As citizens worry over the dearth of democracy dividends at the local government councils, the councils claim that lack of autonomy was an impediment to their meeting the expectations of Nigerians at the grassroots.
Our correspondent, Calista Ezeaku and photographer, Dele Obinna sought the views of Nigerians on the thorny issue of granting autonomy to LGAs or not.
Excerpts:

Well, the issue of the Local Government autonomy should not be a matter that people will begin to argue about. This is a thing that is established by law. It is just like somebody using his position to take over something that rightly belongs to the other person.
So the issue of autonomy is not negotiable. And I think that what the States are doing is an infringement, to usurp about 50 per cent of the local government functions and they have made the councils to under perform in their responsibilities as local governments. So I think autonomy should be granted without delay to enable local governments function. The law recognises three tiers of government – Federal, State, and Local Government.
The same authority that established States also established the local governments. Therefore, usurping the functions of the local government at the State level is an abuse of power. And I think the state governments of the nation should be wise enough to know that they have been holding the thing that rightly belongs to their children and it is high time they released it to ensure that development gets to the grass roots.
Delay in the payment of teachers salary was one reasons given that made the State governments to start controlling the local government’s finance, but one thing is that the issue of payment of salaries has not even changed even now that the States have refused to allow local governments run their councils the way it should be.
The workers salaries have not been effective. If you go to records I can assure you that for the past eight months, salaries are paid two weeks after the end of the other month.
There had been no month that State or local governments pay salaries at exactly the end of the month. It is always a carry over which is a replica of what they said was not good.
So, there should be proper separation of power to ensure proper sanity in the system because the state claim to be more decent in terms of administration than the local government. Everything depends on the mindset. Even in the past when allocations were being tampered with, it was not applicable to all the councils. There were still some local governments that had good leaders that were meeting up with the target to ensure that salaries and other duties that were supposed to be within the coffers of the local government were done.

Henry Chikwele Wechie – Business Consultant.
I think local governments should be granted autonomy so that development can get to the grass roots because without financial autonomy it will be very difficult to get development to the grassroots where people will benefit. We have three tiers of government – federal, state and local government. So local government should stand as a pillar of its own. It is just like we have separation of powers in the judiciary, executive and legislature. They all have their own functions. So, local government should have its own direct function that will take care of the grassroots. Proper separation of powers will ensure that all the tiers of government will do what they are supposed to do and that will facilitate development.

Hon Chochi Amadi – Common Nigerian
I want to say that the autonomy of local government is a good idea. If local governments should be granted autonomy it will be a welcome idea. But there are some portions of the 1999 constitution that need to be touched to be in line with the autonomy of the local government. By that I mean the local government should be put in check. I think it is from this angle that people are saying no to the autonomy of the local government. But if they put everything together in line of checking, balancing and all that, the autonomy of local government is going to be a welcome one.
While a portion of the 1999 constitution will be amended, it will ensure proper checks and balances in all tiers of government. That will make all of them to perform instead of one tier blaming the other for its low performance. If there is a law backing the functions of the local governments and all that they can do, I think it will be better for all.
So there should be an amendment on how the local government should be run. There should be a touching of how it will be balancing so that the people in the legislature, executive will know what the law is saying on that. That will also direct the state and the federal government.

Mrs Felicia Osasuwa – Health Worker
The local governments should be granted autonomy because it seems as if they are tied in one corner. But if the chairmen are allowed to manage the local governments by themselves, I think they will do better. When you give birth to a child, you allow the child to grow and be on his own. It’s not good that the child stays under his parents forever. When you allow a child to be on his own, that child will do better.
There is this fear that if local governments are granted autonomy, the chairman might misuse the funds of the council. But there are some God-fearing local government chairmen. If you are a God fearing person and public funds are given to you, you will use it well. You will not embezzle it.

Hon. Bernard Uche Enyiche – Business Man / Former Supervisor
I worked with the local government council in 1998 as a supervisor for health. We were autonomous then. At the end of the month, the chairman would go for JAC meeting. Their money came direct to the local government. So it was easy to dispense. Projects were easily arranged, organised and effected.
But this money coming from the Federal Government to the State, it does not make things straight and a lot of things go wrong because we are Nigerians. So the best thing to do is to make the local government autonomous.
I think when it comes to development, it was better when the local governments were autonomous than now because now you are not sure of what comes to local governments. If the money will come direct from federal government, chairmen will know how much they get and what projects to embark on with the money. But this time, the money comes from States, and perhaps they do some deductions I don’t know, because of the payments that are involved. And by the time the money gets to the local governments, you can never be sure of how much until they see their accounts.
So if the local government are autonomous, I think it will be the best for the country.
Mrs Lizzy Samuel – Teacher
I think the issue of local government autonomy would have been ideal if we have honest, sincere and selfless people as chairmen. But unfortunately, the reverse is the case in Nigeria. Our leaders are selfish and self centered. Before now, local governments were autonomous, but instead of paying workers, particularly primary school teachers their salaries, they withheld the salaries, owing teachers for up to seven months. That was how the payment of primary school teachers became the responsibility of the State government, who collects the local government allocations from the Federal Government and deduct our salaries before giving the local government the balance. Since then, we’ve not had the issue of prolonged delay of payment of teachers’ salary. When the local governments chairmen were in charge of teachers salaries, many local government councils were almost dead. The chairmen claimed they had zero allocation after paying workers salaries. But since the State government took up the responsibility of payment of teachers salaries, nobody has heard anything like zero allocation again.
So for the sake of teachers, let the statusquo remain. Let State Governors carry on with the control of local government finances. The local government chairmen claim the money given to them by State Governors after the deductions is not enough for them to execute projects. But the question is, the so called little amount they receive, what do they do with it? Some of them generate huge revenue internally, what do they do with it? Nothing! Many of them are seen at their offices only when the allocations come. They will share the money among themselves and nobody will see them again.
That is why there is no development in many local government councils.
I’m not saying the governors are saints, but at least they make sure that our salaries are paid, so they should carry on.