The Kwara State Government spent the sum of N578,071,107.78 on the purchase of motor vehicles between January and March 2025, while ignoring school repairs and other priorities.

The Guardian discovered this when our correspondent perused the state’s budget performance document for the first quarter of 2025, which analyses the government’s spending between January and March 2025.

It was categorised under the purchase of fixed assets section of the total expenditure by economic classification of the state’s budget performance document for Q1 2025.

The figure represents 6.5% of the N8,961,955,000 that was allocated to the purchase of motor vehicles in its 2025 budget.

This is despite pending N4,423,800,309 from the N8,282,000,000 allocation for motor vehicle purchases in 2024.

School Facilities, public toilets, rural roads construction ignored

The Guardian also observed that the state government had not touched the allocation for school repairs, construction of school facilities, and public toilets within the stipulated period.

A total of N16,585,474,743.10 was allocated for the repairs and rehabilitation of public schools in the state’s 2025 budget, but this allocation was left untouched in the budget performance document for Q1 2025.

Similarly, N1,000,000,000 was allocated for the construction of rural roads in the state. Like the allocation for public school repairs, it was also left untouched, according to the Q1 2025 budget performance document.

The Guardian also observed that the state allocated N150,000,000 for the construction of public toilets in 2024, yet spent nothing on these constructions at the end of that year.

In 2025, it also allocated N180,000,000 for the construction of public toilets. At the end of the first quarter of 2025, the allocation remained untouched.

This is despite the state government’s plan to end open defecation in the state by 2025.

Construction/provision of school facilities received an allocation of N2.5 billion in the state’s 2025 budget. However, a look at the budget performance document for the first quarter of 2025 reveals that the allocation remained untouched during that period.

In October 2024, the Kwara State Sports Commission Chairman, Bola Magaji, said 95 percent of schools in Kwara State now lack fields for sporting activities.

Magaji further noted that it was a challenge to the state’s sporting sector.