Former Benue State Governor, Samuel Ortom, on Wednesday, told his successor, Rev Fr Hyacinth Alia, that every succeeding government inherited assets and liabilities of previous administrations.
Ortom, who spoke in a statement issued by his media aide, Terver Akase, advised Alia to stop hallucinating and to focus on how to use huge funds accrued to his administration from the federation account to address development challenges.
The former governor was reacting to the revelation made by the state Commissioner of Justice, Fidelis Mnyim, that the government of Alia inherited over N14 billion consent judgment incurred by the immediate past government.
Mnyim explained that the judgment debts fell into garnishing, which all bordered on several unpaid contracts and 34 months of unpaid pension.
The commissioner had said, “These group of people became so aggressive and filed cases against the State government.
“When we came in, we had over N14 billion consent judgment. This consent judgment cannot be appealed because the government agreed to pay them, and the government is a continuum.
The immediate past governor said the state government had an agreement with the retirees and was paying their arrears of pensions and gratuities as funds permitted.
The statement read in parts, “This was even as the economic situation in the country was severe with federal allocations to states at their lowest since 1999, and Nigeria had plunged into recession at two different times.
“If the present government is complaining about numerous garnishee orders, there is the possibility that it has defaulted on the payment arrangement that the Ortom administration made with the pensioners and the retirees have returned to the courts.
“Interestingly, the current Commissioner for Justice, Fidelis Mnyim, served as counsel to some persons who took the Benue State Government to court.
“He ought to have told the media if the case he handled was among the garnishee orders resulting in the N14 billion that he claimed.”
Ortom, however, advised his successor that “When a new government assumes power, it inherits both assets and liabilities,” adding that he, also like his predecessors, inherited similar financial obligations.
