Ebonyi State Governor, David Umahi says he will disengage over one thousand (1000) aides by the first week of August 2020.
Umahi also informed that his administration budgeted over N28,6 billion to fight the COVID-19 pandemic in the state.
He made this known while signing the Ebonyi State 2020 revised budget into law.
The governor noted that the COVID-19 pandemic has been allocated N28,615,000,000.000, accounting for 21.68% of the states total budget expenditure.
According to him: “The 2020 revised budget is from the initially approved 2020 budget of N178,136,634,975.38 to N132,002,391,626.66 with a percentage decrease of 25.9% having a total COVID-19 expenditure of N28,615,000,000.000 accounting for 21.68% of the total budget expenditure.
“We had reduced and in some cases removed various items from different MDAs in the approved 2020 budget to meet up with the expected revenue.
“All Sectors were affected in the earlier mentioned adjustments, however, special attention was paid to the MDAs that has direct dealing with either the COVID-19 crisis or designed response” he stressed.
Umahi revealed further that “Recurrent Expenditure: Personnel cost was reduced by 14.21% from N18.158B to N15.577B, Overhead Cost increased by 23.43% from N22.922B to N28.293B, Recurrent contingency was reduced by 80% from N5B to N1B”.
“Capital Expenditure: There was a 33% reduction in Capital Expenditure from N127.056B to N85.132B and Capital contingency was reduced by 60% from N5B to N2B” he added.
He, however, blamed all Technical Assistants (TAs), Senior Technical Assistants (STAs) and Executive Assistants (EAs) of not doing anything, and vowed to sack them.
He said: “It is time to work. I have no business with anybody who has an appointment and doesn’t want to work. Let me announce my disappointment at the Technical Assistants, Senior Technical Assistants and Executive Assistants. We have over 1000 of them. Yet, my Deputy and I go out of our way in this COVID-19. We have over 360 Liaison Officers. We have a lot of Management Committee Members.
“I don’t know where else you will get a position and go-on sleeping and be waiting for an alert. It can’t happen under me. By 1st of August, all Technical Assistants (TA), Senior Technical Assistants (STAs) and Executive Assistants (EAs) are dissolved.
“If you are one of them and you want your job back, you will be given a form to fill and a Ministry or Department must endorse you. When they endorse you, we hold that Ministry or Department responsible for you.
“The appointment we make is a source of social security, source of empowerment and source of bringing young men and women to learn the act of governance” he stated
