Nyesom Wike, the minister of the Federal Capital Territory has said President Bola Tinubu approved the removal of the FCT from the Treasury Single Account to enable the Administration to access funds easily to carry out major infrastructural projects.
The minister, speaking at a news conference on Friday in Abuja, said the TSA has made it difficult for the FCTA to access funding to carry out projects, and the capital city has consequently been littered with too many abandoned projects for decades.
TSA refers to a public accounting system using a single account, or a set of linked accounts by the government to ensure all revenue receipts and payments are done through a Consolidated Revenue Account (CRA) at the Central Bank of Nigeria
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He also said pulling out from the TSA, would enable the Administration to access funding in the form of loans from commercial banks to carry out major infrastructural projects, which it has hitherto been unable to do over concerns of repayment.
“The city not growing as it should, you have projects littered up and down. Projects are awarded without financial backup. So many projects as far back as 2002, What is responsible? The government joined the single treasury account, where all accounts will be in the central bank.
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“Now the central bank cannot give us loans, even the IGR is spent as it comes, you cannot tangibly do anything with it. so I said to Mr. Presidnet, if you want FCT to carry out the infrastructural projects then the best is that we must pull out”, the minister said.
While applauding the president for what he termed a bold move that any leaders are afraid to take, said the FCTA will embark on massive infrastructural projects with remarkable results in one year.
“You’ll see from next year, it will be projects up on projects in FCT. What you saw in Port-Harcourt will be a small thing. So those crying of insecurity, no light, and no road will be a thing of the past. You will see the road and you will run”, Wike told the news conference.
