Adamawa state government has said the huge debt left behind by the previous administrations has made it impossible for the state to access the N2billion COVID-19 loans granted to states.
The loan would have assisted the state in mitigating the impact of COVID-19 pandemic.
The state Commissioner for Finance, Dr Ishaya Dabari in an interview with journalists in his office stated this when shedding light on the debt profile inherited by the present administration and the loan collected by the Governor Fintiri administration in the last two years.
“The state is yet to access the N2bn COVID-19 loan granted by the federal government which would have greatly assisted the state in mitigating the impact of COVID-19 on the economy. This is because of the huge debt stock left behind by the previous administrations. It caused CBN and AMCON to downgrade our credit rating to negative,” he said.
He added that the Governor Ahmadu Fintiri administration inherited a debt profile of over N140 billion from the previous government, without much on ground to show for it. He added that, so far, Governor Fintiri administration had borrowed only N15billion from a commercial bank since it came on board with so many achievements on ground to show.
Dabari further noted that the N15bn loan collected by the administration was being used judiciously in the ongoing construction of flyovers and interchange in the state capital and execution of various road projects in all the 21 local governments, unlike the past administrations that collected such loans and shared it among themselves without much benefit to the people of the state.
“Since we came on board we only collected loans once, N15bn from a Commercial Bank which is being used to construct all the roads in the 21 local governments including the flyover and interchange of course. We inherited over 140bn from previous government. The previous government took all these loans but it was not adequately utilised for the benefit of the people. We can beat our chest and ask anyone to come and evaluate loans we collected vis-a- viz the projects they have been used for.”
He said among the loans collected by the previous administration, there are some that have matured and they paid them fully and there are some that are still ongoing, warranting deductions of reasonable amount from the state share of the federal allocations on monthly basis for the settlement of such loans, both local and foreign.
He added that the state will soon float a bond and it has already constituted a committee headed by him for that purpose to finance the state government agricultural business development plan focus on cattle livestock and farming to enhance revenue. He assured that although the size of the bond is yet to be decided, but the people of the state will get value for their money.
