Auchi – Dr Bamidele Agbadua, Head, Department of Banking and Finance, Federal Polytechnc , Auchi has called for drastic cuts in the cost of governance, as a short term measure in the current economic crisis facing the nation.
Agbadua, who made the call on Monday during an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) at Auchi, said that the high cost of governance had become a major national challenge.
He decried the over-bloated and unsustainable cost of running government by the state governors.
“For the states to be viable, government must cut down its expenditure, cut down on political appointees, cut down on political patronages and other issues.
“Some states equally have issues with over-bloated overheads, such as a state governor, for instance, having up to 13 or 14 Special Assistants.
“If the economy becomes harsh, then we expect that they should be responsive and should endeavour to reflect the new reality. If you must go forward, it is expected that the governors should reduce their expenditures,’’ he said.
Agbadua urged state governments to work out a water-tight procedure for generating revenues and checking corruption in their revenue-collection machinery.
“They need to strengthen taxation and they must ensure that they block all the leakages in revenue generation.
“There has to be some aggressive revenue mobilisation initiatives to cushion the effect of the amount of money now available to the state governments,’’ he said.
According to him, good investments in agriculture, eco-tourism, commerce, industry and transportation are capable of reviving the suffocating economies in the states. (NAN)