We Have Released N1.64trn To States, LGs In Two Years - Buhari

President Buhari

The federal government on Sunday said it released additional support of N1.64 trillion to states and local governments between 2015 and 2017 as part of measures to stabilise the polity.

President Muhammadu Buhari, who revealed this in a broadcast to commemorate Nigeria’s 57th Independence anniversary on Sunday in Abuja said that the funds were released to enable the states and local governments to pay outstanding salaries, pensions and small business suppliers who had been all but crippled over the years.

"N200 billion in 2015, N441 billion in 2016 and N1 trillion in 2017, altogether totaling N1.64 trillion.

"This was done to enable states to pay outstanding salaries, pensions and small business suppliers who had been all but crippled over the years".

The president also disclosed that the Federal Government’s current N500 billion Special Intervention Programme targeted groups through the Home-Grown School Feeding Programme and the N-Power Programme as well as providing loans to small-scale traders and artisans.

He said that the intervention programme also covered the Conditional Cash Transfer, Family Homes Fund and Social Housing Scheme.

Civil servants and retirees in some states are still being owed by their governments, backlog of unpaid salaries, pensions and other benefits.

These had led to strikes and work stoppages.

Buhari had on Sept. 11, appealed to state governors to pay all understanding salaries of their workers, and accumulated pensions of ex-workers from the additional funds provided to them by the Federal Government.