The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Ekiti State has slammed Governor Ayodele Fayose over his streetlight fuel supply cost claim.
It said the governor was deliberately inflating the figure while spending less on public light supply to short-change the state.
APC’s alarm came on the heels of increasing wave of criminal activities under the cover of the night in the state capital.
Publicity Secretary, Taiwo Olatunbosun, said in a statement that the short period of light supply between 7pm and 10pm had encouraged criminals to terrorise residents at night.
According to him, cases of car snatching have increased while residents lose their possessions to thieves on the streets at nights unlike during former Governor Kayode Fayemi’s administration when streetlight supply spanned 6.30pm to 6.30am in the state capital.
“Ekiti people cannot continue in this reversal of fortunes since Fayose came on board. The governor said some time ago during his monthly media chat that he spent N210m monthly on streetlights. This is a blatant lie because NUPENG suppliers of diesel for streetlights have since revealed that only 10,000 litres of diesel are supplied monthly to power streetlights,” he said.
Accusing the governor of deceiving the public and passing bloated fuel supply cost to the government, Olatunbosun said the party had since discovered that three suppliers of diesel jointly supply 10,000 litres every month to power streetlights.
He added that even at that the governor was still owing the suppliers millions of naira, even though the governor would insist he paid N210m monthly.
Olatunbosun quoted NUPENG’s letter of August 12, 2015 to the governor pleading to be paid N71,094,750.00 on diesel supply, failure of which they would stop supplying diesel.
He added, “Only 10,000 litres are supplied monthly to power the streetlights in Ado-Ekiti. A litre is N130, meaning N1.3m is spent on diesel every month.
“If you divide that amount into 30 days making a month, then a total of N43,300 is spent on diesel per day, but to the chagrin of the unsuspecting public, the governor is claiming N210m monthly for the supply of diesel.”
