By Adesewa Oyinloye
A member of the Governing Board of North East Development Commission (NEDC), Hon. Sam Onuigbo, has commended the Supreme Court for its landmark judgment on the issue of fiscal autonomy to Local Government Councils in Nigeria.
Onuigbo began advocating for LG autonomy after serving in different capacities as Special Adviser to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Commissioner for Lands and Survey, Commissioner for Finance, Abia State and his subsequent election into the House of Representatives in 2015.
The former National Assembly member who is also the Chairman, Committee on Security, Climate Change, and Special Interventions on the Governing Board of NEDC, stressed that the emasculation of the local governments by state governors was responsible for slow growth of democracy in the country
According to the former lawmaker, the development also led to the lack of productive engagement of the teeming unemployed youths in the grassroots and the attendant insecurity.
He recalled that although former President Muhammadu Buhari signed Executive Order 10 granting fiscal autonomy to the councils, the Nigerian Governors Forum (NGF) found a way around it through the same apex court and continued holding down the council funds through the Joint States and Local Governments Accounts regime.
While commending the President Ahmed Bola Tinubu administration for undergirding the constitutional provision for local government autonomy with judicial pronouncement, Onuigbo said he anticipates that the abolition of State Independent Electoral Commissions (SIECs) would follow suit to ensure transparent local governments.
In a statement to journalists in Abuja, yesterday, the former federal lawmaker regretted that for over 24 years the local government system was left to wallow in incessant manipulation by state governments, stressing that he has been vindicated.
He stated: “I started agitating for Local Government autonomy out of experience and first-hand knowledge of how far the system suffered undue interference from state governments.
“The issues of insecurity, youth restiveness and unemployment were direct fallouts of lull in the activities at the third tier of government which has been starved of funds by the state governors. Democracy could not bear dividends because that tier of government was made an appendage of state executives.
“Now, the Supreme Court judgment has opened a big window of opportunity that things would be made right at the Local Government Councils. What remains is to cut the last ligament of burden by abolishing SIECs so that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) should conduct council polls.”
Onuigbo, who sponsored Nigeria’s landmark legislation on Climate Change, declared that it is only when council chairmen are freely elected by the people that proper accountability and provision of social amenities in the councils will take root.
“Unlike the state governors, council chairmen do not enjoy constitutional immunity. So, any council chairman that messes up with council funds would be made accountable and be prepared to have explaining to do at the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
“But, for this to happen, all loopholes for possible manipulation or intimidation by state governors should be blocked. Communities should know that council chairmen are responsible to them and not to state governors when the opportunity to dictate the tune during council poll is taken away and given to the people,” he added
