Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the Coordinating Minister for the Economy and Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjoiweala, said Tuesday that the allegagation by Former Governor, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Professor Chukwuma Soludo, that N30 trillion was missing from the Federation Account was all lies.
The minister, who said she would not want to join issues with him, said the allegation and other issues raised by Soludo was “packaged lies”. She spoke RayPower FM Radio on Tuesday, while appearing on a programme titled ‘Political Platform.’
According to her, “you don’t join issues when things don’t make any sense.”
Okonjo-Iweala said this while speaking on ‘Political Platform’, a radio programme on Raypower FM on Tuesday.
“That is part of the packaged lies that Nigerians must avoid. I don’t want to enter that debate, we have answered him and I don’t want to join issues with him,” she said.
For her, the states need to prioritise their expenditure, in order to effectively deal with challenges of dwindling revenues from crude oil sales.
She also used the platform to dispel the erroneous idea that the federal government is not owing any state.
She said, “What states need to do is to prioritise their expenditure. If you prioritise that paying salary is the first that you want to do, then you pay salary. The money that they (states) get is enough to pay salary.
“But the federal government cannot tell them what to prioritise. We can only encourage them. So, saying that the federal government is withholding their monies is absolutely not true.”
She also corrected the impression that it as he ministry that commissioned the forensic audit of the NNPC, which report submitted to the President on Monday.
She said it was never assigned to her ministry, saying that it was the auditor-general that given the responsibility.
“I have not been controlling the audit, it was the auditor general. Nigerians have been misinformed. They left out the fact that the auditor general was in charge, I was only interviewed for it and there was no way I could be in charge, but some people decided to paint it as if I was in charge of the report and that is very unfortunate,” she said.
“It is part of the packaging and misinformation in this politics and it has to stop because Nigerians cannot be continuously deceived,” the minister added.
Okonjo-Iweala vehemently dismissed insulation so that the maintained that the Nigerian economy is broke.
She said, “This question of the economy is broke has been going on for four years now. You know people in the opposition has tried to package this and they have been saying this because they just wish the economy will be broke because they want to get Nigerians alarmed.
“They want to make them feel hopeless about the economy. But Nigerians cannot be deceived. All these three years that they have been saying that the country is broke, has the economy not been running?
“Now they saw that oil prices are falling and they are holding on to that. I have been very clear in saying that it is going to be a difficult year for the country, but this is something we can manage.”
