By June 2026, six months into the year, Imo State had paid its workers only 8.0 percent of the N141.49 billion provided for their salaries for the whole of 2026. In the same six months, the official spending records examined by SecretsReporters show that the state spent N802 million on refreshment and meals, out of the N1.10 billion provided for feeding for the entire year, and N877.5 million on its security vote, out of the N1.53 billion provided for the year.
The 8.0 percent is state-wide personnel spending, the salaries of every worker in the Imo State public service. Six months into 2026, 92 naira of every 100 naira provided for wages had not been spent. The money provided for the workers moved at that pace while the money provided for feeding moved at another: by June, the state had spent 72.7 percent of its full-year refreshment and meals provision. In the first quarter alone, N702 million went on refreshment and meals, 63.6 percent of the provision for the whole year consumed in three months.
The security vote, including operations, carries a provision of N1.53 billion for 2026. By mid-year, N877.5 million of it had been spent, 57.5 percent of the annual provision in six months. N555.5 million went out in the first quarter and a further N322 million in the second quarter. Security votes in Nigeria are spent without disclosure of what the money bought, and the records show the amounts and the dates and nothing else.
Travel and transport (general) was approved at N8.57 billion for 2026, one of the largest single overhead lines in the state’s recurrent spending. By June, N2.39 billion of it had been spent, 27.8 percent of the annual provision. Inside that line, international travel for training was given N500 million for the full year. By mid-year, N340 million of it had been spent, 68 percent of a twelve-month provision exhausted in six months, most of it in the first quarter.
Special days and celebrations carried an approved budget of N881.64 million for 2026, and by June N181.5 million of it had been spent. Welfare packages, the line covering staff welfare provisions, was approved at N2.03 billion, with N275.93 million spent in the first half of the year.
These are state-wide overhead lines in the official overhead schedules that Governor Hope Uzodimma’s administration operates. The records do not trace them to any private pocket. They show what the Imo State Government spent each provision on, quarter by quarter, in the first half of 2026, and they show the salaries of the state’s workers standing at 8.0 percent of their annual provision in the same period in which refreshment and meals reached 72.7 percent and the security vote reached 57.5 percent.
Source: …Secretsreporters