President Muhammadu Buhari has approved a 2.1 billion U.S.  Dollars bailout plan.

President Muhammadu Buhari of Nigeria in office since May 29, 2015 is battling insecurity mostly orchestrated by  Boko Haram insurgents, economic problems caused by the drop in oil prices  and one of the teething problems now is the payment of salaries and allowances of State workers.  Indeed, some States are bankrupt and President Buhari has just approved a 2.1 billion U.S. Dollars bailout intervention package to help bankrupt States pay salaries and allowances, BBC reported.

Reports say at least 12 of Nigeria’s 36 States owe their workers more than 550 million U.S. Dollars in salaries and allowances. BBC reports that some workers have not been paid for seven months. Cash-strapped States would be allowed to draw from a specially set up central bank intervention fund worth 250 billion naira to 300 billion approximately 1.5 billion U.S. Dollars. "This will be a soft loan available to States for the purposes of paying backlog of salaries," a statement from the President’s office said, news agencies reported. States would also be helped to reschedule the huge sums they owe to commercial banks, the statement added.

Another measure in the bailout plan, This Day reports, is  a debt relief programme proposed by the Debt Management Office (DMO) which will help states restructure their commercial loans currently put at over N660 billion and extend the tenure of the loans to 15 years, thereby reducing their debt service obligations.

It is reported that in the past, the federal government, states and local government would share 2.1 billion U.S. Dollars  in dividends paid by the state-run Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas Company,  the statement from  President Buhari’s office further stated.  New agencies  said that  no money would be drawn from Nigeria's Excess Crude Account (ECA) in order to meet the states' shortfall, contrary to widespread reports in the country's media, Buhari said.

This is because  ECA is a "rainy day" fund into which the difference between government-set oil prices and the market rate is deposited. The agreed bailout funds  would be released this week to enable the federal, states and local governments offset the backlog of outstanding salaries immediately, This Day reported citing a central bank official.

Nigeria’s government revenue, which depends largely on crude oil exports, has fallen sharply in recent months because of a fall in global oil prices. Last June Mr Buhari said the treasury was "virtually empty".  He has vowed to recover billions of dollars "stolen" under previous administrations.