Subsidy Removal: Ondo Has 6000 Bags of Rice, Others to Distribute, Says Finance Commissioner

Fidelis David in Akure

As part of its palliative measures to cushion the effect of the fuel subsidy removal, Ondo State Government has disclosed that it has taken delivery of 6,000 bags of rice from the federal government and the lot it has paid for.

This was disclosed yesterday by the Ondo State Commissioner for Finance and Chairman, Palliative Strategy and Implementation Committee, Mr. Wale Akinterinwa, when he fielded questions from journalists at a media forum that was organised by the state’s council of Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), tagged “Ondo Media Agenda,” in Akure.

Akinterinwa said that citizens of the state, particularly the vulnerable and pensioners in Ondo State, would soon heave a sigh of relief with the distribution of the rice.

He reiterated that unconditional N10,000 cash transfer would be given for three months to selected vulnerable persons in every local government while pensioners would get N10,000 each from August till December 2023.

He also assured that they would receive the N10,000 set aside for them at the end of this month.

The commissioner stated that the 3,000 bags of rice from the federal government are part of the 81,000 bags of rice promised to each state of the federation to cushion the effect of the fuel subsidy removal.

He assured that besides rice, other local food items would be procured and distributed to the poor people in the state using the existing data in their communities.

He said: “From this month, apart from transportation, the pensioners would get their N10, 000, the vulnerable would also would get the same, some of this promises would definitely take time as we have to ensure transparency and accountability.

“Free transportation for school children would commence next month. Transportation for civil servant would also commence for ease of movement. We intend to buy more vehicles but we don’t want the one using petrol. We want to buy CNG buses because they are bigger, but all the states are going for this purpose because of the fuel cost, we are also on the queue for it.”

Akinterinwa noted that free food packages would be distributed to one million households across the 18 local governments of the state while farm inputs at subsidised rates would be made available to farmers.

He said: “The government would help the famers get their  food crops get to town because we had realised that transportation has been the major difficulties, the farmer do complain of access, we would provide tricycle for easy access when these crops get to town, it would be sold in a subsidised price.”

Speaking on the efforts of Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu-led administration to improve the standard of living and infrastructural development in the state, Akinterinwa revealed that Akeredolu gave him and other members of the economic team a matching order to shore up the internally generated revenue of the state.

He disclosed that at the inception of the administration, the state IGR was hovering between N500 million and N600 million but has jumped to N3 billion monthly.

Akinterinwa said that the governor, through legislative instruments, created Ondo State Internal Revenue Service (ODIRS), which is being managed by an expert from the private sector.

Different leakages in the revenue were blocked and brilliant graduates were employed with encouraging incentives and salaries to begin exploration of the taxable products and services.

“We designed tax payment, you can now pay your tax at the comfort of your zone, all those placement helped out in increasing our IGR, we deploy technology, we have data for all Houses, all we did was just enforcing the law, we have the data to send notice of tax payment to people and we enforce it, everybody was involved and implementation was done, we also tried to be transparent enough about the funds and usage,” he said.