The Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees has called on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, and Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission, ICPC, to probe local government allocations in the past seven years, noting that state governors have continued to divert and misappropriate council funds.
Speaking at a conference which held in Abuja on 1st September , the President of NULGE, Mr Ambali Olatunji, said that the governors are elected to govern the state as a whole while local government chairmen are elected to govern the local government.
He said that the local governments are allocated up to N120m, N90m, N80m from the federation account but what gets to the local government at times, can be N10m or N5m while some don’t even get more than N2m.
He said that NULGE is calling on the EFCC, ICPC and NFIU to track local government allocation in the last seven years and tell them what has been done with them.
He equally called for the speedy passage of the Local Government Autonomy Bill, arguing that this would ensure financial independence for the 774 councils in the country and also address the challenges of insecurity and unemployment.
Olatunji alleged that some governors have been holding secret meetings with the speakers of state assemblies to prevent the states from passing the LG autonomy bill in the ongoing constitutional amendment.
Cautioning the state governors against inducing and conniving with the legislature to stop the passage of the bill, lamented that only 10 states had passed the LG autonomy bill and further encouraged other states to endorse it as quickly as possible as full autonomy for local governments in Nigeria would help solve the challenges of insecurity and unemployment.
