Rivers revenue drops by N5b monthly, says Amaechi Rivers State revenue has dwindled by at least N5 billion as the nation’s finances sink deeper, Governor Chibuike Amaechi said yesterday. According to him, the financial crisis has adversely affected economic planning, development and payment of bill, by the state government. He described the loss of revenue by the state and other states as a disaster. He spoke to members of the House of Representatives Committee on Emergency and Disasters, led by Hon Ifedayo Abegunde, who visited him. “I must say that at different occasions, you have risen to defend democracy. You have a big assignment. The assignment is not only natural, but also man-made disasters. The disasters include those in Yobe, Borno and Adamawa states. We are living in a disastrous country, where there are disasters everywhere. “There is even disaster in the revenue that we are sharing. You won’t believe that from N18 billion to N20 billion allocation that we have being receiving from the Federation Account, we now receive only about N13 billion monthly. “The meaning (of this) is that our wage bills are now affected, including social development. That is a disaster too,” he said. Amaechi, added that Nigerians are extremely hungry without positive response from the Federal Government. He warned that the nation is gradually slipping from democracy to dictatorship. He urged the members of the National Assembly to apply political and parliamentary activism, as part of their oversight functions to protect the nation’s democracy from further disasters and that the federal lawmakers were voted into power to help the citizens when the need arose.
Posted on: Thu, 06 Mar 2014 10:03:20 +0000