The Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE) has called for the creation of more local government areas (LGAs) across the 36 states with the view of unbundling the high population in each of the existing 774 LGAs.
The NULGE national president, Comrade Ambali Olatunji, who made the call at the match-past/parade ceremony organised to mark the maiden NULGE week on Tuesday in Abuja, also recommended a new reclassification of the LGAs based on status and viability.
He said: “The Nigerian population has increased astronomically over the years; the existing 774 local governments are grossly inadequate; there is a need to set standard criteria for more local government creation based on population, land mass, and revenue generation potentials.
“Any community that has a population of 500,000, a minimum of 2 secondary schools and 4 primary schools, health centres, markets, and traditional rulers should be deemed qualified for a provisional local government once a referendum is conducted by INEC with elected representatives.
“It is also recommended that there is a need to reclassify the existing Nigerian local government councils into local government development areas, districts, city councils, etc. based on status and viability. The unitary system of local government is no longer realistic and lopsided.”
Olatunji, who raised concerns over the infrastructural deficit at the LGAs resulting in massive rural-urban drift, said there was a need to make available the needed tools and equipment at communities in LGAs to help improve the living standards and security in local communities.
“The dilapidated nature of infrastructure in the various communities across Nigeria calls for concern and requires concerted efforts to address it. This has led to rural-urban drift, leading to overpopulation, pollution, and increased criminal amenities in our urban centres due to a lack of adequate amenities in our rural areas.
Public roads are no longer available at the local government level; there are no accessible roads, polluted water sources, indiscriminate waste disposal, a lack of farm equipment, dilapidated walls and classrooms Dilapidated primary health care centres are the order of the day.
“In the mind of an average Nigerian, the local government is in the emergency ward, living on oxygen; hence, there is a need to do something unusual to save it from imminent death and extinction.
“An intervention unit under the Ministry of Special Duties and Inter-governmental Affairs is urgently needed to be a dividend of democracy to the grassroots and ensure positive growth and development across the nooks and crannies of the country.
“Give us infrastructural support in terms of equipment like graders, tad boilers, tractors for farming, cesspit emptiers, refuse disposal vans, and vocational skills acquisition equipment to train and empower youths and rural women. We humbly plead for this to make the country functional at the local government level. The intervention should come directly from the ministry to the 774 local governments.
Other demands were the expansion of social interventions across the 774 local governments, a review of the “outdated” 2006 scheme of service, a special rural workers allowance to motivate workers seeking to work in urban areas, the inclusion of a local government service commission and auditor general for local government service in the constitution, the establishment of a public service joint negotiating council, and the establishment of a national institute for local government studies.
Speaking further, the NULGE president appealed to the 10th National Assembly to complete the process kicked off by the 9th Assembly in granting autonomy to the local governments.
“The myriad of problems bedevilling this nation can be situated within the dysfunctional nature of the council’s, which incidentally is the most strategic, most relevant, and closest to the people but has been crippled by both constitutional lacunas and administrative misapplication of procedures.
“We commend the bold step taken by the 9th Assembly but hope that the amendment of the constitution will be effected by the 10th National Assembly under the watch of President Bola Tinubu, who fought tirelessly to ensure the existence and improvement of the local government system in Lagos State as the then executive governor. Therefore, there is an urgent need to fix the local government by ensuring the local government operates within a reasonable context of political, administrative, and fiscal autonomy for the betterment of the Nigerian masses.”
Minister of Labour and Employment, Simon Lalong, who noted that over 75 per cent of Nigeria’s population resides in rural areas, said the government was poised to address their poverty problems through the promotion of good governance.
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