By IYKE DURUMBA –
“I don’t know why a lot of us Nigerians suffer from a pitiable form of amnesia. Were we not in this country when the then Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala kept harping on the need to save funds in the Excess Crude Account but the state governors insisted on sharing same claiming they had ‘people-oriented’ (more like pocket-oriented) projects to spend on?
Were we not in this country when the FG at a time instituted a Sovereign Wealth Fund which was bitterly opposed by the same governors to the extent that some went to court all in a bid to share whatever accrues to such a fund?
Were we not in this country when Rotimi Amaechi accused the FG of looting the Excess Crude Account but the Ministry of Finance published figures showing that Rivers state among other states had collected billions and billions from the same funds he claimed was looted?
Why don’t we recall basic facts like and tell those governors to do either of these:
1) Produce those funds from wherever they kept them and pay their workers
2) Resign if they’re so helpless or
3) Go to hell and quit irritating our ears with their infantile ejaculations of helplessness.
All this hue and cry about states besieging the FG for bailout simply reinforces the desperate need for the true fiscal federalism some of us have been shouting about for years now’’.
