The Minister of Power Works and Housing, Babatunde Raji Fashola has confirmed that about N70 billion has been paid to contractors out of the N102 billion released to his ministry.
He disclosed at the ongoing town hall meeting in Abuja, that following the payment, contractors were able to resume back to their construction sites.
According to him, there are over 200 on-going road projects valued at N2 trillion under supervision of the ministry. He added that the N19 billion initially released from the 2015 budget was grossly inadequate.
Fashola emphasized that work has resumed at Kano-Katsina road, Port-Harcourt-Enugu road, Lagos-Ibadan expressway, Loko-Oweto Bridge, and this has invariably led to economic improvement in the communities around those sites.
He said previous governments gave more attention to recurrent expenditure as against the capital expenditure, which according to him, worked negatively against the nation’s infrastructure and the economy.
He advised Nigerians to be patient and positive affirming that things would soon improve. He urged Nigerians to familiarize themselves with how the budget works, saying that budget is a document and not cash as it is generally believed in some quarters.
Speaking on power projects in Zungeru and Mambilla hydro power plant in Niger and Taraba States respectively, the Minister restated his commitment, stressing his resolve to ensure on-going transmission works at the sites are completed.
He corrected the erroneous impression in some quarters that government was managing the affairs of Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN). According to him, rather than being a government business sector, government is now playing a regulatory role while the power side is private sector driven.
In his remarks, the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, said that the Presidency is willing to collaborate with any organization that wishes to partner with government in its effort to provide good governance.
The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Muhammed, urged the public to offer advises to the federal government especially on economic solutions rather than consistent criticism of the government in power over the poor state of economy.