Zamfara Governor says it inherits N42 b debt

Posted by admin Governors, Headlines, State News, Zamfara Wednesday, June 1st, 2011

The newly sworn-in Governor of Zamfara state, Honourable Abdulazeez Abubakar
Yari has reversed the sales of state government property made by his
predecessor, Mahmud Shinkafi in the past one month.

Governor Yari who is the third executive governor of Zamfara state stated in
Gusau, the Zamfara state capital.

The new governor who lamented what he described the betrayal of trust and
disservice to the people of Zamfara state by the immediate past governor urged
those who have looted the government property to return them within one month.

He noted that though the state is burdened by the debt of about N40 billion, the
Governor maintained that the debt would not deter his administration from
delivering its promises to the people of the state.

The state according to him is indebted to different banks to the tune of N16.
3billion while contractors are being owed N26.1billion being cost of unpaid bills.

His words: “I am mindful of the fact that this government, your government is
saddled with over N 40 billion debt. This is a good excuse for lack of performance
but we will not fail you. I have devoted myself to serving you and I do not intend to
fail now. The consequences of failure on this generation and indeed future
generations of Zamfarans are best imagined.

“There have been looting and selling off of government property in the past few
weeks. This is not only a betrayal of trust and disservice to the people of Zamfara
state. This government will not fritter away property belonging to the state. I
hereby reverse all sales made within the past one month and strongly advice
those who have looted government property to return them within the next one
week”.

Governor Yari who promised to tackle the problem of ghost workers in the state
disclosed that the size of the State government was boosted a few days after
elections by the unplanned and unbudgeted employment of about 10,000 civil
servants by the previous administration.

He noted that the State Executive Council when constituted would embark on a
general audit of state government employees saying “we must plug all avenues of
waste. This government will not tolerate the ghost worker syndrome. Fraud by
any name it’s called is bad. This administration shall have zero tolerance for it”.

-African Examinerwp_posts