The Pacesetter Frontier Magazine

Tag: debt

  • Anambra Govt Challenges Obi’s Claim of ₦2.13bn Ecological Fund

    Anambra Govt Challenges Obi’s Claim of ₦2.13bn Ecological Fund

    Precious Nwonu, Enugu

    The Anambra State Government has challenged former Governor Peter Obi’s claim that he left more than ₦2.13bn in an ecological fund account when he handed over power in 2014.

    The government said records from First Bank showed that the account identified by Obi was an Internally Generated Revenue Consolidated Revenue Account and not an account specifically designated for ecological funds.

    The Commissioner for Information and Value Reorientation, Law Mefor, disclosed this in a statement issued on Wednesday in response to Obi’s recent comments on the state’s finances.

    Mefor said the government had obtained a certified printout of First Bank account number 2018779464, which Obi identified as the account where he left the ecological funds.

    According to him, the records covering the account from its opening in 2011 to the present did not show any transaction or balance corresponding to the ₦2.13bn claimed by the former governor.

    “We have obtained a certified printout of the account from inception to date. The account is an Internally Generated Revenue Consolidated Revenue Account, not an ecological fund account,” Mefor said.

    “From 2011 when the account was opened until date, there has never been any such amount, whether as inflow or balance, in the account.”

    The commissioner consequently asked Obi to explain where the money he said he left for his successor was kept.

    The dispute followed Obi’s rejection of claims by the state government that his administration left behind financial obligations, including an ecological-related loan, contractor liabilities and arrears involving salaries, pensions and gratuities.

    Obi had maintained that his administration cleared more than ₦35bn in historical gratuity and salary arrears and handed over the state without outstanding obligations to workers or contractors for completed and certified projects.

    On the ecological fund, the former governor said the money was released shortly before the end of his tenure to address the erosion crisis in Oko and Umuchiana.

    He said he deliberately left the funds untouched for the incoming administration because the money was tied to a specific project.

    Obi also said more than ₦2.13bn remained intact in the First Bank account at the time he left office.

    The former governor had challenged anyone disputing his account of the fund to provide evidence to the contrary.

    “If anybody can establish anything to the contrary, I will stop campaigning,” Obi said.

    However, Mefor expanded the state government’s response beyond the disputed ecological fund, saying eight external loans remained outstanding after Obi left office on March 17, 2014.

    He said the outstanding balance of the loans stood at ₦127.4bn as of June 30, 2026, based on the official exchange rate.

    The loans listed by the government were connected to projects including malaria control, agricultural development, health system development, education, community development, erosion management and value-chain development.

    Mefor also disputed Obi’s claim that his administration left office without unpaid salaries, gratuities and pensions.

    He said the administration of Governor Chukwuma Soludo had cleared about ₦22bn in inherited gratuity arrears, while alleging that some liabilities from the Obi administration and earlier governments remained.

    The commissioner cited arrears involving retired teachers and workers of the state Water Corporation.

    He said salary arrears owed to Water Corporation workers continued through the Obi administration and were eventually settled under the Soludo government, with two of three instalments already paid.

    Mefor further alleged that the Obi administration had verified and certified 16 months of salary arrears for primary school teachers but paid only five months.

    “The Obi administration verified/certified 16 months of salary arrears for primary school teachers but paid only five months,” he said.

    The commissioner also questioned Obi’s claim that his administration left more than ₦75bn in savings.

    “We will not engage in nebulous creative accounting. If there were ₦75 billion in savings, as claimed, where are the records?” Mefor asked.

  • Obi Vows to Quit Campaign if Anambra Debt Claims Proven True

    Obi Vows to Quit Campaign if Anambra Debt Claims Proven True

    Precious Nwonu, Enugu

    Presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress, Peter Obi, has challenged the Anambra State Government to provide evidence that his administration left behind unpaid debts, salaries, pensions and contractor liabilities when he left office as governor.

    Obi, who governed the state from 2006 to 2013, made the challenge in a statement posted on his social media account while responding to claims concerning the financial obligations inherited by successive administrations.

    He said his administration cleared more than N35 billion in historical gratuities and arrears before leaving office and maintained that there were no outstanding salaries, pensions or gratuities at the point of handover.

    Obi also said contractors whose projects had been completed and certified were paid before his administration left office.

    Addressing the controversy surrounding an alleged N2 billion ecological fund, the former governor said the money was released about three months before the end of his tenure to address the Oko/Umuchiana erosion crisis.

    He claimed that he deliberately left the funds untouched for the incoming administration because they were earmarked for a specific project.

    According to Obi, more than N2.13 billion remained in a First Bank account he identified as the account where the ecological funds were kept.

    He further said the money was separate from the more than N75 billion in savings which he claimed his administration left for its successor.

    “If anybody can establish anything to the contrary, I will stop campaigning,” Obi said.

    The Anambra State Government, however, disputed Obi’s account in a statement issued on Wednesday by the Commissioner for Information and Value Reorientation, Law Mefor.

    The state government said eight external loans obtained during or inherited into Obi’s administration still had an outstanding balance of $92.35 million, which it valued at N127.37 billion as of June 30, 2026.

    It said the loans were connected to projects in areas including healthcare, education, malaria control, erosion management and community development, and that the current administration was servicing the outstanding obligations.

    The government also disputed Obi’s claim that he left office without salary, pension or gratuity arrears, saying the current administration had inherited and cleared about N22 billion in gratuity arrears owed to retired state and local government employees and teachers.

    It further alleged that salary arrears involving workers of the former Anambra State Water Corporation remained unresolved, while some primary school teachers had outstanding salary, pension and gratuity arrears.

    The state government also challenged Obi’s claim concerning the N2.13 billion ecological fund.

    According to Mefor, a certified statement of the First Bank account cited by Obi showed no evidence that the alleged amount had ever been deposited into the account.

    The commissioner said the account was an internally generated revenue consolidated account rather than an ecological fund account, and challenged Obi to explain where the money was kept if it was not in the account he identified.

    The latest exchange has renewed debate over the financial position of Anambra at the end of Obi’s tenure, with both sides presenting conflicting accounts of the state’s debts, arrears and funds left for subsequent administrations.

    ### Obi opens up academic records

    In a separate development, Obi said he had no objection to legitimate scrutiny of his academic records.

    The NDC presidential candidate said he had authorised the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and other institutions he attended to release his academic records, subject to applicable laws and institutional procedures.

    He said the records could include his certificates, admission documents and other official academic information relating to his studies.

    Obi said candidates seeking public office should be prepared to subject their qualifications and records to legitimate scrutiny, describing transparency and accountability as important to public confidence.

    “I have absolutely no objection to the release of these records,” he said.

    He also challenged other presidential candidates to make their educational qualifications and relevant academic records available for legitimate public examination.

    ### Obi camp questions reported Tinubu endorsement

    Meanwhile, the Peter Obi Media Office has raised concerns over reports that about 600 university academics endorsed President Bola Tinubu ahead of the 2027 presidential election.

    In a statement signed by its spokesperson, Idris Zekeri Jnr., the media office said the reported endorsement raised questions because university academics have previously been recruited by the Independent National Electoral Commission for electoral duties, including as returning and collation officers.

    The group argued that academics who publicly support a presidential candidate could face questions about perceived impartiality if subsequently appointed to sensitive electoral positions.

    It urged INEC to identify academics involved in political endorsements and consider excluding them from sensitive electoral assignments in 2027.

    The media office also called on INEC to publish the names of prospective returning and collation officers ahead of elections, saying this would allow political parties, civil society groups and members of the public to scrutinise potential conflicts of interest.

    The reported endorsement and the allegations raised by Obi’s media office remain claims by the political campaign, rather than an established finding that any electoral process has been compromised.

  • Finance: FG owes CBN N9.8tn debt

    Part of the report read, “Sustained use of direct monetary financing could raise risks to macroeconomic stability – given the current weak institutional safeguards – but we expect the FGN to reduce its use of the facility in 2021.

     

    “The FGN directly borrowed 1.9 per cent of GDP from the CBN to fund its fiscal deficit in 2020, estimated by Fitch at 3.6 per cent of Gross Domestic Product.

     

    “A number of emerging markets resorted to central bank deficit financing in 2020 against a background of urgent spending needs and temporary market dislocations associated with the coronavirus pandemic.

     

    “However, the use of central bank financing in Nigeria predates the pandemic shock.”

     

    The report added, “We estimate that the balance of the government’s WMF with the CBN was around N9.8tn (6.7 per cent of GDP) at end-2019, up from N5.4tn (4.2 per cent of GDP) at end-2018.

     

    “Unlike the government, we include this balance in our metrics for Nigeria’s government debt. Borrowing from the facility accounted for 30 per cent of the FGN’s debt at end-2019, on our estimates.”

     

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    Fitch Rating stated that repeated central bank financing of government budgets could raise risks to macro-stability in the context of weak institutional safeguards that preserve the credibility of policymaking and the ability of the central bank to control inflation.

     

    The CBN’s guidelines limit the amount available to the government under its WMF to five per cent of the previous year’s fiscal revenues.

     

    However, it added, the FGN’s new borrowing from the CBN had repeatedly exceeded that limit in recent years, and reached around 80 per cent of the FGN’s 2019  revenues in 2020.

     

     

    Source: wwwpunchng.com