while governance between 2007 and 2011 can be said to have been conducted along familiar lines, with some semblance of respect for known rules of procedure and civilised democratic governance, after 2011, there was a sharp decline and the descent of governance to the level of bestiality, where impunity, nepotism, sectionalism became the order of the day.

From the records, between May 2007 and May 2015, the sum of N525.35bn was the total income that accrued to the state, statutory allocations inclusive, but the state was left with a debt of N222.3bn by May, 2015. In other words, the sum of N747.65bn could be said to have been expended on Plateau State citizens in the last eight years. Looking at the state in its current condition, we are at a loss where all this money went to.

Second, the Central Bank of Nigeria remitted the sum of N2bn to the coffers of Plateau State Government for the benefit of small and medium scale industries in the state. However, about 90% of this amount, which was remitted to the state on March 17, 2015, was drawn in two days (between March 24 and 26 2015) for unexplained expenditure, without a single small and medium scale enterprise in the state benefitting from the money. Yet, the handover notes dated May 29, 2015, stated that the government was yet to access the fund.

In addition, various sums, totaling N6.1bn were transferred from the accounts of SUBEB, SURE-P and Ministry of Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, to state government accounts without justifiable explanations on how the funds were used.

On May 27, 2015, four political appointees of a certain government agency, who were not entitled to severance allowances as specified by the Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal Commission, illegally paid themselves the sum of N30m severance allowance.

The handover notes received from the preceeding government claimed the level of indebtedness of the government was N103.9bn as of May, 2015.  Our findings put the figure at N222.3bn.  Furthermore, what was left as credit in all the government accounts, put together, was N93m.

While the outgone government claimed to have spent N8.6bn on the new Government House at little Rayfield, our findings put the figure at N16.4bn and work is still ongoing.

The sum of N28.2bn was raised from the capital market on the eve of the departure of the former government ostensibly to refinance existing state loans in three commercial banks. Government will need to have a second look at the status of the projects covered by the bond.”