The precarious financial situation in the 25 local government councils in Delta State is set to worsen with an alleged demand of N5million from each of the councils to organize a controversial seminar for the newly sworn-in local government council Transition Committee members, Fresh Angle can exclusively report.
The intention of the proposed seminar which was made known to the chairmen at Asaba, the state capital during a meeting held Tuesday November 27 is another ploy by some greedy elements in the State House of Assembly to further milk the councils dry.
A top politician in the state hinted Fresh Angle that such seminar have been organized in the past, with the chairmen of the councils getting about N2million each from the N5million the councils are made to cough out.
Investigations reveal that after such controversial huge sums are paid, the councils will equally be compelled to pay the hotel and travelling allowances of members of the transition committees from their coffers to attend the seminar. There are average 20 members in each of the transition committees across the state.
While a reasonable number of councils in the state are owing their staff average two months salaries as a result of empty treasury, the new transition committee chairman of Uvwie local government was reported to have borrowed to pay October salary just this week and with increasing pressures by state government officials on regular basis regarding the running of councils, there are indications that the near zero activities in most of the councils will eventually be grounded to a halt.
The leadership of Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN in Delta State only recently condemned the appointment of transition committees and threatened to take legal action, but the Special Adviser to Delta State governor on political matters, Chief Ighoyota Amori reacted angrily to the ACN statement, urging the party to prepare for next year’s local government polls to be conducted by the yet to be constituted state electoral commission which will be controlled by the PDP led government in the state.
A prominent lawmaker in the state recently dropped hint that the state governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan and Speaker of the State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Victor Onyekachi Ochei are not disposed to local government autonomy.
This position was further confirmed at a meeting of members of governors’ forum in Port-Harcourt, Rivers State. Most of the PDP governors at the meeting spoke vehemently against local government autonomy and there are indications that they will lobby federal and state lawmakers from their states to ignore the demand for local government autonomy which is enjoying the support of majority of Nigerians.
Investigations reveal that most local government councils across the country barely struggle to pay staff salaries following alleged deduction of their monthly federal allocation by the state governors under the guise of joint allocation committee, just as nothing is said about the internally generated revenue by the three tiers of government.
Copyright: Fresh Angle International (www.freshangleng.com)
ISSN 2354 - 4104
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