* Says councils without democratically elected leaders shouldn’t
get allocation
Human rights lawyer, Dr. Olisa Agbakoba, has filed a suit at the
Federal High Court, Lagos, to stop allocation of public funds to
unelected and unaccountable local government councils, running into
trillions of naira.
According to Agbakoba, the basis of the case is that Section
7(1) of the 1999 constitution guarantees a system of democratically
elected government councils. But local government councils in
Nigeria are never elected and are unconstitutional. Therefore,
allocation of public funds to them is a violation of the
constitution, as there is collusion with state governments in the
use of trillions of naira of public funds.
The case raises concern that unelected persons have unimpeded
access to huge monthly allocations that are actually funds intended
for democratically elected local government councils as guaranteed
by Section 7 of the constitution.
Agbakoba noted that Nigeria operates democratically elected
governments at all levels. The current situation where most of the
774 local governments are unelected is not only unconstitutional
but meant no development at the local government level.
Agbakoba also noted that corruption is widespread in Nigeria
because unelected persons that are not accountable to the
electorate have received trillions of naira of public funds.
Although the Federal Government denied the case, it appears that
Agbakoba’s concerns have found support with guidelines recently
issued by the Nigerian Finance Intelligence Unit (NFIU), which
directs state governors and local governments to follow the
constitution regarding disbursement of local government funds.
Obviously, the new NFIU’s guidelines, like Agbakoba’s case, will
uphold accountability of public funds at local government
level.