Abuja — THE thirty-six state governors under the aegis of Nigeria Governors' Forum, NGF, have concluded arrangements to confront the Senate and the Ministry of Finance on external borrowing on the revised proposed pipeline projects as contained in the Medium Term Plan of 2012 to 2014.
The governors who rose from a meeting at the Rivers State Governor's Lodge, Asokoro, Abujain the early hours of yesterday, said the move to meet with the lawmakers became imperative to enable further deliberation on the issue.
A communiqué read by Rivers State governor and Chairman of the forum, Chibuike Amaechi, said the governors also carried out an end of year review of its polio eradication initiative across the states of the federation.
The NGF also emphasized the centrality of routine immunization as a sustainable means of eradicating polio and the need to engage stakeholders from local communities in the campaign, even as the body noted changes in the demography of incidences and resolved that states should put necessary incentives to motivate vaccinators for better performance and better information sharing mechanism of good practices across states.
The forum also emphasized the centrality of routine immunization as a sustainable means of eradicating polio and the need to engage stakeholders from local communities in the campaign.
It would be recalled that the Minister of State, Finance, Yerima Ngama and some state commissioners of finance had before the Senate defended their request for an external loan of $7,905.69 billion. State commissioners, in particular were, on Monday, with the Senate Committee on Local and Foreign Debts.
President Goodluck Jonathan had also sent a letter to the Senate, seeking its approval to borrow $7.9 billion for 2012-2014 pipeline projects.
The loan named Medium-Term External Borrowing Plan (Revised), which spans 2012 to 2014, will enable the states fund specific developmental projects.
According to some of the governors who were at the meeting, the brainstorming exercise with the Senate and the ministers will be fruitful and it will be a way forward to clear some issues associated with the Medium-Term External Borrowing Plan.
Speaking with journalists at the end of the meeting, Governor Peter Obi ofAnambraStatewho noted that borrowing for development purposes was right, stressed that it would be wrong when borrowing was done for consumption.
Also speaking, Governor Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti State explained that the Medium-Term External Borrowing Plan was in stages and that the Ministry of Finance and other relevant bodies had cleared some issues on it.
He said: "The National Assembly and the Senate have been sitting on this and some issues have come up and that is what we are trying to clear."
Governors of Abia, Ebonyi, Anambra,Enugu, Imo, Borno, Taraba, Bauchi, Gombe, Akwa Ibom,Kaduna, Jigawa,Kano, Kebbi, Zamfara, Kogi attended the meeting.
Others were governors ofNiger, Ondo, Adamawa, Kwara,Lagos, Ogun, Ekiti and Yobe states.
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My advise to Ngozi Okonji-Iweala, I share with you in this tragic adventure to pick up your current position with hardened criminals as Minister of Finance as lot many citizens from developing nations would do. Events over time have shown you the impossible task to change extremely corrupt and dishonest looters and rouges with different morality and work ethics like you. Remember when Babangida used that strategy to lure in many of the nations best including Tai Solarin of the May flower School whose anger over growing vandalization of the earning from petroleum by then Minister of Finance, Alhaji Alhaji he vehemently criticized. Babangida let this social reformer go on with the idea to create mini-banking to help prop up local traders especially village women and those without no access to credit mechanism . When Mr Solarin found out the wave of corruption after the news of Nigerian Finance Minister who left a bag of U.S and British currency in the London Taxi with his passport . Solarin went to Babangida with stories from women recipients of such loans and he was assured that he will not be under the Minister, but promised to bring the Finance Minister face to face with him.When they met, Solarin could not believe the out come of conspiracy and sell out as Babangiga listened to his Finance Minister admonish Solarin on the difference between school compound bully and Ministry of finance while Babangida looked on with laughter. Next day he quit that job. Similarly. former governor Mbakwe of then IMO State had become convinced of the goodness in Babangida's recruitment drive to lure citizens from the South to brighten up his mainly Northern dominated regime with national character until his son warned his to back off from that strategy of recruiting citizens with fame and respectable history of leadership, mess up their names to bring them down to the mud like himself. How many citizens from the southern part of the country fall victim to the destructive tactics which earned him the infamous name of Maradona, even the vetran writer Wole Soyinka alkmost got mired into same seek and destroy strategy but for his creative wisdom when he took up the road safety position to help save life of citizens who die from road carnage everyday . Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala seem to have become mired innocently in a quagmire to help her country under the most difficult mafia machinery beyond the world renounced Cicily mafia. I will get out if I was her before the entire human capital she worked hard to build become withered away in a company she can never understand .