LG autonomy purely state matter – Fashola

Category: Inside politics Published on Friday, 22 February 2013 05:00 Written by Mahmud Lalo, Lagos

Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Raji Fashola said the issue of local government autonomy should be left purely in the hands of the states that created them rather than be considered as a matter for constitutional grant.

Fashola said the constitution of Nigeria has provided in clear terms the creation of local governments is a matter for the state, but it creates an anomalous situation by asking the National Assembly to play a role in listing the created.

“Let me re -state my understanding, that it is the states that are federating to form a union and local governments are not part of the federating arrangements, instead, they are, as some eminent scholars have described them, development centres within the state.”

Fashola stated this at the commemorative public lecture to mark the 80th birthday anniversary of Alhaji Lateef Olufemi Okunnu in Lagos recently.

He explained that the matter is best handled by the states. “The simple point I want to make is to state that the question of whether a local government should be autonomous or not, or what level of autonomy it gets, should be a matter for states, this is the essence of a federal arrangement, if we intend to do otherwise, we must decide to be unitary state instead of a federation; and allow everything to be regulated from the centre,” he said,