Fayose: States contributing to school feeding scheme? That’s fraud!

Ayodele Fayose, governor of Ekiti state, has described the directive of the federal government that states contribute 40 per cent to the school feeding programme as fraudulent, saying his state would never be part of it.

Fayose, who said the current administration did not make adequate consultations before implementing the programme, asked the All Progressives Congress-led federal government to fulfill its campaign promise to Nigerians.

He alleged that the government was already looking for an excuse for the impending failure of the programme.

“Were the states consulted before the APC made the promise during the presidential campaign? How can you make a promise and win election on the basis of that promise and now expect States to help you to fulfil the promise? That to me is fraud!” he said in a statement issued on his behalf by Lere Olayinka, his special assistant on public communications and new media.

“Apart from the fact that Ekiti state lacked the financial wherewithal to provide counterpart fund for such a programme, it is the duty of President Muhammadu Buhari and his APC that won election on the basis of their promise to give free meal to school pupils to fulfill the promise without placing any burden on other tiers of government.”

Fayose said the APC should rather blame itself for “failing to do a proper study” on the practicability of the scheme before promising Nigerians instead of looking for who to blame for not fulfilling the school feeding promise.

“The federal government knows that 80 per cent of the states lack the financial will to be able to contribute the 40 per cent counterpart fund for the programme and the time the programme eventually fails, Nigerians will be told that it failed because States did not key in to it,” he said.

“As for us in Ekiti, we are interested in the programme because Nigeria belongs to all of us. But we won’t contribute any counterpart fund because the programme is solely an electoral promise of the APC and we were never consulted before the promise was made.

“We don’t even have the capability to make any financial contribution even if it is 10 per cent because our financial condition is such that we can’t even pay workers salary.”

Last week, Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo said 23m children across 18 states, will benefit from the programme in its first year.

He explained that the programme will kick-off in Osun and Kaduna, where children are already benefitting from the scheme.