The Executive Secretary, Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC), Dr Hamid Bobboyi, has said that the Federal Government would pay N71.29 billion directly to the commission being the outstanding counterpart funds.
Bobboyi made this disclosure in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Friday in Abuja.
According to him, the Federal Government will deduct the entire outstanding counterpart fund against all states of the federation from their Paris Club Refund.
He explained that the Federal Government would provide just the matching grants, while the state governments would provide the counterpart fund to be able to access the funds provided by the Federal Government.
“There is a new development and the Federal Government has given us a schedule of these states.
“ The total amount the Federal Government is going to pay and remit directly to the commission is N71, 292, 316, 087.84.
“So, UBEC in disbursing the funds will put the counterpart funds along with the matching grants and disburse to states if they meet the conditions.
“So, the issue of funds not accessed in UBEC will soon come to an end at least for 2018, which is a good thing.’’
Bobboyi, however, said a lot of progress had been made by states in accessing their matching grants from UBEC, adding that previously there would be stacks of money in the commission waiting to be accessed.
According to him, in the last few years, states had made a lot of efforts to ensure they paid their counterpart funding in order to access the matching grants provided by the Federal Government.
“For example, we are in 2018; the funds have not finished accruing to the account; so it will take up to December 31 when you will have the entire amount.
“By the time we are in December, you will be sitting on half of the allocation of the year not accessed because the matching grant is 50 per cent.
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