From Lateef Dada, Osogbo
Former Deputy Speaker do the House of Representatives, Hon. Lasun Yusuf, has described the move by the Federal Government to demand autonomy for the Local Government as mischievous.
The former legislator who spoke to our correspondent in Osogbo at the weekend, posited that the judgement of the apex court would remain ineffective until the constitutional matters are addressed on the issue are addressed.
He said the attorney general of the federation should have approached the national assembly with a bill to amend all the constitutional areas of the matter instead of running to the Supreme Court.
“According to the constitution of Nigeria, it is the state that can create local government. It is the state that can determine the structure and administration. It is the same constitution that created a joint account committee. It is the same constitution that creates an independent electoral commission for each state. All those sections have not been deleted or amended and you just go to the court for the financial autonomy.
“Tinubu is just bamboozling everybody. There is nothing there. If anybody says there is anything there, let the person come and tell me how they are going to operate it. The man just wants the situation to be complex so that at the end of the day everybody is confused, and whatever he says, everybody will just go and sleep.
“It is mischievous of the federal government to have gone to court in the first instance. It is mischievous of the Attorney general of the federation to have taken such a thing to court. It is not right,” Yusuf posited.
Yusuf who insisted that there is no order, stated that “the reason why you think there is an order is because local government is listed in the constitution of Nigeria.
“Other than that, everything about local government according to the Nigeria 1999 constitution as amended belongs to the state and so, even there is a fundamental question that has not been answered, are we running two tiers or three tiers of government? Nobody has answered that question.
“As a legislator, there is no decision in the Supreme Court verdict. Which financial autonomy? How will you give financial autonomy when it is still in the constitution that the establishment, the structure, the administration of any local government will be determined by the state his the House of Assembly?
“Have you deleted that part of the constitution? Have you deleted the part of the Constitution that says there must be an independent electoral commission in each state which will require the state to conduct elections into local governments?
“So, it is just a way of diverting our attention. When the federal government went to court, I was wondering who the Attorney General and Minister of Justice were. Why should he go to court for such a thing? What they are supposed to do is to take all relevant sections of the constitution relating to local government and the state and now write a bill for the national assembly for amendment,” Yusuf said.