The governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, in Kaduna State, Malam Nasir el-Rufai, on Monday alleged that the Kaduna State Government had received over N600bn from the Federation Account in the last seven years with nothing to show in the state for the huge allocations.
El-Rufai made the allegation when he appeared as guest on Barka da Warhaka, a Hausa programme on Freedom Radio, Kaduna.
He also claimed that Kaduna was the second most indebted state in Nigeria.
He, however, added that though Lagos State was more indebted than Kaduna State, the former had the capacity to pay its debts, arguing that Kaduna received the second highest statutory allocation from the Federation Account in the North after Kano, “but has nothing to show for it”.
El-Rufai said, “Although, Lagos State is more indebted than Kaduna State, but it (Lagos) has the capacity to pay. Governor Babatunde Fashola generates about N20bn monthly internally but Kaduna State does not get N1bn from Internally Generated Revenue”.
The governorship candidate noted that his criticisms were not borne out of partisanship because other PDP states like Gombe and Katsina states are executing laudable projects.
“Why should our own PDP government in Kaduna State be different?” he queried.
El-Rufai, who is a former Minister of the FCT, faulted the state government’s claim that it used most of the money that accrued to it in the last seven years to service debts as the government was still indebted to contractors to the tune of N30bn.
According to him, there was no reason why Kaduna should be the second most indebted state after Lagos since the Ahmed Makarfi-led administration had liquidated all debts in 2006 before leaving office in 2007.
El-Rufai recalled that by 2005, the country had exited external debts during the ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration, saying what remained were debts between states and the Federal Government.
“By 2006, the Makarfi administration had paid off all domestic debts. This fact can be verified from the website of the Debt Management Office”, he stated.
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