The Governor of Anambra State, Prof Chukwuma Soludo, has contrary to the decision of the Supreme Court that granted full financial autonomy to the 774,000 local government councils in the country, signed an anti-local government autonomy Bill passed by the Anambra State House of Assembly into law.
Governor Soludo, while signing the Anambra State Local Government Administration Law 2024, at the Government Lodge, Awka, on Tuesday, October, 14, said, granting full autonomy to the country’s 774,000 local government councils is synonymous with brewing and incubating chaos.
Soludo posited that absolute autonomy for the local government councils impossible and would create problems due to mounting challenges, adding that, section 7 of the constitution empowers state Governors to enact laws for local government administration stressing the importance of state oversight.
“The absolute autonomy to the 774 local government areas in the country is an impossibility,” Soludo said. “In fact, it is a recipe for humongous chaos. The attendant challenges before the issue of local government autonomy are such that would certainly deepen the fate of the system and spell doom for the expected beneficiaries of the process if not well planned.”
Soludo explained that the new laws are consequential to the Supreme Court judgment and not intended to undermine it.
“The new laws by Anambra House of Assembly are therefore consequential to give operational life to the Supreme Court judgment and not to undermine it,” Soludo stated.
“If the State House of Assembly abdicates this constitutional duty, the Local Government will then have no law on the use and management of its finance.”
Politics Nigeria reports that the bill requires local government areas (LGAs) to remit a portion of their federal allocations into a consolidated account controlled by the state.
Section 13(1) of the bill stipulates that the state shall maintain a “State Joint Local Government Account” into which all federal allocations to LGAs must be deposited. Section 14(3) of it mandates that each LGA must remit a state-determined percentage to the consolidated account within two working days of receiving their allocations.
Meanwhile, Section 14(4) outlines that if the state receives the LGA’s allocation on their behalf, it must deduct the specified percentage before disbursing the remaining funds to the LGA”.
