By Ben Agande

Abuja—Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State has set up three committees to probe the administration of the immediate past governor, Dr. Gabriel Suswam.

The governor also explained that the resumption of payment of full salaries and overheads in the state were responsible for the increase in the state’s wage bill.

Speaking Tuesday evening when he met with journalists in Abuja, Governor Ortom said the committees were for assets verification, contracts verification and recovery of monies and moveable assets owed and due the government and people of Benue State.

On his plans to check the insecurity in the state, Governor Ortom said he had proposed an amnesty for those in possession of illegal weapons, with compensation ranging from N100,000 for those with automatic weapons and N10,000 for those with locally-fabricated weapons.

On the probe, he said the panels are to ascertain Benue’s assets, the funds that came into the state and how they were managed between 2007 and May 2015.

He said from preliminary investigations carried out by his administration, it was discovered that apart from the indebtedness of the state, it appeared that the salary of workers was being spiked.

He said an independent body would be empanelled to determine the actual salary of Benue workers.

Governor Ortom added that biometric data of all Benue civil servants would be conducted to curb the issue of ghost workers.

He said the state’s monthly wage bill ranged from N2.9 billion to N3.7 billion, when overhead was added, while the salary arrears was N12 billion, with pension/gratuity over N19 billion.