EDITORIAL: Bounty For The States

Questions have to be asked about what the sub-nationals are doing with their increased earnings from Federal Allocation. The Federal Government, States, and Local Governments shared N1.17tn in December 2023. Much like striking Gold!

The windfall should reignite the process of development, starting from the local government base level.

Unfortunately, the grandiose has replaced the quest for development. A fixation has been developed for “projects” rather than the quest for sustainable development. We are now in essence developing underdevelopment and the trend must be reversed.

The bounty must go into real development such as schools, health facilities, and rural roads. Parliamentary scrutiny must be tightened, otherwise, we are in for another wasted opportunity. This was precisely what happened to the Gulf Oil Windfall during the Babangida era; it must not happen again. This time we must go back to the root cause of poverty and tackle it to end the scourge of poverty.

To achieve the desired objective, the local government system must be reinvigorated and unshackled. Without greater democratisation of the local governments, we labour in vain. We should rise to turn the present crises into a historic opportunity for an advance.