The Governor  of Katsina State, Aminu Bello Masari  said the loan approved for the state by the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, rather than mortgage, is securing the future of the state and its children.

Bello Masari

Chairman of  National Conscience Party, NCP,one of the opposition parties in the state, Mallam AbdulMumin Sani had criticised the loans secured by the Masari led APC government as mortgaging the state and it’s children. According to the governor’s Senior Special Assistant, Media,  Abdul Labaran Malumfashi, the loans, apart from the fact that there is a compelling need  for taking them, they are offered by the CBN to bail out the states from the financial dire straits they have found themselves, as a result of which many of them were unable to pay workers salary for months and or pension and gratuity.

“These loans, which attract a single digit 9% interest and are payable in 20 years, are the N11.7 billion for the payment of pension and gratuity arrears, the N2 billion for small and medium enterprises and the N10 billion for infrastructure development, which is broken down thus; Education, N3 billion, Health, N2 billiion, Water, N2.5 billion and Agriculture, N2 billiion.

“This administration would not have found it necessary to resort to taking these or any other loans had the previous administration in the state made judicious use of the over N1 trillion it had earned as revenue from the Federation Account and Internally Generated Revenue in the eight years it had been in office.

“On assumption of office on May, 29th 2015, Governor Masari had met a staggering N11.7billion pension and gratuity arrears owed by the state and local governments to retirees. He had also met a society where poverty has dug deep, forcing youth into all manner of criminal activities, including drug abuse. Even the cattle rustling that had threatened farming and other commercial activities was a function of the abject poverty then prevalent in the state.

“The government has completed the settlement of the pension and gratuity arrears to retirees of the state civil service. Payment to the local governments beneficiaries has also commenced and is progressing in earnest.

“Similarly, the small and medium enterprises loan has also been disbursed to the beneficiaries without bias to gender or political party affliation”.