The Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE) has warned politicians, especially governors to free the local government tier of government from “her excruciating control or break Nigeria into pieces.”
National President NULGE Comrade Ambali Olatunji stated this in an interview with Blueprint, saying “you can’t do the same thing and expect different result.”
“Our massage about autonomy for local government in Nigeria is simply that the governors should either local government autonomy or they break Nigeria into pieces.
“You can’t continue doing the same thing the same way and expect a better result. If we want government’s impact to be felt by Nigerian masses, local government autonomy is the way to go. It is not that money are not allocated to local government, but somebody somewhere corners the money, the sovereign wealth of the nation ended up in the pockets of few people and majority of the people are suffering.
“You can see poverty in the land, you can see deprivation, you can see hopelessness, you can see restiveness, you can see banditry, you can see terrorism, and you can see clamour to break down Nigeria and you still want to continue,” he said.
On the N100 million nomination fee for the presidential aspirant on the All Progressives Congress (APC) platform, the labour leader said the ruling party was converting political position to commercial venture.
According to him, the move would eventually fail, saying the APC was inadvertently calling for a mass opposition to its reign.
“Let me tell you, this thing will fail because if you over concentrate power in the hands of few cabals, at the end of the day you are calling for mass opposition and my concern is that APC should be careful. It is too early, I love the party, but they have to be careful. They should not feel that they have arrived and are above everybody. It is the same Nigerians who whip PDP, they are still alive,” the NULGE President warned.
He regretted that what the youths had achieved through the “not too young to run” provisions in the law, has now been destroyed by the over commercialisation of political positions by the ruling APC.
“That is not encouraging, how can women raise N100 million for God’s sake, or even half of it, which is 50 per cent. How can youth raise N100 million or 50 percent of N100 million? It means that those who are stolen Nigeria money are the ones that will continue to pauperize and rule over us; that is the meaning.”
He, therefore, called for independent candidates in the electoral process, adding, “that is why we must pursue the issue of independent candidature if we are serious in Nigeria.
“Vote must belong to the candidate and not the party because it is not the party that rules it is the candidate that rules at the end of the day. The bulk stops on the table of the President and the Governors. Even if the party says yes, and they say no, the no stands.”
