By Our Correspondent
The Chairman of Warri South Local Government Area of Delta State, Hon. Mofe Edema has explained why council chairmen in the state cannot pay workers salaries, noting that allocation from the Federal Government has drastically reduced.
Speaking with our correspondent in an interview at his office, the Warri South Council Chairman said the council has a deficit of about three million naira in last December salaries.
While lamenting that the state of the local government councils was very bad, Hon. Mofe stressed that they are being owed salaries for close to six months now, a situation he said even the last bailout by the Federal Government could not resolve.
He said; “The Federal Government gave us a bailout which covered only two months. And since that time of the bailout, more months have accumulated. The allocation for December that I got in January, I got a minus three million deficit. The one we got for February is eight million plus. So how do we cope with this?”
On the way forward, the Council boss calls for patients and understanding on the part of the workers, stressing that these are tough times that needed the cooperation of everybody to survive.
On internally generated revenue, Hon. Edema said the council is taking the issue of revenue very seriously this year, adding that the list of contractors that will be involved in generating revenue for the council were out, while those not directly given to contractors will be paid directly to the council account.
Hon. Edema who absolved the state government of any blame in the situation the councils found themselves, said that the state government has been sympathetic with the plight of the council workers and they have been augmenting what comes from the Federal Government’s allocation.
“While some people are clamoring for autonomy of the local government, that is not to say that the state government tampers with our money. Also if you look at it very critically, how many local governments are viable. Up till this very moment, the state government still augments what comes to the local government,” Hon. Edema said.
The Warri South Council Boss, however, stressed that with the little resources available to him he had been able to make sure that the surroundings in the council area are kept clean, at least to make the people comfortable.
“The people are already aware of what is happening in the country. But you still have to talk to them to let them see reasons why things are the way they are now but with the little resources you are able to make you can begin to do little things for the people. Now you can attest to the cleanliness in Warri and that is to tell you that even if we cannot build gigantic structure now, we should be able to clean up the place and provide some basic necessities that could make life comfortable for the people,” he added.
