Politicians fuelling crisis in Plateau, says Governor Lalong

The Chairman of the Northern Governors Forum and Plateau State Governor, Simon Lalong, has accused politicians of fuelling crisis in his state.

He disclosed this on Tuesday during Day Two of the Nigerian Economic Summit in Abuja where participants had gathered to deliberate on the nation’s security, education and politics.

According to Lalong, the governors of the 19 northern states are in full support of the creation of state police to tackle the numerous security challenges facing their domain.

He noted that Plateau has long been known as a state of peace and tourism before some political actors started creating problems in the state.

“Plateau is codenamed the home of peace and tourism. Then all of a sudden, what happened? I will say also that part of it is the role of political actors,” he said.

“You see people bringing issues like ethnicity, religion-dominated issues, and so we were now beginning to see ourselves as enemies.

“If I am a Christian, I don’t want a Moslem to come near me or I belong to this tribe, I don’t want that tribe to come in.”

The governor also faulted successive administrations in the state for capitalising on the situation, rather than finding means to bridge the gap.

Lalong believes the issue resulted in the killings of several people in the state, noting that the situation made the state government make some recommendations to President Muhammadu Buhari.

He lamented that as part of some measures in tackling religious and ethnic violence, some state governors would use resources at their disposal to acquire some technological equipment, which may end up not being used.

Meanwhile, the Chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum and Ekiti State Governor, Kayode Fayemi, who also spoke at the event said Federal Government cannot commence its plans to make deductions from the federation account for payment of consultants for the Paris Club Refund.

According to him, a situation where the Federal Government makes arbitrary deductions without the input of state governors is wrong.

He said state governors have agreed not to collect any allocation from the Federation Allocation Account (FAAC) until the issues are resolved.

“We are dealing with the issue. we would find a resolution to it. As far as states are concerned, they do not accept that funds belonging to federation account could just be arbitrarily deducted without the input of the states, and that’s why we are insisting that until this is clarified, we would rather leave the money in the pool until we have all agreed on the direction,” Governor Fayemi said.