Hiding under the pretext of a range of Machiavellian manoeuvres, state governors, particularly those who have just been inaugurated, have moved to undermine the local government system. Between Inauguration Day on May 29 and now, some of the new helmsmen in Oyo, Bauchi, Adamawa and Imo states have summarily dissolved the LG administrations in their states. Predictably, this has instigated controversies and legal disputations. This does not look good for the country’s democracy. It is a reflection of the primitive and predatory politics we play in Nigeria.
Right after being sworn in, Oyo State Governor, Seyi Makinde, shattered the conjugal bliss his successor, Abiola Ajimobi, contracted with the 33 local government areas and 35 local council development authorities in the state when they were sworn in to office in March 2018. Legally, their election secured a three-year mandate for them, but Makinde, citing mismanagement, unilaterally sacked them.
Historically, this has been the pattern by many governors in the Fourth Republic. It is more pronounced when a governor from another party takes over the reins of office. Makinde, for instance, won power under the umbrella of the Peoples Democratic Party. Under Ajimobi, all the 68 councils were under the All Progressives Congress, the then ruling party in Oyo. In Nigeria’s complex political space, it is an unwritten rule that governors prefer to have their way with the LG structures in their domains.
In Bauchi, Governor Bala Muhammed sacked the 20 council chairmen shortly after his assumption of office. On Tuesday, new Adamawa governor, Ahmadu Fintiri, swore in the caretaker chairmen for the 21 LGs in the state, having dissolved the previous committees on assuming office, and pledged that elections would soon hold. In 2015, Governor Nyesom Wike had dissolved the LG structure in Rivers State on assuming power. After a period of litigation, the courts affirmed his action.
A similar drama is unfolding in Imo, which also has the PDP back in power as against the APC. Imo is going through a slightly different route. Early in June, its House of Assembly suspended indefinitely all the chairmen and councillors of the 27 LGAs in the state, asking them to “hand over immediately to the directors of administration in each local council.” In furtherance of this, Governor Emeka Ihedioha suspended all council chairmen, deputies, councillors and LG appointees. In their place, he installed interim management committees, which are to be in office for six months. This is untenable and undemocratic.
The 1999 Constitution makes no provision for the IMCs. In Section 7, it expressly guarantees the existence of democratically elected officials. Indeed, in resolving the dissolution crisis in Ekiti State, the Supreme Court, in 2016, voided the law that authorised governors to sack elected LG chairmen and councillors. In 2010, the then governor, Kayode Fayemi, had booted out the LG officials, who went to court. In its judgement, the Supreme Court described the action as “executive recklessness,” stating that Fayemi overreached himself by abridging their tenure.
In spite of this, governors are still bypassing the law. This creates unnecessary divisions in the polity. It defeats the purpose of the LGs, which are primarily to execute development at the grass roots. Take the case of Ondo State. Within a space of two years – between 2017 and 2019 – the executive and the legislature have tampered with the LG system on three separate occasions. Claiming that they came illegally into office under his predecessor, incumbent Governor Rotimi Akeredolu sacked the appointed 18 caretaker chairmen to head the LGAs in the state. That was in 2017. In October 2018, the governor again sacked the caretakers, following a court judgement. Last month, the Ondo State House of Assembly dissolved the caretaker committees. With this, chaos is entrenched in the system.
With governors in charge, democracy at the LG level is under constant threat. Elections define democracy, but deliberately, some governors delay elections at the grass roots. It is akin to not holding election at the federal and state tiers in a four-year cycle, which is unimaginable. Yet, this was the case in Anambra State under successive governors. In Imo State, transition and caretaker committees were the order of the day.
Further, in the states that conduct the LG elections, it is often a charade. In nearly all these elections, the ruling party in those states wins landslide victories in all the councils. This is bad politics. It imperils good governance.
The quandary is partly traced to Nigeria’s unworkable pseudo-federal political structure. In this, the constitution wrongly makes them a third tier of government. They are given allocations from the centre. The Economic Confidential magazine calculated that the 36 states and their LGs received federal allocations totalling N3.3 trillion in 2017; in 2018, the two tiers, which operate joint accounts, got N4.5 trillion. This translates to huge funds, which the governors look to control to suit their whims.
It is a different ball game in thriving federal constitutions. In the United States, LGs (or their equivalents) – there were 89,004 in 2012 according to the US Census Bureau – are constitutionally under the purview of the 50 state governments. They (LGs) do not share federal revenues, so the state governments create or merge them as they please. This way, governors are likely to be more circumspect in the way they handle the LG administration since the burden of funding and administering the LGs rests squarely with them. Therefore, the conspicuous step for Nigeria is to implement true federalism.
In addition, the law should be enforced, particularly in the area of corruption at the LG level, which has entrenched maladministration at the grass roots.
