Soludo explains why he didn’t appoint many advisers, says he is not taking people’s support for granted
The Governor of Anambra State, Professor Chukwuma Soludo, has explained why his administration did not appoint many Special Advisers.
The governor said the state does not have the resources at this moment to take care of those appointments due to the prevailing economic situation.
This was made known by the Senior Special Adviser to the Governor, Dr Alex Obiogbolu, while speaking to journalists on Friday in Awka, on behalf of Governor Soludo.
Government will not take people’s support for granted
According to the governor’s aide, Soludo said he had not taken the people of Anambra or their support for his government for granted but was doing the best a responsive government could do in terms of delivering dividends of democracy within the limits of available resources.
Soludo said, ‘’Nobody is despising anybody, there is a need for us to separate public interest from personal interest. We have a state with a population of about six million or seven million.
“This administration came in and decided to treat the road as an emergency and in 10 months, 267 kilometres of roads have been awarded, guaranteed to last 20 years. All will be delivered in 24 months and 35 per cent of these roads are near completion
“We have an approved loan request of N100 million but it has not been accessed, yet we have paid about 30 per cent mobilisation for all the road contracts.
“It is true that the good people of Anambra rooted for this administration but they did it in the first place because they believed we will do a good job.’’
State government decided to fill manpower gap in critical sectors
On the accusation of heavy taxes and not appointing many people as Special Advisers, Soludo said the prevailing economic situation of the state could not shoulder the burden at the moment.
He said, rather than appoint many Special Advisers, his administration had decided to fill the manpower gap identified in some critical sectors, including education, health and address the challenges of insecurity.
He said he was evolving a progressive tax regime where the poor would no longer fund the rich as well as expanding the tax base to shore up the revenue profile of the state.
He said, “The salary of a Special Adviser is about the salary of six teachers a month, when we came in we met schools without teachers, and hospitals without doctors.
“Out of the 7,500 manpower gap identified in the school system, we employed 5,000 in one full swoop that is roughly the salary of 900 Special Advisers.
“We appreciate the support we got from our people, about people who supported the government to assume office, there is nothing bad in having 1,500 Special Assistants but the resources available cannot take care of this for now.
“That is the public interest decisions we are talking about, how is the government despising anybody.’’
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Full Story: https://nairametrics.com/2023/03/10/soludo-explains-why-he-didnt-appoint-many-advisers-says-he-is-not-peoples-support-for-granted/
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