Three opposition parties in Ogun State have warned Governor Ibikunle Amosun against expending the larger share of the N420.6billion budget he proposed for 2019 on roads construction only.
Governor Amosun recently submitted a budget proposal of N420.6billion to the state House of Assembly for approval for the 2019 fiscal year.
But the three opposition political parties in the state, including the Alliance for New Nigeria, the Labour Party and the All Progressives Grand Alliance, faulted the governor for allegedly allocating a larger part of the previous budgets to the construction of road projects in the state at the expense of the other sectors.
They accused the governor of abandoning other sectors, including Education, Agriculture, Health, among others in the past seven and the half years to construct road and bridges mainly in Abeokuta, the state
capital.
The opposition parties, therefore, charged Amosun not to use the fund meant for the 2019 budget to complete the abandoned road projects in the state.
The Publicity Secretary of the ANN, Mr. Lugard Ola-Raheem, urged that the governor not to tamper with the 2019 budget by channeling a larger chunk of the budget to road construction as he had allegedly done in the past.
Ola-Raheem, who also alleged that the state government was in the habit borrowing money to finance its budgets, blamed the governor for devoting much of the money borrowed on only sectors where he could derive personal
benefits.
He said, “The governor in the past years, has devoted larger chunk of the budget to infrastructure development, particularly road construction. Why is it always that the governor rely on loan to finance budgets and what is the impact of accessing loans to finance road projects alone that are concentrated in the state capital.
“What you see you on paper is actually different from what you see in reality, when the by the time the budget is approved, you will realise that money will be devoted to. Why they will have their largesse at the detriment of education and health and many of the workers are lamenting that salaries are not
paid.”
Also, speaking the state Publicity Secretary of APGA, Mr. Kola Ogunyinka, urged the governor to allocate all the money in the budget to the various sectors and not just roads and bridge construction alone.
Ogunyinka said since government is a continuum, Governor Amosun should forget the idea of completing all the road projects before the end of his tenure in
office.
“It is an over-ambitious budget. The current expenditure is rigorously low. He wants to put everything on capital project. I don’t think he can complete the ongoing road projects in the state because government is a continuum. He should not use the budget to complete the ongoing projects,” he
said.
On his own part, the state Chairman of the Labour Party, Comrade Abayomi Arabambi, who praised the governor over the projects, however, noted that the governor would not be able to complete up to 30 per cent of the road projects before leaving office in May, 2019.
Arabambi urged the Ogun governor to allocate money to all the sectors they were meant for in the
budget.