Ekiti State APC Questions Fayose’s Bailout Fund Politics

The Ekiti state chapter of the All Progressive Congress (APC) has warned that Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti state cannot escape scrutiny over salary bailout funds.

The Publicity Secretary of Ekiti state APC, Mr. Taiwo Olatunbosun, said in Ado Ekiti on Thursday that the governor had been playing pranks to avoid the Senate Committee’s screening.

According to Vanguard, He explained that the Senate had the power to screen how the bailout money was utilized because the money was different from regular federal allocation.

The Secretary agreed with Fayose that regular allocation could not be subjected to scrutiny of the Senate, but differed from him on the bailout money. The governor, he said, could not hide under the constitution to abuse the special intervention scheme for a specific purpose.

The governor had written the Federal Government, citing separation of power and independence of the state in the appropriation and application of federal funds allocated to the state governments. He insisted that fiscal independence of the states would not allow his government to open its books to the Senate Committee touring the states to investigate how the bailout cash was spent.

But Olatunbosun said that Fayose was playing with facts and the law to avoid scrutiny on how he spent the special funds specifically approved to pay backlog of salaries, pensions and other entitlements to former political office holders. He described Fayose’s stance as laughable and said: “Fayose cannot pretend that he did not know that the Federal Government attached certain terms and conditions to the bailout before he collected it. He queried why the governor that agreed to the terms was now refusing to explain how he spent the money. “

The bailout is like taking a bond that is programme-specific and Fayose knew this before he took the bailout and we wonder why he is now behaving as if the bailout is a Father Christmas gift that doesn’t require accountability. “It is now glaring that Fayose has many things to hide, as we had on several occasions cried that he had diverted the bailout to his private pocket instead of using it to pay salaries as the main condition attached to the loan.”