Governor Idris Wada of the central Nigerian state of Kogi has ordered a comprehensive audit of the accounts and finances of the 21 local government areas in the state.

In a statement issued on Sunday in Lokoja, the governor said that the exercise had become necessary due to inability of the local government areas to pay full salaries to their workers since 2013.

Signed by Mr Jacob Edi, the Special Adviser to the Governor on Media and Strategy, the statement quoted the governor as saying that the decision had been conveyed to the local governments’ chairmen.

According to the statement, the governor has directed that the auditing must be carried out by private audit firms and should end within three weeks.

The statement said that the state government would oversee the payment of salaries of local government workers in the interim.

It said that the chairmen of the local government areas had also been directed to steer clear of the accounts of their respective administrations.

The statement said that the governor expressed concern about the perceptible recklessness and lack of financial probity among some of the local government areas.

“We will sanitise the local government system, a situation where most chairmen cannot pay full salaries to workers is not healthy for development; efforts must be made to reverse it’’, it said.

It said that any chairman indicted by the report of the audit exercise would be directed to the appropriate authority for necessary action.