Skip to main content

Amend Constitution to guarantee local government autonomy – Adeolu Akande

Image
By


A former Chief of Staff to the governor of Oyo State and Visiting Professor of Political Science at Igbinedion University, Okada, Edo State, Adeolu Akande, has advocated local government autonomy as the panacea to the problem of local government administration in the country.
Akande, who was a guest on a television programme monitored in Ibadan, Oyo State capital at the weekend, said local government in the country has failed to achieve the objective of grassroots development because of three factors.
He listed the factors as lack of autonomy, lack of direct financial allocation from the federation account and the failure to elect local government councils, explaining that the three factors boil down to the issue of local government autonomy.
“Local government councils will be accountable to their people if they are elected. Caretaker committees are only accountable to their appointing autorities,” he said, explaining that it is when a government is accountable to the people that it is motivated to perform to the expectation of the people.
He said the failure to make direct financial allocation to local government councils also inhibit local government performance.”The Joint State-Local government account system denies local councils the opportunity to determine projects that are relevant to their people. The situation where state governments award uniform projects for all local government areas is a negation of the principle of grassroots development that undergirds the creation of local councils as third tier of government,” he said.
He advised that the Joint State-Local Government account should be abolished while administrative guidelines are stipulated for the payment of teachers and other workers’ salaries as first line charge on local government accounts.
Akande said that the Constitution should also be amended to allow Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) or a new national electoral body comprising representatives of states and political parties to conduct local government elections.
He said the present system where ruling parties at the state level win all local government elections that they conduct does not promote democracy, good governance and competent leadership at the local government level.”It is indefensible that no ruling party in any of the 36 states has ever lost a local government election in their respective state. This clearly makes a mockery of our democracy and there is need for an urgent review of this electoral embarrassment”, he submitted.
Akande, who is also the Director of the Centre for Presidential Studies at Igbinedion University, said the conduct of local government election by state governments has denied the third tier of government the opportunity to recruit competent and accountable leadership at that level. “The caretaker system has denied the people the opportunity of electing leaders of their choice at the local level. This is against the provisions and spirit of the 1999 Constitution”, he said, arguing that the conception of local government as a training ground for leadership at higher levels of government is lost because democratic tenets of governance are not allowed to blossom at the local government level.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular Post

We are sorry for 16 years failure, says PDP defector

By
FORMER commissioner for Culture and Tourism in Enugu state, Chief Joe Mammel has apologized to the people of the state, particularly to his native Ezeagu local government area for what he said was a disappointing outing of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in 16 years. Mammel who also was the Chairman of Ezeagu local government council said he was sorry to have participated in what he called PDP’s disappointing 16 years outing. He tendered the apology at his country home, Aguobu-Owa, when a businessman from his community, Kingsley Ubenyi joined the APC at Eke Ozom market square. Mammel said: “I am now in APC because of change. Change is that you have to think before you leap, I have thought about it. One thing happened, like what passes through my local government, the Enugu-Onitsha express road. For 16 years I had been in government and my people have suffered, linking themselves to the commercial city was impossible and I am married to an Anambra woman and it was impossible f...
Post a Comment
Read more

ZIKA VIRUS: ECOWAS warns Nigerians against home treatment of fevers

By
The Acting Executive Director of the Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS, Regional Surveillance and Disease Control Centre, RCDC, Prof. Abdulsalami Nasidi has cautioned Nigerians against home management of any type of fever, particularly in women of child bearing age. His warning is coming on the heels of a prediction by The Lancet, an American scientific journal that Nigeria and seven other countries are potentially at risk of Zika virus spread. Reacting to The Lancet prediction in a telephone chat, Nasidi, who was former Director General of the Nigerian Centre for Disease Control, NCDC, urged all Nigerians to abide by the World Health Organisation, WHO, recommendation for management of fevers. “It is very true that Zika virus may likely spread to Nigeria because the vector and all the factors that can cause Zika abound in Nigeria. We don’t know the strain that is spreading it but all we know is that the strain is spreading so fast.” He told Good Health Weekly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

I will decline N1 million English film for N200,000 Yoruba film – Oga Bello

By
When veteran Yoruba actor, Adebayo Salami, popularly known as Oga Bello speaks, there is little else to do than to listen. With more than 50 years of experience in the movie industry, everything he says must be gold or one may just as well be doing away with wisdom as the man radiates wisdom, knowledge and experience. In a recent chat with Potpourri, the veteran Thespian gave reasons he has not been appearing much in English-speaking films, reiterating that what matters to him most is the preservation of Yoruba culture. He also admitted that he had not been getting many calls for English films even though the Yoruba ones are of more importance to him. “Well, I cannot speak for those people that did not invite me, they have their personal reasons and I don’t want to go into it so much but I am sure if am invited I can express myself and I can interpret roles in English,” he said. ““ I don’t normally participate in English films like Jide Kosoko does but I must confess to you...
Post a Comment
Read more