The Enugu State House of Assembly has authorised the state government to secure N30 billion bond for its ongoing development projects.

The Leader of the assembly, Mr Ikechukwu Ezugwu (PDP-Udenu) , who sponsored the bill, said that the essence of the bond was to enable the state to meet up with its needs in view of the economic meltdown that had affected its revenue.

“The Enugu State House of Assembly has approved the request by the state government to secure N15 billion bond from the capital market and N15 billion loan from bridging finance facility from a bank,’’ he said.

Supporting the bill, Mr Chinedu Nwamba (PDP-Nsukka East) urged the people of the state to support the bond as it would be re-paid by the present administration and would not be inherited by another government.

He said that the action they took was in line with the campaign promises made to provide improved living for the people and assured them that the assembly would monitor the spending through their over sight functions.

In another development, the lawmakers urged the executive arm of government to dissolve and reconstitute the management of the state-owned parastatal agencies.

Moving the motion, the Leader of the assembly said that the state should dissolve, reconstitute and create new management for those parastatal agencies that had no board to enhance their productivity.

Seconding the motion, Dr Emeka Ogbuabor (PDP-Isiuzo) said that the government should reconstitute the boards with people of good reputation and not those with questionable character.

The legislators also read a bill for the consolidation of all property and land-based rates and charges payable under the property rate law for the first time.

Introducing the bill, Ezugwu said that it intended to streamline everything concerning land and property rates to reduce the rift between landlords and tenants.

Ezugwu said that the law would help in data collection as well as enable the state to know the exact number of property in an area and to know the quantity of social amenities that would be provided in such area.

The Speaker of the assembly, Chief Edward Ubosi, urged the committees concerned with the bill to put it in such a way that people would pay the rate with ease and not with agony, adding that the report was ready before one month.

He thanked the sponsor of the bill and the members for their robust contributions during the debate and urged them to embark on proper oversight function to ensure that the money was prudently spent.