google.com, pub-3998556743903564, DIRECT, f08c47fec0942fa0 Senate's Empty Threat to Enforce Local Government Autonomy

Senate's Empty Threat to Enforce Local Government Autonomy

By Polycarp Onwubiko

Ignorance is a devastating disease. The half enlightened membership of the Senate rose to threaten enthronement of supposed "Local government council autonomy" to stop the state Governors from using Caretaker Committee to run the local government councils.

 Jesus Christ in his earlier mission to save mankind from perdition, had an occasion to express anger on the hypocrisy of  religious leaders who readily find faults by their followers asked them to first of all remove the log in their eyes before convicting their adherents of sins

. In like manner, the itching palmed members of the Senate who created the impression that they are losing sleep about the need of the state Governors to conduct local government council election in sync with section 7 of the military Decreed 1999 Constitution (contraption)  supposedly and deceptively referred to as "amended" , threatened to request the president to stop releasing monthly Statutory Revenue Allocation to the state governments where the local government councils are not run by democratically elected chairmen and councillors.

First and foremost, the Senate should know that Nigeria is not practicing Constitutional Democracy whereby there ought to have been two tiers of government as practiced in sane and sanitized Federations that practice federal system of government. 

Even during the first republic with the 1960 Constitution fashioned by the selected representatives of ethnic nationalities in a Constitutional Conference held both in Nigeria and Britain had Two Tiers of government viz: Federal Government, and Regional Governments. The issue of Local Administration was purely under the authority of the Regional Governments and not the federal government.

It was the aberrant military autocrats that Decreed local government council as a Third Tier of government contrary to the principal and federal system of government as obtained the world over. More importantly, the extant Constitution was not fashioned by the selected representatives of ethnic nationalities and therefore, it is fundamentally flawed and a fraudulent meta legal document, a contraption, to say the least. That's why there has been a nationwide clarion calls for the restructuring of the lopsided Federation to reinvent the inexorable principles of federal system of government.

Fact remains that the National Assembly members have no moral standing to question the state governors on running the local government councils with Caretaker Committee whose tenure expire every three months and the tenure is renewable or a new set appointed. 

If Nigeria is serious about True Fiscal Federalism, there should be immediate Restructuring of the lopsided Federation with the six geopolitical zones as the new Federating Units and the Federal Government and the Geopolitical Zones (as Regional Governments) will make up a Two Tiers system of government as obtained in the suspended 1963 Republican Constitution.

In conclusion, the National Assembly should stop fooling themselves by threatening the state governors for running the local government councils with Caretaker Committee. Do the proper thing by dumping the military imposed pseudo federal arrangements and enthrone proper federal structure with two tiers of government viz: Federal Government and State governments. 

In the alternative, the country can be restructured by using the Six Geopolitical Zones as Regional Governments which will explore and exploit the natural and mineral resources within their jurisdiction to run their respective Governments to kickstart realistic socioeconomic growth and development in the country.


Polycarp Onwubiko, media commentator, writes from Awka, Anambra State.


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