Ngige Urges S’Court to Revisit Judgment on Local Government Financial Autonomy

Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja

A former governor of Anambra State, Senator Chris Ngige, has called on the Supreme Court to revisit its judgment on local government financial autonomy, saying it undermined the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended).

Ngige, who was the Minister for Labour and Employment from November 2015 to May 2023, frowned at neglect of more than 15,000 primary healthcare centres in Nigeria.
He argued that the judgment attempted to completely knock down Section 7 of the constitution, which puts the local government areas under the control of the states.
Beside the political consequences, he recalled that the same Supreme Court, had earlier in 2006 made a pronouncement, warning the federal government against dictating to the states how to spend local government funds accruable to them.

The previous ruling by the Supreme Court under Justice Mohammed Uwais, Ngige recalled, was made in a case filed by three state governments – Lagos, Abia and Delta –through their attorney generals, challenging then President Olusegun Obasanjo’s Local Government Account Monitoring Committee Act 2005.
He spoke at the weekend in Enugu, as a Guest Lecturer at the 29th Annual General Meeting (AGM) and Scientific Conference of the Association of Urological Surgeons, Nigeria (NAUS).

Speaking on the topic, “Local Government Administration and Primary Healthcare,” Ngige who is a medical doctor and health system administration specialist,  said he did not support the direct payment of federal allocation to the local governments without statutory first line deductions for payment of salaries and wages of local government workers, pensions and gratuities, traditional rulers entitlements and customary court allowances.
Citing his experience as a governor, he recalled that council chairmen between 1999 and 2002 owed several months of salaries and allowances, and pensions and gratuities, not only in Anambra State, but almost all the states of the Federation.

He said most past council chairmen craved for acquisition of choice estates in Abuja, Lagos and even London, at the detriment of public health centres and schools in their area, whereas teachers were owed several months arrears of salaries and allowances, stressing that some chairmen even proved to be more corrupt than the Governors.
He opined that the judgment of the Supreme Court not only runs ultra vires of the Constitution but amounts to throwing away the baby with the dirty bath water.