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Agabi criticises
governors over council funds
By Bassey Inyang
Correspondent,
Calabar
Special Adviser on
Ethics and Good Governance to the President, Mr Kanu Agabi has said it is
constitutionally wrong for state governments to take over the administration of
funds meant for local governments.
He also faulted the
removal of any local government council chairman by any authority other than
the legislative council made up of elected councillors.
Ironically, in Cross
River State from where Agabi hails, the chairman of Akpabuyo local government
council, Dr. Salem David Joshua was sacked by the governor, Mr. Donald Duke,
sometime this year.
The state government
accused Joshua of contributing to the breakdown of peace and order in his
council. However, opponents of Duke said the council chairman was removed for
challenging the decision of the state governor to take over the disbursement of
council funds.
Speaking in Calabar at
the weekend, Agabi who served as Minister of Justice, until the end of
Obasanjo’s first term in 2003 observed that elected persons can only be
sanctioned by those who elected them, or through their elected representatives.
He stated this while
delivering a lecture at a seminar in Calabar organised by the Calabar branch of
the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA).
Speaking on
“Local governments under the Constitution”, Agabi maintained that
although some states have enacted laws to administer local governments, such
laws does not empower any governor to sack any council chairman.
“In the light of
the above, any state law empowering a governor to exercise disciplinary control
over a chairman or councillor is unconstitutional.
He argued that if a
council chairman or councillor commits any offence, the immediate
constituencies they represent is most pained and it falls on the constituency
to discipline the individual and not the state government that is afar off.
Agabi said the
increasing control and take over of council funds has denied the elected
council representatives of their statutory responsibilities to the people at
the grassroots.
He pointed out that as
much as state governments have advanced several reasons for the policy,
including accusation that they loot funds, the state governments have done
nothing different as hijacked council funds are shared by state government
functionaries.
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