[Mhiz Rebecca]

Obasanjo has accused many state governors of
defrauding and stealing funds belonging to the
Local Government Areas.
Obasanjo said this at a conference in Babcock
University, Ilisan, Ogun State on Tuesday, October
11, 2016.
Recalling how he initiated Local Governments
reforms between 1976 and 1979 to make them
autonomous, functional and developmental,
Obasanjo lamented that the current happenings is
saddening.
He said once the FG pays the Local Government,
such money were illegally deducted by governors
with no LGA chairman daring to question or
challenge such illegality in the state.
“I called such fraud, stealing and corruption. It is
fraud, it is corruption. They will say they have done
something or paid for something for their Local
Governments. And when the Local Governments’
money comes, they take it. Who is that chairman
that will tell the Governor you have taken our
money? You are gone,” he said.
Obasanjo further said that since the 1999
Constitution became operational, LGAs in many
states across the country have become the most
constitutionally-abused.
However, the ex-President said only a handful of
states had held local government election while
others carried on in running local governments
without the Constitution that created them.
In his words: “The constitution envisages that the
with the allocation from the Consolidated National
Revenue Account to the Local Governments on the
states will be added, the contribution of the State
into a joint account as funding for the functions of
the Local Governments.
“Not only did most of the States contribute nothing
in breach of the Constitution, they also devised
different dubious programmes and plans by which
they took substantial amount of allocation due to
the Local Governments.
“With that done, most of the Local Government
officials just shared what remained among them
without any serious service being undertaken for
the people. It is perpetrated by most of the states,”
Obasanjo said.
Expressing optimism, the former President said the
problems and challenges of LGAs in Nigeria are not
beyond solutions, hence they have to be led by
men and women who understand the enormous
challenges they face and the need to focus
primarily on those issues that would enhance the
living standards of the masses.