The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP in Osun State has berated Governor Rauf Aregbesola for plunging the state into what it described as a huge debt which will take it many years to settle.
The state chairman of the party, Soji Adagunodo, who said this in a statement in Osogbo on Sunday, spoke in a reaction to the report of the Nigeria Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative, NEITI which listed Osun State with a debt profile of N165.91 billion as the third most indebted state in Nigeria.
The NEITI which listed Lagos State with a debt of N605.23 billion and Delta State N331.95 said that the debt burden of Osun, Delta and Cross River States raised major concern because their borrowings were found to be more than double the total revenue accruing to them.
However, the PDP chairman, who said the NEITI did not have the total figure of the debt which Osun State was owing, added the money borrowed from some commercial banks was not part of the figure given.
The opposition party stated that the administration did not have commensurate things to show for the huge money it borrowed, saying the fund was spent on frivolities.
The PDP statement read, “The governor had rebuffed all attempts to make him come clean on the the state of indebtedness of Osun state at different fora in the past. The record of NEITI which puts the debt of Osun state at N165.91 billion is scandalous, frightening and portends danger for the fragile economy of the state.
“We have it on good authority that the figures provided by NEITI did not take into account several other loans sourced from commercial banks in the state especially in the past three years.
“We wonder why Osun which is always on the lowest rung of FAAC allocations and a weak Internally Generated Revenue will be classified on the topmost debtors list alongside Lagos, Akwa Ibom and Delta who are all some of the highest revenue earners in Nigeria.
“This in effect shows that Mr. Aregbesola has run the economy of the state aground by deliberate acts of wastages, frivolities and lack of transparency in the management of its resources but has rather created a huge financial burden for generations yet unborn.”
The party stated that the House of Assembly which ought to check the alleged excesses of the governor had become a lapdog and an ineffective organ of government.
Adagunodo called on founding fathers of the state to avail themselves of the report of the NEITI to know the center of economic damage the current administration had done to the state.
However, the Chairman of the All Progressives Congress, APC in the state, Gboyega Famoodun, said the PDP spoke just to be heard and not because their statement made any sense.
He said, “Even the blind can see that this administration is working. There is nowhere in the state that this government has not touched. But we have to concentrate on the state capital in order to attract investors and to boost the economy.
“Apart from the International Breweries Plc and the newly renovated Cocoa Processing Industry in Ede, there is no company that employs more than 100 workers. This is what the governor is trying to correct.
“The PDP chairman should open wide his eyes to see the good works of the administration. But I pity him because he must be saying something to remain in the news because the PDP is fast going into extinction.”
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