SAN FRANCISCO, December 17, (THEWILL) – The Federal Government has confirmed the release of the final tranche of the Paris Club refund to 27 state governments.
The release of the refunds to the states is in keeping with the directive of President Muhammadu Buhari that the states should get the money before Christmas to enable them pay workers and pensioners.
The Director, Home Finance, Federal Ministry of Finance, Mrs Siyanbola Olubunmi, confirmed the release of the fund to the 27 states while speaking at the end of the Federation Account Allocation Committee meeting held at the headquarters of the ministry of finance.
THEWILL gathered that nine other states, including Delta, Ogun and Adamawa, are to wait for now before collecting their own share of the third tranche of the Paris Club refunds because their payments was being delayed by some processes including a lawsuit.
The Federal Government had in July released the second tranche of N243.79bn, bringing the amount so far disbursed to states as refund under the Paris Club loan to N760.17bn.
A breakdown of the amount showed that five states received the highest amount of N10bn each.
The states are Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Delta, Kano, and Rivers.
The total amount of N50bn received by these five states represents 20.5 per cent of the entire amount released under the second tranche.