Abia State Governor Alex Otti has declared that Local Government funds cannot be hijacked under his watch.
Otti said this during the monthly media parley at Government House in Umuahia, the Abia State capital, on Friday, April 5, 2024.
The governor said he was intentional about ensuring that funds meant for the Local Government Areas of the Abia State would be utilised to facilitate balanced socioeconomic growth in the state.
He said: “Local government funds cannot be hijacked under my watch and if you see what is happening in the local governments, you will know that the funds are working.
“So anybody who says funds have been hijacked needs to tell us who hijacked the funds and we can now begin to pursue the hijackers, but to the best of my knowledge, it is impossible to hijack funds under my watch.”
Otti further stated that the Abia State Government had developed a robust strategy to reposition education in the state.
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“We have looked at the curricula, teaching staff, the infrastructures, and we are in the process of enumerating the civil servants we can redeploy to the schools,” Governor Otti added.
The governor noted that the government was making concerted efforts to make the teaching profession very attractive, saying the government has commenced its retrofitting programme in 171 primary schools and 54 secondary schools to upgrade the selected schools to be of high quality standard.
He added: “We have what we call the minimum standard; if you get into a primary school that we have touched you will understand.
“There are facilities that must be there in the schools like libraries, laboratories, students’ hostels, and principals’ quarters among others.”
Otti said his administration has been able to cut down the cost of governance by ensuring that only absolutely necessary expenditures were undertaken by the government.
“It’s tough but we have to do it. We have been managing our expenditures in such a way that we are able to live within our means as much as possible,” Otti said.
According to him, as of the time his predecessor took over, the state owed N34.5 million and as of the time he took over, the debt had reached over N192.2 million.
Otti, who expressed dismay that the funds could not be accounted for, said some of the debts had been paid off because they were commercial bank overdrafts at very high interest rates.
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