Paris Club cloudy refunds to states

Pensioners

These are trying times for many states in the federation. While many of the state authorities are still battling with the payment of arrears of salaries and pension benefits to their public sector workers, the peculiarity of the current political climate with the oncoming party primaries and general elections has put economic governance and the provision of public services in the back seat. Consequently, the likelihood that funds meant for the upkeep of the states will be diverted to election-related purposes appears not far-fetched. This again does not inspire hope of a better tomorrow, the only comfort you can give to a weeping child.

Hence the recent decision of the Federal Government to release the Paris Club refunds to the states is considered wholesome to some state government officials but curious to some other members of the public. In retrospect, the Paris Club refunds are the longstanding claims resulting from reported over-deductions regarding Paris Club debts made on state government accounts as far back as 1995 to 2002. These refunds are over deductions from the states’ Federation Account Allocation Committee payments for foreign loan service over the stated period. These refunds have been an issue of dispute between the federal and state governments, with the Debt Management Office taking on the yeoman’s job of reconciling the extent of overdeduction for individual states.

So far, with the directive by the Presidency in 2016 that 50% of the claims by the states be paid back to them, to sort out salary and other pressing financial needs, the balance of the claims has been a subject of controversy between the states and the Federal Government.

Source:

 //guardian.ng/opinion/paris-club-cloudy-refunds-to-states/