The Akwa Ibom government says it will resume payment of bursary to students in tertiary institutions more than eight years after the last payment was made.
Former governor Udom Emmanuel refused to pay the money for eight years despite complaints and criticisms. The last payment was made in 2014 by former Gov Godswill Akpabio.
Mr Emmanuel also refused to pay retired primary school teachers and other local government workers throughout the duration of his stay. Akwa Ibom is one of the nation’s richest.
His successor, Umo Eno, says the government will pay N10,000 to each student as part of monetary aid to residents aimed at relieving the impact of the removal of petrol subsidy by the federal government.
The approval was given at the state cabinet meeting on Thursday, state commissioner for information Ini Ememobong said in a statement shared on Facebook.
40 bags of rice for each village
Commodity prices have skyrocketed in response to the removal of petrol subsidy by President Bola Tinubu on May 29.
Prices of petrol have also tripled within two months from N189 in May to N617 in July, a development that has doubled transportation fares forcing workers to trek to their offices.
The Akwa Ibom government said it will also distribute 40 bags of rice to each of the state’s 2,272 villages.
The government said it has received 7,200 bags of rice and N2 billion as “palliatives” from the federal government.
The government says it will pay N2 billion to workers and pensioners as “money award” for three months.
Traders and transport operators will not be paying daily fees on Fridays till December.
“Financial support (Money Award) to the tune of N2 billion for government Workers and Pensioners to cover a period of three months. Fridays will become a ticket-free day for transport operators and traders in markets in all the local government areas up till December, 2023,” the government said.
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