Lack of LG Autonomy Turning Youths to Deviants, Monsters, Declares Dep. Speaker
Boniface Okoro in Umuahia
The Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Benjamin Okezie Kalu, has said the lack of local government autonomy was turning Nigerian youths into deviants occasioned by lack of sustainable employment opportunities.
Kalu, who stated this in his Bende country home in Abia State while interacting with newsmen at the weekend, said it was to arrest the ugly situation that National Assembly was fine-tuning the Supreme Court judgement on local government autonomy and other related laws for effective implementation of local government autonomy.
“Lack of autonomy handicaps local governments from engaging youths, leading to their recruitment for social media insults and propaganda,” Kalu said, emphasising that implementation of LG autonomy would create jobs, reduce burdens on governors, and develop states.
He stressed that lack of LG autonomy was negatively impacting national development by providing opportunity for politicians to create monsters out of Nigerian youths.
According to him, since the local governments were not allowed to control their resources, they lacked the capacity to provide platforms for meaningful engagements of the youths, leaving them to be recruited as e-rats to hurl insults on people on the social media.
"Youths given tablets to insult people, particularly opposition politicians, on social media are being under-developed. At the end of the day, we create deviants.
“When we hand over tablets to young people to sit at home, earn money at the end of the month, based on how many insults they give to opposition, you are creating monsters, who will end up fighting us later and that is the sad fact,” the lawmaker added.
Though laws have been passed granting the local governments the autonomy to manage their affairs, backed up with a Supreme Court ruling, the governors have been reluctant in implementing the laws and the apex court’s decision.
“If the constitutional court of the land has taken a decision on an issue, it should be recognised. At the constitutional amendment level, we are also fine-tuning that. This will, embolden the local government to be autonomous,” the Deputy Speaker said.
He said the President Bola Tinubu administration was desirous of implementing the local government autonomy because of its numerous advantages.
“Truly speaking, some of these interventions we are making is because of the weak local government system. If the local governments were working efficiently, there would be less for us to do, most of the legislators will focus more on law making and oversight functions.
“But, because there is a gap, that is why as representatives at the federal level, we are intervening to see that our constituents are not allowed to suffer,” he said.
Kalu also said implementation of autonomy would reduce the burden of government on the governors and allow them to develop their states through the local governments which would bring about jobs creation.
