Anambra govt releases records of alleged unpaid debts by Peter Obi during tenure as governor
The Anambra State government has released what it termed the public debt records of the presidential candidate of Nigeria Democratic Congress NDC, Mr Peter Obi, while he was governor. In a press...
The Anambra State government has released what it termed the public debt records of the presidential candidate of Nigeria Democratic Congress NDC, Mr Peter Obi, while he was governor.
In a press statement signed by the Commissioner for Information and Value Reformation, Dr Law Mefor, and titled Gov Peter Obi and Record of Public Debt in Anambra: Facts Beyond Propaganda and Lies, the state government insisted Obi left behind debt as governor, both in domestic loans and unpaid pensions and gratuity.
The statement read: “Our attention has been drawn to a viral post by a former Governor of Anambra, HE Mr. Peter Obi, CON, on what he described as Phantom Debts and Ecological Loan Fallacy, which presumably was in response to some statements in a podcast by the Anambra State Commissioner for Finance.
“We understand that this is a campaign season and candidates often go to extremes to impress. If not that the said post was in his personal handle, we would not have believed that he could have made such wild, and verifiably false claims. As a government, we are focused 100% on delivering dividends of democracy to millions of Ndi Anambra. However, when a former governor of the state makes some outlandish claims about the state of public debt he left behind and especially when the present government has been spending billions of Naira servicing the same debt, a responsible government owes the public a response in the interest of transparency and accountability.”
Stating what it described as the fact, the state government clarified that: “HE Peter Obi Spent about $4.05 billion (equivalent to NS.4 trillion at current exchange rate) in 8 years and also contracted US$ 123.77million in external debt alone which our government has so far paid billions of Naira in service payments.
“Let’s be clear: hardly any government in the world has zero debt stock. The issue is not whether or not borrowing is good: no business or government can scale significantly without some debt. Yes, we converted the audited and published expenditures using the average official exchange rates during the eight years of Peter Obi and they sum to about USS$4.05 billion.
“At the current official exchange rate, it would sum to about N5.4 trillon and he surely governed to the best of his ability. Of course, no government will ever finish the work of development.”
“As of the date HE Peter Obi left office (17th March 2014), there were and still are 8 different external borrowings his administration left for his successors.
