In an effort to refute the claims made by the Rt Hon Speaker of Adamawa State House of Assembly (ADHA), Alhaji Aminu Iya Abbas that the immediate past Governor of the state,Senator Muhammadu Umaru Jibrilla Bindow have borrowed 6 billion naira after losing election and failed to pay April Salary.
In a counter response, the organising Secretary of the All Progressives Congress Party chapter of state, Alhaji Ahmed Lawal refuted that Bindo didn’t collect any loan in the last laps of his tenure.
He described speaker Aminu as a ” rubber stamp and yes Sir speaker” of Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri of the state who is “an ardent liar” in favour of the Governor who is known to be his Boss for many years.
Ahmad lamented that the Speaker is lacking the capacity to work for Adamawa state people, as according to him since the resumption of his office their is no tangible resolutions,bills or laws passed in the general interest of the state.
He said the speaker and his fellow members are failing to checkmate the excesses of the present Government under the leadership of Governor Ahmadu Fintiri who without commissioners and aides is adding contracts of billions of Naira.
“I expect the speaker to pressurise the present government to pay the civil servants whose seven months salaries are still hanging and the honourable members are mute because they have been bought over by the Governor.
” Why is the speaker talking about the previous government, for God sake is a speaker of all Adamawa indigenes why is he becoming partisan, please if he lacks the good will to do the work of the speaker, he should give men of capable hands to do it because making is making the people of the state to loose future in him.
Lawal revealed that the past government of APC under the leadership of Governor Bindo applied a loan but Fintiri frustrated the efforts by asking the Banks agencies never to be granted the loan.
According to him when Bindow lost the 2019 election federal allocation was hijacked by Fintiri government to the extend of threatening the payment banks not to allow him pay the salaries, at the end of the day Fintiri
“So many things are going wrong with this government but they remain silence because of their personal interest, the lawmakers are not suppose to be partisan but it is appear they are.
” We are reminding the speaker to stop laying and focus to the work of checking and making sure he puts the executive on their toes to work for Adamawa state not to put his energy on past government of history because he has been bought over by the present Governor.
“More importantly we want the whole world know that Bindo didn’t borrowed any money after he lost his election Rather the Governor did through the state Assembly to collect a loan of over 9 billion for the purpose of constructing a needless over head bridge in the state” He added
He continue to say that he should refer back to state Account General and the state Auditor to let him have any classified information pertaining loans in the state not to come out to make Mockery of himself to the public.
Another chieftain of APC in the state, Mr PP Elisha consider the whole story as “false” as according to him the integrity that Governor Bindow have when leaving the office is unquestionable.
According to him Bindow Left the office of the Governor with a clean hand and a structured loan judiciously used to settled the outstanding salaries of Health LGAs and Primary schools workers inherited from previous administrations.
“I challenged the Rt Hon Speaker to bring out the said loan Bindo borrowed after loosing election with date accurate facts and figures please.” Elisha said
You may wish to recall that speaker Iya Abbas has stated how the immediate past Governor of the state, Muhammad Umaru Jibrilla Bindow borrowed a whooping N6 billion after losing election ostensibly to pay April salaries but refused to pay a dime to the civil servants.
Iya said:“This money is from the federal government issued to the state at zero percent interest rate. It is a grant or a facility but does not attract any interest and is not given to the state government but a company, ‘Family homes’, created by the federal government to build the houses.
“What we did in the house was to give a resolution that will allow this money to be given to the company from the federal government in the name of building houses for Adamawa people.
“Why are people not talking about the N6 billion we restructured? Because the same day, we restructured N6 billion. This N6 billion was taken by the last administration in April, after losing the election. And the burden is on the state and they took that money, if you remember, they didn’t even pay salaries for that April.
“After collecting that money and the subvention, the April salaries were not paid in the state, we had to come and pay salaries for April and May. The N6 billion was for payments of salaries and whatever in the state and it wasn’t paid; nothing was paid.
“They collected the N6 billion to be paid in 24 months and we said no. The burden will be too much on the state. We increase the time to 36 months, that’s what we did.
“But people don’t want to think of why is this N6 billion. Why did people refused to mention N6 billion? But are talking of N9 billion that will beneficial to all the citizens of Adamawa state. A lot of staff, a lot of people in this state don’t have houses,” the speaker said.
“As I am talking, the deductions on Adamawa state is about N1 billion per month. The state is paying about N1 billion per month on facilities. When I discussed this with some people, they say if they are given the governorship of the state, they won’t take it.
“We are paying N1 billion per month to service our debt and we are getting between N3.8 and N4 billion on monthly basis; and the salary of the state, even without the political appointees is between N2.2 to N2.3 billion and will be much more higher when the political appointees come on board.
“By the time you bring all these political appointees in, you now look at how much the salary is going to be. By the time you start paying their entitlements apart from salaries, everybody has a housing benefit, furniture, car, whatever; the burden will be too much.
“It is because of the prevailing circumstance that we in the house don’t have cars for almost four months now. Because we are looking at the financial status of the state.
“If we are going to buy cars for the Assembly alone, we are spending over N1 billion,” He said
