El-Rufai wants EFCC office established in Kaduna to track looters
El-Rufai wants EFCC office established in Kaduna to track looters
//Godwin Ekosin, Kaduna//
Following the discovery of financial misconducts in Kaduna civil service resulting from ongoing verification exercise, the State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai has expressed interest for establishment of office of Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) in the State.
El-Rufai, who spoke through his Commissioner of Finance, Suleiman Abdul Kwari while addressing correspondent chapel of Nigeria Union of Journalists in Kaduna Tuesday, hinted that the state government has already provided office accommodation for the commencement of the Commission in the state.
According to the commissioner, the Commission national office is working towards opening the office in Kaduna with intention of tracking not only the big thieves but also the small ones.
He noted that the administration of El-Rufai is faced with criticism though, but vowed never to allow that to deter them from supporting a course they believed to be just in the interest of approximately eight million populace.
He said, “we are not bordered about the noise some few people are making about the ongoing verification exercise now because we belief it is to the advantage of the larger people resident in the state.
“Many people will still be gone after because the governor has graciously given office accommodation and EFCC national body is working towards opening an office here. They are not only going after the big ones, we are going after such small cases of of people been dishonest. That to some extent will be a thing of the past and it doesn’t matter how small because crime is a crime.
“So we would continue and government as government will rest its case as far as verification exercise is concerned by the end of this month,” he stated.
The State debt profile according to the Commissioner now stand at N70billion. He said the state government was working to see how it could be reduced.
He gave an instance where a road project that was approved by the immediate past administration was renegotiated which eventually saved the government the sum of N1.1billion
“We have just renegotiated Kawo road extension project and that has saved us N1.1billion. We will continue to do this because some of the contracts are double awarded while some are not real. So debt profile of the state will reduce and the result will be made public after the Auditor General of the state is done with his work on that.”
His counterpart in the ministry of Budget and Economic Planning, Muhammed Sani Abdullahi, decry the state of economy in Kaduna hitherto before the advent of current administration.
He hinted that 70 percent if economy activities in the state in the past 10 years, has gone down which he added had affected practically all sector of the economy, “we are working seriously to improve our economy far better than what we met when we came on board. For instance, out of over 500 decayed public schools, we have completed renovation of 120 and we are providing furniture at the same time.”
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