Emmanuel Igbasan, the Ondo state Commissioner for Budget and Economic Planning, has said the administration of Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu has reduced the state debt from inherited N220bn to N92bn.
Igbasan, who spoke this on Thursday in Akure at an interactive session with members of the Correspondents’ Chapel, therefore, attributed the reduction of the debt to the proper budgeting and good economic planning of his ministry in order to bring good governance to the doorstep of the citizens in the state.
According to him, the state was not owing up to N10bn as conceptual debt.
Igbasan also said the Akeredolu’s led administration decision to engage input of the citizens on its budgeting processes in 2017 helped the state to receive several global partnerships.
He explained that the recently rolled out 30-year development plan was the state to be able to meet its needs by the year 2054 after a critical assessment of its asset, its potentials and capabilities.
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On the state government plan to tackle Ayetoro sea incursion, Igbasan said the sea incursion problem faced by Ayetoro’s residents has been a source of worry to Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu.
According to him, “Ayetoro is a problematic and pathetic one for us as a state. If you look at the historical heritage of that place and their enterprises, it is not a place that should go into extinction.
“There are so many theories because for me, before I propose a solution, I want to dig deep into the root of the problem so that I won’t be dealing with the symptoms. I told Mr. Governor that before we can give solutions to the problem in Ayetoro, we need to know the cause.There’s no vacuum in nature. If you look at the proximity of Ondo State to Lagos and the volume of sand that was pulled from the sea to create a city where they drove the sea several miles away, there’s a possibility the sand was gotten from Ondo State.
“Some states erected sea breakers at the button of the sea which would change the natural cause of flow of the sea water, that might have been the repercussions that we are facing here. Another perspective is the activities of the Oil company. While I was doing my research, I stumbled on an information as far back as 1958, and it has been predicted that something like this would happen.
“The rise in climate change and the erosion level can be the cause too in Ayetoro. They have awarded numerous projects to salvage the issues in Ayetoro, one of them brought in sand to fill the place but within a few days they ran out of sand.
“Many of the perspectives put there are not true, we need to conduct a critical survey on the solution to that place. Mr. Governor, before he went on vacation, has put up a committee on the Ayetoro problem. They are to look for funds to tackle the situation. The Governor was emotional and he said this would be one of the bad things he will leave behind that he left Ayetoro worse than he met it.
“I see Governor Akeredolu as a highly insightful person. I see him as a man that’s devoid of offence towards anyone. He takes actions as it comes to him out of free conscience. I had studied him when I came into governance, he is a lover of intelligence and a lover of critical issues.”
