El Rufai to pay security allowance to traditional rulers

Governor of Kaduna State, Malam Nasir El Rufai, has promised to pay district and village heads security allowance to enable them discharge their responsibility of gathering intelligence to help in stemming crime in the state.

The governor, who spoke at a stakeholders’ meeting yesterday, said the state Ministry of Local Government Affairs will come up with a template for payment of the proposed allowance.

He said the template will only spell out the minimum amount that will be paid to district, village and ward heads as security allowance, adding that local governments can even pay higher.

“When we assumed office, we found out that what local governments were paying district and village heads was nothing to write home about. In fact, ward heads were not paid anything. In some local governments, district and village heads had not been paid for several months because of lack of funds, “he said.

The governor said his administration decided to reduce the 390 district heads to 77, in addition to reducing staff of the local governments throughout the state.

“The restructuring freed up resources of local governments as they can now pay salaries. Before we came, eight area councils couldn’t pay salaries without a bail-out from the state government,’’ he said.

The governor said a ward head is better placed to know which household has a new born child and that will help in vaccination and collation of other demographics.

The governor recalled that his administration was criticised for reforming the traditional institution and restructuring the staff of local government, adding that the focus of his administration is to enhance the living standard of the common man and not to make the elite happy by allowing them to corner the resources of the state.

“Before we came, the chunk of state resources was pocketed by a few elite, leaving the people who actually need government’s help with nothing. We were determined to change this trend and this didn’t go down well with many people and several interest groups,’’ he said.

The governor further said that his vision is to see that every major town in Kaduna State has a good school, good healthcare facility, electricity and potable drinking water.