The Kwara State government as asserted that there is no discrepancy in the figures for Local Government funds given by Governor Ahmed's twitter handle and the one given by the Secretary to the State Government.

The SSG had given a figure of N 1.25bn while the Governor Ahmed had given a figure of N 1.2bn. In a press release on Monday, the State Government said the Governor only abbreviated the N 1.25bn to N 1.2bn in line with common media practice and to meet the space constraint of twitter.

The State Government through the Senior Special Assistant to the Governor (Media and Communication), Dr. Muideen Akorede said "It is typical of the ACN's infantile propaganda to attempt to misrepresent facts. There is no discrepancy between what the SSG said and the Governor's tweet. The Governor only abbreviated N1.25b to N1.2b as is common practice in the media. Anyone familiar with the micro-blogging site, Twitter, knows you can only use 140 characters, hence the abbreviation. So the ACN is either being mischievous or displaying ignorance.

Akorede said the delay in local government workers' salaries was due to the reduced allocation from the FG. He said "By the local government's chairmen's admission, the temporary delay in local government worker's salaries is due to reduced and delayed allocations from the federal government. This information is in the public domain. Any interested party can check the website of the Federal Ministry of Finance.

"The ACN should be honest enough to applaud the administration of Governor Abdulfatah Ahmed for refusing to retrench workers in the face of these challenges while the ACN government is Oyo state, faced with similar challenges, is sacking 1600 workers as another state mulls the sack of 50 per cent of its work force.

"Rather than withhold LG funds, the state government has been remitting 10 per cent of IGR to the LG's even though they have been unable to remit PAYE in the last two months. Governor Ahmed has also been working with the LG's to find mutually-acceptable ways of shoring up their finances."

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