Zamfara State Governor, Dauda Lawal, has revealed that secondary school students could not sit for the West African Examinations Council and National Examinations Council exams for two consecutive years due to a backlog of debts totalling ₦3.2 billion.
Speaking during an interview on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Wednesday, Lawal described the state of affairs he inherited upon assuming office in May 2023 as dire, particularly in the education sector.
“We had to settle WAEC and NECO debts to the tune of ₦3.2 billion. We’ve worked on over 450 primary and secondary schools, and some tertiary institutions. We were always at the bottom, but I’m happy to say things are changing,” he said.
According to the governor, the debts prevented students from taking their critical examinations, a situation his administration prioritised upon taking office. “It is interesting to tell you that for two good years, our students didn’t write WAEC or NECO because of debts owed. The first thing we had to do was make a conscious effort to settle those debts so our students could write their exams. All pending certificates from the past have now been handed over,” he added.
Lawal said the situation compelled him to declare a state of emergency in the education sector. He also cited the accumulation of unpaid scholarships and pension arrears dating back over a decade.
“We’ve settled every pension and gratuity without borrowing a single kobo. It’s all from our internally generated revenue (IGR),” the governor said.
He claimed that the state’s finances were in a poor state when he took over, with just ₦4 million left in the treasury and monthly IGR at only ₦90 million, 90 per cent of which came from PAYE (Pay-As-You-Earn). He noted that Zamfara’s monthly IGR has since risen to over ₦2 billion.
Challenging claims from the previous administration about the state’s finances, Lawal said, “I was a banker, so I know how finances work. If they had a contrary position to mine, they should have shown me the bank statements. If they had ₦14 billion, why couldn’t they pay four months’ backlog of salaries, or settle WAEC, NECO, and electricity bills? Even the Government House was disconnected when I took over.”
He added that no such sum was reflected in the handover documents and invited critics to provide verifiable financial records.
The governor also disclosed that over ₦1.2 billion is deducted monthly from Zamfara’s allocation from the Federation Account as repayments for debts inherited from the previous administration. “Go and check with the Office of the Accountant-General and the Debt Management Office. We are still paying over ₦1.2 billion monthly through direct deductions. Yet, there are no visible projects to show for all that spending,” he stated.
Despite the financial strain, Lawal said development is ongoing across the state. “There is no single local government among the 14 in Zamfara without a project worth between ₦5 billion and ₦10 billion,” he noted.
The revelations come amid an escalating war of words between Lawal and his predecessor over alleged financial mismanagement and conflicting accounts of the state’s fiscal condition.