The federal government, in line with the judgement of the Supreme Court on local government autonomy will stop allocations to local governments areas in the country without democratically elected chairmen.
An official in the Federal Miinistry of Justice told LEADERSHIP Weekend that a three-month moratorium, beginning from July had been given to states which do not have democratically elected chairmen to conduct elections and put their houses in order.
There was an agreement between the states and the federal government to hold on with the implementation of the judgement to allow them put their houses in order.
The Supreme Court on July 11, 2024, gave a landmark judgment affirming the financial autonomy of the 774 LGs in the country and ruled that governors could no longer control funds meant for the councils.
The apex court also directed the accountant-general of the federation to pay allocations directly to their accounts, as it declared the non-remittance of funds by the 36 states unconstitutional.
Also, the special adviser to the president on communication and publicity, Office of the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mr Kamarudeen Ogundele, in a chat with our correspondent confirmed that copies of the judgement had been sent to the ministry of finance and other relevant agencies for implementation.
According to him, the minister of justice is not in charge of implementation of the judgement.
He said, “Well, as far the office of the Attorney General of the Federation is concerned, we have received a copy of the judgement and all the appropriate bodies have been written with copies of the judgement attached for implementation.
“We have done our bit, so we are not the one in charge of FAAC and the ministry of finance are to do the implementation.
“I think if you want to find out about the position of things, I think the appropriate body to contact is FAC and the ministry of finance but as for us we have done our part in the matter. The judgment said the state who do not have democratically elected LG chairman, will they benefit from this judgment.
“I think the judgment is clear, we don’t need to add or subtract from the judgement, the judgment is clear to the people. They said the money should be paid directly to the local government chairmen and the local government chairmen in this case are those who are democratically elected and not appointees of the governor because the Supreme Court was clear that the local government is the third tier of government in Nigeria, so, they cannot be run as departments in the state government. So, local government is an independent government on its own so the judgment is clear as to who are the expected beneficiaries of the government”.
