A Chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief Hycienth Ngwu, has tasked the National Assembly on fast-track actions to ensure benefits of the local government’s financial autonomy to Nigerians.
Ngwu, a former APC Publicity Secretary in the South-East, gave the task on Friday while speaking to newsmen in Enugu.
The APC chieftain spoke following perceived covert moves of state governors to thwart the laudable move by the Federal Government backed by the Supreme Court pronouncement to ensure speedy development of the 774 council areas in the country.
It would be recalled that some governors had hurriedly conducted “selective council elections” in their states and declared their political party as winning all elective positions even where there is a vibrant opposition political party.
Governors have gone ahead to push for or enact state laws against the Supreme Court backed financial autonomy and others gone to court to interpret sections of the Constitution calling for a joint account between state and its council areas.
According to Ngwu, the National Assembly should act fast to bring to full realization of the benefits of financial autonomy recently restored in the nation’s local government system.
“The bastardization and mockery of the electoral processes at the local government elections is one of the reasons for the unrest in Rivers State today.
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“The same agitation is building up in all the states, although in many different ways.
“The Rivers State case is pronounced because of the open political rift between two powerful groups.
“It is an anomaly, politically incomprehensible and humanly unreasonable that in an election where you have strong political divides that one party will win in all the polling units, polling wards and local government councils.It is totally absurd,” he said.
Ngwu noted that from all indications, the local government system in Nigeria would never be accountable to the people, if the election continues like we presently have it conducted by the State Electoral Commission.
The APC chieftain said, “Therefore, if we really want to sustainably grow and deepen democracy in Nigeria by making the local government financial autonomy work, we (especially the National Assembly) must act to make the foundation very strong.
“The foundation is the total overhauling of the local government elections for the people’s benefit.”
