Nasarawa State Government has flagged off the distribution of palliatives to cushion the effect of hardship as a result of fuel subsidy removal on its citizens.
Recall that the federal government had on May 29 announced the removal of fuel subsidy.
Gov Abdullahi Sule, while flagging off the distribution in the Lafia local government area of the state, assured that the distribution would be done without taking into consideration political parties affiliations.
According to Sule, it is the responsibility of the government to take care of its citizens irrespective of their political and religious affiliations, noting The choice of palaces for the distribution of the palliatives shows that is not a political party’s affairs.
Gov Sule explained that the Nasarawa state government had received N2 billion so far out of N4 billion palliative federal government recommended for the state, noting that the state looks forward to receiving the balance of N2 billion.
“As far as the palliative is concerned, you have been hearing of N5 billion that is going to be given to the states; it is indeed N5 billion, but the N5 billion is not all in cash.
“N4 billion is being given to every state, and out of the N4 billion, the federal government is going to contribute N2. 80 billion which is 52 percent of the total amount, and the state will contribute N1.92 billion, which is the details of the amount.
“On the part of the federal government, they have already sent N2 billion to us, they will send the remaining N2 billion to us. But N1.92 billion of that money will be repaid to the fed govt by the state under ISPO,” he said.
Gov Sule further stated that the federal government had also allocated N1 billion of grains to every state.
“In addition, the N1 billion you have not had is not coming in cash. The federal government has grains at strategic reserves all over the country. They have maize, so the N1 billion worth of maize at N25,000 per bag will be given to every state.
“Because all their monies are supposed to go for food items, how do they come up with the calculation of N4 billion, what the federal government has in mind is to buy only rice at N40,000 per bag. N100,000 bags of rice at N40,000 per bag is amount to N4 billion,” he explained.
Sule said that the state had engaged traditional and religious leaders, inter-party advisory councils, youth and women groups, and officials of the government in the sharing arrangement to ensure success and transparency.
Speaking earlier, Justice Sidi Bage, Emir of Lafia, thanked President Bola Tinubu and gov Abdullahi Sule for thinking right to give palliative to cushion the hardship of the people.
“The time now is not quite easy for people since after some of these good policies of the government, there are some effects which will definitely, as we already assured our people that this is temporary, after some time it will ease off,” he said.