Nasir El-Rufai
Governor Nasiru El-Rufai of Kaduna State, Monday, said prominent politicians and influential personalities benefit from the Ramadan and Christmas welfare packages rather than the poor.
Mr. El-Rufai was explaining the reason he scrapped the welfare package – distributing food items and gifts during Ramadan.
While hosting religious leaders last week, the governor said Kaduna State was broke and needed to tighten its finances to serve the people better.
He said the state government will no longer tolerate the siphoning of government resources in the guise of gifts to prominent politicians, public servants and famous figures, or the feeding of indigent persons during religious occasions; neither will it be involved in sponsoring people to religious events.
In a statement Tuesday, the governor said his administration stopped issuing contracts to so-called “super” politicians to supply foods, beverages and other essentials as Ramadan gifts across the state because the process, in the past, was fraudulent with nothing tangible to show for it, except playing to the gallery to score cheap political goals and fraudulently enrich a few individuals.
“It is a known fact that the so-called feeding of the poor during Ramadan is a window created to loot the public treasury with impunity using religion as a cover,” the statement read.
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