Bauchi State Government, yesterday, declared that it has no money to give to the State Independent Electoral Commission to conduct local council elections.

The government said that though the local council polls are important, it has been unable to raise about N2 billion required for the elections.

Alhaji Abdullahi Idrees, the state Commissioner for Information and Tourism, made the declaration in Bauchi yesterday.

Mohammed Abubakar

He said: “We are ready to conduct the elections because this is a democratically-elected government and we respect people that are duly elected. We are not saying that it is not important; it is very important. But there is paucity of funds.

“But I want to tell you that the governor is ready to conduct local government elections. The budget is over N2 billion. It is not much though, because you have to produce ballot papers, do delineation, collation and training of staff.

“Our hope and desire is that when funds are available, the local government elections will be conducted in Bauchi State.”