The Kwara State government said it is expecting about N850 million from the World Bank for community development projects. It added that this followed the payment of a N50 million of its counterpart funding for the projects.

The state has also paid the N100 million counterparts funding of its health Insurance scheme, which is being run with the coordination of non-governmental agency and has thus fulfilled necessary conditions for the continuation of the programme in 2016.

Commissioners for Planning, Alhaji Wasiu Odewale and his Health counterpart, Alhaji Suleiman Alege, were addressing a news conference. Odewale, who described the Kwara Community Development Agency (KWACIDA) as a model among the 26 states participating in the scheme, said the projects would be sited in each of the 193 wards.

His words: "The reorganisation of KWACIDA has put us ahead of the 26 participating states. When we came in, we met the agency in a not too good situation but we are glad that the governor has assisted us, and today, we have paid the N50 million counterparts funding required by the World Bank.

"We will get N850 million from the World Bank in the next few weeks and each ward of the state will benefit between N5 million and N10 million in terms of project. Each ward will choose a project it wants executed in its domain, they will choose the contractor and KWACIDA will only supervise the completion.

"If you go to Agbamu, Share, Ilorin West, Kaima, and Baruten, you will see a number of projects that the agency has executed and every time we go for a national meeting, they tell others to go and see what Kwara is doing."

The commissioners debunked insinuations that the state's debt profile showed that it owes N29 billion, both in commercial banks and bailout fund. As such, he said the state is in a good position to borrow if it wants to, except that government considers the need to meet other obligations and would not over burden the treasury.

On his part, Alege said with the payment of the N100 million, the existing beneficiaries of the health insurance scheme have nothing to fear. He hinted that government was also considering expanding the programme to the informal sector, as well as among the core civil service.

"We want to expand the programme; we want to see how the formal and informal sector can benefit. We want to bring in the civil servants and we have already sent the necessary papers to the governor who will translate it into a bill to be forwarded to the House of Assembly."