The Presidency has confirmed that from the end of January, local government areas in the country will receive their money directly from the Federal Allocation Account Committee.
The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Public Communications, Sunday Dare, disclosed this in an interview on Arise News on Thursday night, saying President Bola Tinubu would ensure the local government autonomy.
On July 11, 2024, the Supreme Court, in a unanimous judgment read by Justice Emmanuel Agbim, said “The state’s retention of the local government funds is unconstitutional.
“Demands of justice require a progressive interpretation of the law. It is the position of this court that the federation can pay local government allocations to the LGs directly or pay them through the states.
“In this case, since paying them through states has not worked, justice of this case demands that LG allocations from the federation account should henceforth be paid directly to the LGs.”
The court ruled that the state government had no power or control to keep the local government council money or funds.
The judgment followed a suit filed on behalf of the Federal Government by the Attorney General of the Federation, Lateef Fagbemi (SAN), seeking to grant full autonomy and direct funding to all 774 local government areas in the country.
Following the judgment, efforts to commence the direct payment to the councils had stalled.
The PUNCH reported that the Federal Government did not commence the immediate enforcement of the judgment to put modalities in place for the smooth take-off of the autonomy.
Speaking during the interview on Thursday, Dare confirmed that direct payment for the councils would begin in January end.
“We have a President who ensures local government autonomy. I spoke to a local government chairman, who said, ‘Oh, I will be getting N2.9bn, instead of the N200m I was getting before’.
“From the end of this month, LG will receive the money directly,” he said.
Dare stressed that the current focus should shift more towards state and local governments.
He cited an example of a state that collected N499bn last year, which is four times its previous amount, yet had not shown any noticeable improvements.
“Blaming the Federal Government all the time, I think we need to revert it. One state last year alone collected N499bn, almost four times what it was collecting before. Now, go to that state and see if there is any improvement, N499bn is not a small amount of money.
“The framers of our constitution, who said we should have the federal, state and local governments, it’s for a reason. The Federal Government cannot take care of the entire country.
“You see the breakdown of the FAAC. Now, what are the states doing? We can talk about what the Federal Government is doing, the conversation should go to the states and others.
“The Federal Government collects the allocation, it doesn’t take the 100 per cent, but distributes it. We have to find out what the states are doing with the allocation.
“So we should put our radar on the states and local governments and, of course, the Federal Government has its own responsibilities,” he said.
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