Chief Adekunle Emmanuel hails Tinubu on LG autonomy, Says it’s a long awaited victory for the grassroots
A former house of Assembly candidate in owo Local government Area of ondo state, Chief Adekunle Emmanuel has commended president Tinubu on the recent supreme Court verdict on full local government autonomy in Nigeria, describing is as a long awaited victory for the grassrooters.
On Thursday, the supreme court ruled that the federal government should henceforth pay allocations directly to local government councils from the federation account.
The seven-member panel of justices held that state governments have continued to abuse their powers by retaining and using the funds meant for LGAs.
The apex court also ordered the federal government to withhold allocations of LGAs governed by unelected officials appointed by the governor.
In his reaction in an interview with our heritage reporter, Chief Adekunle Emmanuel described the supreme Court judgement as a wat of returning development back to the grassroots.
According to him, the Governor’s will only come to the local government during electioneering period, it is the council chairmen that knows the major problem in the local government, but when the resources are been controlled by the governor’s, it becomes a huge problem for them to solve.
I could remember in those days, when our councillor will come to the street to inspects projects, but for a while now, it’s been a different case for such, local government chairmen has become tools in the hand of governor’s and this has derailed development drastically in the grassroots, Chief Adekunle Emmanuel said.
More also, it’s the local government chairmen who knows and understand perfectly well on when to grade and rehabilitates the farm roads in those days, but since the power have been withdrawn from them, it becomes an issue to transport farm products to the market because the roads are not accessible to use, then inflation of commodities begins, but now we can all go back to farm and make request from the local government everytime the farm roads needs rehabilitations, the power is back to the people and that’s the true definition of democracy.
He further commended president Bola Tinubu for his commitment towards the development of Nigeria as a nation particularly, by fighting the local government autonomy case to a victory state, it’s indeed commendable, this is signaling that, the president is indeed well prepared to return Nigeria to her glorious level.
I want use this medium to congratulate our people at the grassroots because, the dividend of democracy is gradually returning back, Chief Adekunle Emmanuel stated.
