Bauchi state governor Bala Mohammed has described as baseless and unfounded the reasons given by the former speaker house of representatives Yakubu Dogara for his defection from PDP to APC.
Recall that Dogara alleged that the state government withholds local governments funds, failed to conduct local government elections, delays payment of workers salaries and collects loans illegally as against the promised made to the electorates during campaign.
Mr Dogara claimed that if he talks on the alleged wrong doings, he would be accused of disloyalty to the government and party, hence his decision to decamp to another party.
But in his reaction, governor Bala in a press release issued by his media aide Mukhtar Gidado on Wednesday said all the allegations by the former speaker were mere fabrications aimed at justifying ‘his selfish political action’.
According to him, right from the inception of this administration, the state has judiciously adhered to the extant financial rules, in the management of allocations to the local governments, based on federal allocation and cash flow.
“Contrary to what obtained during the last administration which Dogara endured for four years, the present administration has been paying wages and salaries as at when due. However, it should be placed on record that the LGs are indebted to the State Government to the tune of N9b. This arose from projects purportedly executed by the previous administration, through the Joint Account Committee. But we have stopped the charade and we are now rebuilding the finances of the Local Governments.
“No detractor, not even Dogara will deny that one of the major achievements of the Bala Mohammed administration, in its first year in office, is the restoration of life and activities to the hitherto comatose Local Government Areas.
“Like the LGs, the Emirates councils are getting their allocations. But we will not be surprised if Dogara is not aware of this. It takes someone like Dogra who is not in touch with his place, not to recognise that we have comprehensively reinvigorated the Emirate Council system for greater efficiency and comfort of our highly revered traditional institutions.
“We acknowledge that Hon. Dogara is one of our highly placed sons. We will continue to accord him the respect due to him. We also concede his right to join any group of his choice and to pursue any ambition within the law. However, he must realise that this time around, the old strategy of blackmailing and discrediting people and jumping from one party to another, will not work.” He said.
