Candidate of the African Democratic Congress(ADC) in the Ekiti state governorship election scheduled to hold June 18, Dr. Wole Oluyede has said it would take concerted efforts for the state to stand afloat economically, with over N88 billion debt, N37.8 billion indebtedness on retirees’ gratuity and arrears of workers’ salary.
Oluyede who is an Australian based medical doctor warned that the state may find it difficult to develop if it continues to rely solely on federal allocations.
He said, “As I was told, the state had borrowed up to N88 billion. We have 2.3m well educated persons having nothing to do. If all Ekiti is to share from the N2.3 billion monthly allocation, then it amounts to N1, 100 per month and N35 per day. This is extreme poverty and there is no plan on how to get out of this.”
He stated this in his country home, Ikere-Ekiti, Thursday, in an interactive session with journalists on his programme for Ekiti.
The ADC governorship hopeful promised to back and allow local government autonomy if elected governor.
He said he was dissatisfied with governors opposing local government autonomy, saying, “Why are local governments not autonomous? If government is local, then development will be local.
“If elected governor, all the LGs allocations will go to them directly to bring development. Too much control of government makes things difficult. We must make government more accessible to people by removing bottle-necks, which is what is obtainable world over.”
