Starting in July, the Federal Government of Nigeria will cease the allocation of local government funds to 20 states. This action follows a landmark ruling on local government autonomy by the Supreme Court on Thursday.
The Attorney General of the Federation, Lateef Fagbemi, represented the Nigerian Government in this case. The Supreme Court’s ruling prohibits the Federal Government from distributing allocations to local governments led by appointed officials instead of elected ones.
Justice Emmanuel Agim, who presided over the case, directed that local government funds should no longer be paid through state governments, asserting that governors have misused these funds. He highlighted that governors have been retaining and misappropriating these funds, which negatively impacts the local government councils.
As a result, the 20 states that lack elected local government chairmen will be barred from receiving local government funds starting in July until they hold elections. The affected states are Jigawa, Rivers, Anambra, Imo, Kwara, Zamfara, Bauchi, Plateau, Abia, Enugu, Katsina, Kano, Sokoto, Ondo, Osun, Delta, Akwa-Ibom, Cross River, and Benue.
For the month of July, the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) received N293.82 billion from the federal government on behalf of the 774 local government areas in the country.
