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On the 2nd of December, during a parley with members of the Senior Executive Course No. 44 (2022) of the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies, Kuru, held at the State House Banquet Hall, Abuja, The Nigerian President Major General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd.), had in a statement, accused governors in different states of the federation of looting funds from their Local Governments.

The President said the stunted development experienced at the local government level was caused by governors and local government officials who “pocket” public funds and this has led to poor governance at the grassroots.

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Reacting to the President’s comments, Nonso Nnamani, the APGA Candidate for House of Representative in Enugu North and South federal constituency, said the President’s comments are the realities that Nigerians are not even aware of.

He said local government chairmen are handicapped in performing their duties because the state governors interfere so much with the affairs of the local government and the only way to ensure proper and effective governance at the grassroots was to emancipate the local government from the grips of the state government and this emancipation has to be thorough, beginning from the elective process which has been flawed, as it is the state government that has been in charge of conducting council elections which does not offer a fair process as it allows the governors ensure the candidates they handpick always emerge and this puts the chairmen in their pockets as they have to do the biddings of the governors else they’ll be removed.

To correct this anomaly, Nonso Nnamani suggested that local governments be allowed to conduct their own council elections without interference from the state government. He said the current arrangement of the state organizing council elections doesn’t allow the elections to be free and fair.

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He further said that if the local governments aren’t able to conduct the elections on their own, then the INEC can always be called upon to organize the elections which will be more free and fair than anything organized by the state government.

Nonso further stated that by giving the local governments their own autonomy, it will ensure that a lot of grassroot developments will begin to grow especially in Enugu where a lot of the rural communities lack most basic amenities necessary for survival. He cited the example of Nkerefi in Nkanu East Local Government, were a community for 24 years is yet to witness electricity. He said this is an example of the failure of local government to take charge of the development of rural communities but however said the blame of this lies squarely on the doors of the state government.

“Over the past six months, the 17 local governments in Enugu has received a total of 47 billion naira as their allocations and yet despite this, there is no significant achievement in terms of infrastructure or social amenities by any of the local governments to show for the huge amounts of money these local governments receive”, Nnamani said.

Harping on the urgent need for Civil Society Organizations and even the citizens to sit up and demand for better accountability from their leaders, he noted that the Civil Society Organizations are meant to not only help in providing them with appropriate information they need to keep up with the activities of the government but provide a platform for the citizens to engage the governments in dialogue that will help provide accountability in government.

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Nonso who had earlier promised to push for a bill to separate and give local governments autonomy from state government when elected as a member of the federal house of the representative during the unveiling of his manifesto believes that this will allow the local governments full power to engage in developmental projects within their communities without the interference of the state government.