Monday Ubani, a former Vice-President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), has lauded the President Muhammadu Buhari-led federal government for granting financial autonomy to the local government councils.
Recall that Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU), had directed the banning governors, banks, financial institutions, public officers and other stakeholders from tampering with statutory allocations of local governments.
The agency imposed a daily N500, 000 cash transaction limit on all the 774 local governments among other guidelines, to take effect from June 1, with sanctions.
Ubani, who is also a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress in Abia state, in a statement obtained by DAILY POST on Saturday, in Umuahia, the Abia state capital, described it as a far-reaching decision that would not only impact on governance, but delivery of democracy dividends for the citizens and generations yet unborn.
He berated former President Olusegun Obasanjo and Dr. Goodluck Jonathan for lacking the political will to bring governance to the doorsteps of the Nigeria people at the grassroots.
Parts of the statement read, “The present government recently re-emphasized financial autonomy to local governments in Nigeria. This reminder was contained in a release by the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU) to the effect that from June 1st, 2019, disbursement from the joint state/local government accounts in relation to local government allocations should be credited to local government Account and that states would cease to participate in the meddling of their accounts. This was a seal to the autonomy many Nigerians had been calling for the serially abused local government system in Nigeria. The NFIU directive stopped the control of local government funds by states and limited the cash withdrawals by local governments to N500,000 daily. The move is seen as the most radical in giving the local governments the needed power to manage their affairs and resources outside the states which have treated local government funds as its own and have released paltry amounts to the councils.
“The decision has been widely lauded and seen as a way of ensuring the third tier of government lives up to its real constitutional roles as the tier of government nearest to the people and with constitutional capacity to attend to their basic needs more than other tiers of government. Simply put, local governments have been conquered vassal estates of the states and their resources spent at the whims and caprices of the state governments who have perfected the art of rail-roading their hirelings to control these local governments on their behalf. Through a ubiquitous state/local government joint account, the allocations for local governments have been spent as the state governments deem fit and this has grandly defeated the idea behind the third tier of government as the local governments were reduced to mere appendages that satisfy the desires of the states and nothing more.
“But, with the emphasis on financial autonomy by the present government through this NFIU directive, there is no doubt that the local governments will play more expansive and vital roles in the lives of the citizens if they manage the resources that accrue to them justly. There is no doubt that the bold decision of the NFIU is freeing the local governments from the stranglehold of the states and unleashing their real potentials on the populace, if the monster of corruption and fiscal brigandage is curbed with this new order. There is no doubt that this decisive impetus granted local governments by this government is going to initiate a regime of responsibility, which has been denied this vital tier of government for the greater parts of its existence.
“Before this directive, the local government has undergone a macabre rape by politicians and sundry interests that see the system as a milk cow for them and their cahoots while the interests of the people suffer. Every month, humongous allocations have been released to the local governments and these allocations are appropriated by the states through the notorious state/local government joint account and frittered away in reprehensible manners. Through a shambolic state electoral system, state governors effortlessly impose their lickspittle and feckless hirelings to control these local governments and these were often so powerless to ask questions about the resources of the local governments or challenge the governors to let free these resources. So, with this order, the local governments became more appendages of the state governments while the important roles they should play in the lives of the citizens and for which they were created were abandoned to rot.
“Successive governments, especially since the advent of the present democratic dispensation 20 years ago, have moaned in criminal helplessness as this misnomer thrived. Yes, the civil society, local government workers and other motley interests have raised a weak call for the reversal of this order but nothing substantial was done to correct this. The Obasanjo regime whelped in sterile helplessness that the local governments had become mere 774 stealing centers but that regime did nothing to correct this in its eight years in power. The Yar’adua government did not even betray any knowledge of the fact that the system was raped by states and their political actors at will.
“The Jonathan regime, notorious for its lack of will to even recognize the problems afflicting the nation it pretended to govern, showed no inkling that there was any problem with the local government system when he was moonlighting all over. At best, what happened was the raising of some splotches of noise here and there about local government autonomy and nothing more, as the system practically wobbled under the undue meddlesomeness of state governors. But with the new directive by the NFIU which is notable for taking hard but necessary decisions that stand to nudge the nation forward, there is no doubt that the original intendment behind the creation of local governments would be realized”.
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