Nigeria marked her 52nd independence anniversary yesterday. But does the local government administration have anything to show for it? This, Assistant Editor DADA ALADELOKUN, examines in this report.
Proponents of local government admin-istration had, at its very inception, even in the pre-colonial era, envisioned a heartening situation whereby the grassroots people would enjoy robust access to the fruits of governance. Thus, to them, as Nigeria marks her 52nd Independence anniversary today, every family should be alive in revelry, celebrating better life at the grassroots level. But no, the grassroots people are mourning the perpetuity of progressive inertia.
To the general run of the Nigerian populace today, local councils are largely malnourished and hence, pathetically ineffectual. Reason: What has become of the so-called Third Tier of government has, in a sordid manner, run foul of the Fourth Schedule of the 1999 Constitution of the country which assigns some critical responsibilities to local councils.
By the content and intents of the constitutional principle, local governance and the involvement of grassroots people in the ordering of their own livelihood should be an integral aspect of the nation’s development, democratically and economically. But with the passage of years, the fortune of the tier of government has continued to make its proponents’ blood run cold.
The tier’s tribulation did not just start yesterday. The Ibadan District Council, which came into being in 1954, was soon tormented to its marrow by unhealthy political interests. It was same tale for the Ibadan Municipal Government (1957 – 1979) which produced a number of exemplary administrators.
Not a few worried souls are always quick to implicate military rule as a negative influence. But many others are wont to ask: Why have the councils remained comatose, years after the men with starched khakis “stepped aside?”
This progressively unending failure has inspired many attempts at re-creating the system. One was the famous 1976 Local Government Reform with one sole aim: Making local councils more accountable. Even by 1986, under the Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida-led administration, it still remained a pipe-dream.
It, therefore, prompted the Political Bureau instituted to pay attention to the importance of local government and the need to buoy it up. Before then, what was known as Dasuki Committee on Local Administration in Nigeria had made far-reaching recommendations on how local councils live to its billing.
The committee came up with some joker to rescue the tier from the brink precipice: Further decentralisation of local councils, their autonomy, improved revenue allocation from the federal coffers and healthier attitude towards them by both federal and state governments.
Still convinced that the tier remained the surest source of goodies to the local inhabitants, between May 1989 and September 1991, the Babangida administration created more councils, raising the number within two years from 301 to 589. And by 1999, the number became 774 with the six area councils of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), all listed in the 1999 Constitution.
In fact, some state governments, notably Lagos and Enugu, exercising their powers to establish local councils under Section 7 of the Constitution, created local government development centres to further take governance to the doorsteps of the grassroots people. For months, Lagos State, under the then governor, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, saw the rough side of the Olusegun Obasanjo administration as it withheld funds meant for the councils. Tinubu’s ‘offence’: Creating 37 local government development areas out of the original 20 councils. Still, to many a Nigerian, not yet any dice in terms of the dividends of all the efforts!
The simple constitutional duties of the councils have been practically begging for attention. Even far back in 1999, when the politicians took over power from the soldiers, they pledged to strengthen the local government system by involving the people in running their own affairs and making government responsive to their needs. But the new rulers have proved to out-Herod their unwelcome predecessors – the soldiers.
Close watchers of happenings at the level would easily conjecture why the local councils have remained on the sickbed against all expectations. Undue federal and state government control and interference are primary among the reasons.
Section 7 of the 1999 Constitution has tied them to the apron strings of the state government. How? It is through giving the states the power effect their creation, structure, composition, finance and functions. Unfortunately, most states have not failed to abuse the use of such a power.
In virtually every state, local councils exist only in name as states encroach on their functions without let. In most cases, the states’ helmsmen, spurred on by his “executive powers,” behave like the Lord of Manor.
Practically in most states, the council bosses lick the feet of their governors. Woe betides any council chairman who flexes muscles to assert himself. As you read this, Imo State Governor Rochas Okorocha is still at loggerheads with council chairmen in the state over tenure issues.
Financing the tier of government is another sore point. Bad enough as it seems, the 1999 Constitution further places the local councils under the control of the states. Section 162(6) of the constitution creates what is known as State Joint Local Government Account. By the provision, the state possesses the powers to pay local councils under its jurisdiction on “such terms and in such manner as may be prescribed by the National Assembly… or by the House of the state”.
No reference is stated therein to the Federal Allocation Formula under which the local councils are entitled to 20 per cent of federal income. In reality, the councils never get their ideal share of the revenue allocation. Their resources are “lost in transit” between both the federal and state governments.
For instance, during the Obasanjo-led administration, money was deducted at source from councils’ revenue for the purported construction of healthcare centres in all 774 local councils by the overlord called Federal Government.
Most state governments today, taking refuge under the guise of helping the local councils to perform their functions, also withhold or divert money meant for them. In manners that smack of deceit or coercion, some of the helpless council chairmen across the country have ceded some of their statutory functions to their respective state governments.
The desperation of the state governors to win council elections for their parties, especially at the grassroots level has remained another cause for worry. Elections are rigged even more brazenly. A vivid example was the nationwide council elections in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)-controlled states in December 2007. Quite funny; in April 2007, even out-going governors – Oyo State’s Rashidi Ladoja and Plateau’s Joshua Dariye -wanted to conduct local council polls before the expiration of their dying tenure. Their main aim: To install their loyalists at the grassroots.
Another major part of the problem is the quality and mentality of those administering the grassroots level. As in every other level, have they been prepared for the job? Why were they desperate to get the mantle, even with the last drop of blood in them? What legacy have they been leaving after their tenure? So many questions!
The general fear across the land today is that corruption has become a monster at the level. In the northern part of the country especially, reports have it that local government chairmen only visit their offices at the end of the month to share allocation among their councillors and wait till when the next fund is released!
In most of the states, the Houses of Assembly have both the knife and the yam. With their new-found legislative powers, the set ceiling for the amount any council can spend on capital projects; hence, the latter would always have to go to them cap-in-hand for approvals.
Besides armies of ghost workers, in most of the councils today, the quality of their staff is appalling. Their leadership is made up of the flotsam and the jetsam of the community, motor park touts and suchlike misfits.
In the face of all these, not a few worried observers have at one point or the other, made strident calls for the scrapping of local councils. But many were quick to point out that such a precipitate move would succeed in making state governors inebriated with excessive powers.
To the latter, more power to the states would engender and consolidate more opportunities for theft and dangerously widen the gulf between the leaders and the led at the grassroots.
The unending awkward scenarios have continued to give birth to many posers and proposals. The various stakeholders, the local councils must be made autonomous; the State Local Government Joint Account should become a thing of the past; the federal revenue sharing formula is crying for urgent review in favour of the local councils; state governments should hand off conduct of elections into state councils; structures should be created to ensure greater accountability at the council level; the bar of entry level for council elections must be raised and most importantly, the people must not only become more vigilant, but pluck up the courage to ask questions about how council resources are being (mis)used.
Now a member of the House of Representatives from Ekiti South West, Ikere and Ise/Orun Federal Constituency, Dr Ifeoluwa Arowosoge served as elected chairman of Ekiti South West between 1991 and 1993. He shared his view with The Nation at the weekend. He bemoaned what he termed the worsening fate of the councils, saying that they “are now mere appendages of their various states to the detriment of the people at the grassroots.”
Recalling his experience, Arowosoge said: “During our time, under Babangida, we enjoyed considerable autonomy and because of that, coupled with the fact that we were elected, we had the free hand to appoint capable hands to work with us and for that, we made remarkable impacts on the welfare of our people. The councils are now mere appendages of the states.
“Today, the autonomy we had is no longer there economically, administratively and constitutionally. Drop-outs from secondary schools (not in tertiary institutions) are now councillors, and the councils now lack the wherewithal to embark on projects since the paltry sums they get from the states are barely sufficient to pay staff emoluments at the end of the month and maybe, run the councils. It is sad.”
“This is why today,” he added, “moves are in top gear to review the local government laws as stipulated in the constitution. Unless the constitution is amended to rescue the councils from the current shackles of bondage, the council will remain lame.”
Oladele Adekanye who calls the shots at Lagos Mainland Council, too, is aggrieved with the status of the tier. “I’m sad; in fact, I shed tears for the tier of government because, generally, it’s been a tale of failures, except for exceptional situations, especially, here in Lagos.
“I make bold to say that with the little fund available to us, I have constructed and rehabilitated more than ten roads and touched all other major spheres of people’s lives in my domain. However, we can do better if we have the funds; unfortunately, the money we should be using to develop the grassroots is held at the centre. The federal government should have nothing to do with security and such issues that are ordinarily the responsibilities of the local government. I’m not saying that there are no bad eggs among council chairmen, but the fact remains that the encumbrances placed on the neck of the councils by both the state and federal authorities must give way,” Adekanye said.
Sadly, however, as developments have shown, it’s been 52 years of Nigeria’s independence and 52 years of conditional freedom for the councils. And so, for the third tier of government in a nation so tormented and beleaguered, stakeholders can always wish for better times.
