By Myke Uzendu, Abuja
The National Chairman of African Democratic Congress (ADC) Ralph Nwosu has described The Supreme Court ruling affirming Local Government Financial Autonomy as an unprecedented political victory for the judiciary.
The ADC boss in a statement on Friday said that the judgement is a clear manifestation of how each arm of government can drive development by taking principled and patriotic positions for the interest of Nigeria. He said that the ruling is a great outcome for our democracy and catalyst for national development.
He said, “My party, the ADC has continued to advocate for the active participation of the local government Area councils in running our affairs as the council is the authentic grassroot leadership any nation needs to make organic progress. Total Local government autonomy, financial and otherwise are critical for grassroots development.
“I congratulate Mr President, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu for the bold step not minding his past and the antics of state governors and some of the legislators. The main kudos and compliments goes to the men and women who sat in the Supreme Court today to affirm that “all the local government councils across the country should, from Thursday, receive their allocations directly from the Accountant-General of the Federation”.
“The judiciary has by this singular ruling breathed life into our local governments and vitality to all communities and persons in this country. They have also put the shameful actions of all the governors who have served for the last 21 years to an end. The governors, all of them without exception, have acted as octopuses strangulating local government and our communities’ development and in many ways debasing our democracy”.
Nwosu said that by the time we have free local governments with five to 10 billion naira distributed to each of the 774 of them annually, the effect will be phenomenal. Some LGA councils’ performance will put many governors to shame.
He particularly called on Chief Edozie Njoku to compel the governor of Anambra state to fix a date for conducting Local government council’s election in Anambra state without delay. He said that Anambra state has remained the worst hit state, as the successive governors have been operating with caretaker and interim council structure for the last 21 years.
He further called on all National Chairmen of all other political parties that are in control of the states to call their governors to conduct Local council elections forthwith.
