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It took a weighty statement, probably a slip of the tongue, on the part of then President Goodluck Jonathan for many Nigerians to come to grasps with how governors – or at least a vast majority of them – illegitimately appropriate and squander funds meant for local government councils in their states.
The date was April 15, 2014, and the President was in Kano to formally receive Malam (now Senator) Ibrahim Shekarau, the then immediate past governor of the state, who was defecting from APC to the ruling PDP with his teeming supporters. Engineer Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso was the Governor of Kano at the time, and there was a unanimity that the man had performed wonderfully well, especially in the development of education and infrastructure in the state.
But Jonathan opened what could well fit-in as a Pandora’s box when he challenged Kano people to ask their governor where he took N255 billion meant for the 44 local government areas of the state. He was referring to statutory allocations that accrued to the local governments from the Federation Account, from May 2011, when Kwankwaso took over power, and April 2014, when the challenge was being made.
Even though nobody has said it out before now, the reality is that Kwankwaso’s successor, Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, has received far above that figure in the first three years of his administration. Of course, he has had to settle about N300 billion worth of liabilities and ongoing projects shockingly bequeathed to him by Kwankwaso. Between January and November last year, for example, Ganduje received and singlehandedly controlled a whopping N84.75bn that ought to have gone to the 44 local governments of Kano State. This is aside from the statutory allocation for the state. The fact that he and a few governor colleagues try to spend these funds judiciously does not make it legal in any way.
It is an open secret that most governors in Nigeria have deployed a dubious platform called joint account, under which all monies accruing to local governments are lodged. Once those monies get into that infamous account, the governors assume full control and only give chairmen of the local governments a pittance, at times as ridiculously low as a million or two or even far less, often to keep body and soul together and settle the few hangers-on around them. It would then be up to the governor to pay salaries for workers of the local councils and, on rare occasions, execute one or two projects. He pockets the rest of the money, and you would be ostracized once you exposed this sad reality.
It is for that chief reason that elections to local government councils in Nigeria are worse than a joke. In most states of the federation, you hear of the ruling party winning everything, all chairmen of local governments and every councillor. Unlike other elections, governors are in full charge of local council elections, as they appoint the chairmen and members of the state electoral commissions. They then assign them one unambiguous mandate: return candidates of my party as winners in all the positions being contested for or risk being fired. Disgracefully, I have never heard of even one member or chairman of a state electoral commission resigning in protest to this totalitarianism. All they want is service to the belly, and the only way to ensure that is to do the governor’s bidding, however ridiculous.
The only exception, as far as I could remember, was, incidentally, Malam Ibrahim Shekarau, the man being received by President Jonathan at that time. When he held sway as governor of Kano State for two straight full terms of eight years, the Sardaunan Kano enthroned a transparent administration that ensured every dime of local government funds was promptly credited to the accounts of all the local governments. It was an era of prosperity in the state, and Shekarau used that to largely remove Kano from the list of states that tended to erupt in serious violence on slight pretexts. With money touching the grassroots, there was little time for mischief, and Kano was the better for it.
Apart from significantly reducing poverty by ensuring local government administration remained relevant in the state, Shekarau, also for the first time in the history of the state, ran a government of inclusiveness by appointing non-indigenes, Igbo, Yoruba, etc, to cabinet positions in government. But, since 2011 when he rounded off his second term of office, only one or two governors in Nigeria have been according local councils their dues. All the others have virtually deployed their immunity against prosecution to misappropriate the funds with reckless abandon.
To further understand how serious this situation is, please, study the table below to see the total amount that accrued to all the local government areas of each state of the Nigerian federation in only 11 months (January to November 2019) and multiply the figure at least by four, to get a complete picture of how much each governor has received in one term of office.
STATUTORY ALLOCATION THAT ACCRUED TO LOCAL GOVERNMENTS FROM JANUARY TO NOVEMBER 2019 ( TOTAL RECEIPT PER STATE):
Abia: N30.3 billion.
Adamawa: N37.76 billion
Anambra: N38.84 billion
Akwa Ibom: N54.42 billion
Bauchi: N42.97 billion
Bayelsa: N17.47 billion
Benue: N44.8 billion
Borno: N50.44 billion
Cross River: N32.45 billion
Delta: N40.46 billion
Ebonyi: N58.49 billion
Edo: N33.98 billion
Ekiti: N26.44 billion
Enugu: N33.18 billion
Abuja FCT: N28.46 billion
Gombe: N21.75 billion
Imo: N44.71 billion
Jigawa: N46.92 billion
Kaduna: N54.55 billion
Kano: N84.75 billion
Katsina: N62.87 billion
Kebbi: N39.29 billion
Kogi: N38.11 billion
Kwara: N28.6 billion
Lagos: N96.53 billion
Nasarawa: N24.92 billion
Niger: N47.45 billion
Ogun: N66.98 billion
Ondo: N34.27 billion
Osun: N44.27 billion
Oyo: N58 billion
Plateau: N34.61 billion
Rivers: N45.82 billion
Sokoto: N42.93 billion
Taraba: N31.76 billion
Yobe: N32.33 billion
Zamfara: N29.61 billion
Let’s not forget that the total collection above is only for 11 months in the preceding year. And any investigation would confirm that only about 10 per cent of the trillions of naira that governors collect on behalf of the 774 local governments in Nigeria go to the local councils. The fate of the balance is determined by only one person: the all-powerful governor. And it is on that score that poverty is becoming more grinding in the grassroots.
Every day in Nigeria, some poor compatriots die because they cannot afford N500 medication or even less. Only a few citizens could access their governors. And even fewer could access the country’s President. With local governments rendered comatose and useless, there comes the feeling of hopelessness on the part of locals who, hitherto, could easily access their local boss and get one or two solutions to their problems granted.
So, you can see that, even if the money would be stolen, as always alleged to justify the serious act of illegality on the part of the governors, the stealing would be done by 44 thieves (representing local councils in a state like Kano) and it would widely trickle down to the grassroots. While by no means justifying thievery of any kind, the fact remains it is better than having just one person, the governor, stealing everything all alone, with only a few around him benefitting.
If we are serious and truly interested in getting to the root of our security problems, we must ensure local governments are returned to relevance and state governors completely stopped from stealing monies meant for the third tier of government. Unless this is done, we can choose to appoint a million service chiefs for our armed forces and procure the best equipment for the police and our military, with very limited success. That’s just the bitter truth. We should all rally round the National Financial Intelligence Unit in its fight in that regard. It is by all means the only way to enthrone a renewed era of relative prosperity in the grassroot members of society and give them some hope in life. It is one of the easiest ways President Muhammadu Buhari could realise his dream of lifting 100 million Nigerians out of poverty.
A few days ago, the African Development Bank (AfDB) released its African Economic Outlook for 2020. It was a damning but factual report showing half of Nigeria’s 36 states are worst hit by very high levels of poverty, far above the 69 per cent national average, which in itself is one of the highest in the whole world.
What that means is that, out of a projected population of 180 million people, 124 million of them live in abject poverty. If the population figure now touted to be 200 million is the one that is correct, it means about three quarters of the country’s population are in dire straits, unable to meet the basic necessities of life, food, clothing and shelter.
The National Bureau of Statistics has also released a report showing rising inflationary trends, triggered mostly by closure of our borders to neighboring countries, and the fact that the border closure has been matched by our inability to meet local consumption demands.
On December 3, 2017, I was driving with my family in the city of Abuja around 8pm when I was accosted by what I thought were personnel of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), as the gunmen had no uniforms. It was only when I pulled over as instructed that I realised I was face-to-face with daredevil armed robbers. One of them was so emaciated that I thought if I gave him a dirty slap, he would pass out. But then he was wielding a gun, by virtue of which he was the boss. Everything he demanded, I replied very positively with a “yes, sir.”
After robbing us to their satisfaction, the lean one turned to me and somewhat apologised, saying they were forced into crime because he in particular had a master’s degree, but that all his efforts to secure a job or raise some capital for small business met a brick wall. Certainly, this cannot be an excuse for anyone to take to crime, but it underscores the desperation driving it in many cases. The news of that sad incident was widely reported by many national newspapers, but since then I and many other colleagues have either been robbed again, or had members of our families kidnapped in various parts of the country.
For the first time in our history, owing to deep feelings of abandonment and hopelessness on the part of our locals, cattle rustling assumed a dimension that is frightening in nature. The Fulani were getting dispossessed of their only means of livelihood by some locals, and some of them took up arms fighting imaginary enemies. Soon, some politicians saw that as a means to get at their opponents, and sophisticated weapons were procured for the Fulani to wreck havoc. It is now a full-scale war, with banditry and kidnapping becoming the most lucrative businesses in town.
I was amused the other day when I read reports that some elders in Borno State were expressing disappointment in the Chief of Army Staff and his air force counterpart, saying the two military chiefs have let them down. I wonder where the elders were when a former governor of the state was seriously arming and funding what has metamorphosed to Boko Haram just for its adherents to attack his political opponents and ensure he and his cronies always won elections. I also wonder where these elders were when the people of Maiduguri, the birthplace of the Boko Haram monster, were providing full kinship support to members of the terror group, giving them support because they were their own siblings and children. It is sad to note that there are still people in that ancient city who have continued to give this kinship support to Boko Haram members, and we all know that once they stop doing so the monster would altogether come to a decisive end.
During the general election of 2019, we all witnessed how some governors procured sophisticated weapons and gave then to militias that they formed to intimidate (and at times kill) members of the opposition, just to ensure they won the elections. Even in the latest elections that took place in Bayelsa and Kogi, the same thing played out. In Kogi, for example, an opposition woman leader was roasted alive in her house by heartless thugs hired by the ruling political party in the state.
Sadly, most of these governors always abandon these thugs after “winning” the elections, and the thugs, faced with complete hopelessness, and being used to easy money, resort to crime to have their way and maintain their illicit lifestyle. Unfortunately, the masses have always been the ones at the receiving end because neither the governors nor members of their families could easily be reached and attacked by the monster they formed and oiled. 
From North to South, West to East, this is the situation virtually everywhere in Nigeria. It is the survival of the fittest.
Unprecedented greed and serious desperation for power are at the heart of most of the problems bedeviling the nation. Our political leaders hardly care about the fate of the country, and the nation can go to blazes inasmuch as they will remain in power. What then are we talking about when we keep complaining of rising insecurity and blaming only the military, whose job, as Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila said earlier in the week after visiting President Buhari, is protection of our country against external aggression? The police that are suppose to tackle internal security are ill-equipped and ill-funded, largely because the money to do so has been stolen by politicians of the old (and in some cases even the present) dispensation, who we still adore and always eulogise.
One is by no means resting all the blame on the footsteps of only the governors, who, as some may argue, are only chief security officers of their states by name. But the fact remains that whenever we are talking about how the entire problem took its firm roots, we simply cannot exonerate the governors. It is either they directly contributed in deepening our insecurity by forming and arming militias, or have done so by deepening poverty and hopelessness in the grassroots.
Most of the governors who have collected hundreds of billions of naira since coming to office could hardly pinpoint at even one project that justifies a significant percentage of the colossal amounts they have received. In many of those states, the governors have succeeded in enthroning a reign of terror that brooks no opposition. A few states are lucky, though, and in most cases, you find that the security situation in those few states is not as bad as others where misgovernance is the norm, rather than the exception.
Of course there are some exceptions even to that, like in Kaduna, where the governor is working very hard, but is inadvertently contributing in worsening the security situation in his state by his unguarded utterances and exclusive style of governance. There is also the fact that he has the misfortune of his state inhabiting almost the entire stretch of the main highway linking the north-west with Abuja. Until very recently when the security services upped the ante, the Kaduna-Abuja highway used to record the highest number of incidences of brutal kidnappings in Nigeria.
Another factor contributing to serious poverty and insecurity in many states is lack of capacity on the part of the governors. The people elected them because some godfather asked them to do so, or owing to misperception that the man has the magic wand to make all problems disappear overnight. As Bill Gates had cause to tell the federal government a year ago, you cannot achieve much when you don’t develop the human capital. Sadly, you find many governors engaging in white elephants projects just to create the impression that they are working, and to use the procurement process to shortchange their people.
In reality however, these are wasteful projects that add no true value to the lives of the people. In this, the blame is shared with the federal government, as some of its political appointees have continued to also exhibit an unmistakable lack of capacity to deliver on the mandates assigned to them by Mr. President.
Many Nigerians must by now have forgotten of the existence of the National Orientation Agency, because the agency is busy doing virtually nothing. Yet, this is the time in our national history that its services are needed most, with more and more Nigerians getting divided along ethnic and religious lines.
Many Nigerians have also forgotten to take cognizance of the international dimension that our war against terror has since assumed. Of course if previous administrations, particularly that of Goodluck Jonathan, had done the needful, Boko Haram will have been history even before Buhari became President. But we wasted so much precious time blaming the North as using the Boko boys to destabilize that government, an allegation that was totally unfounded, as the war started two years before Jonathan became President, at a time a Muslim from the North was the President.
In reality, most of what is being experienced, or what we call a spike in the rate of crime, was occasioned by the fact that this is a new war being fought by an enemy that is far more sophisticated than Boko Haram; an enemy that has humongous resources at his disposal ; an enemy possessing some of the most sophisticated weapons in the world. ISIS is richer than many countries of the world. And it has spread its tentacles everywhere, especially Africa where it operates under the banner of ISWAP. There are also reported cases of foreign powers working very hard to entangle Nigeria and dismember the Federation.
Let’s not forget that defeating such an enemy, or routing him completely, is one task that has defied even the best military in the world. Till today, the decades long fight against the Talibans of Afghanistan is ongoing. So also ISIS and other terror cells globally. The reason is simple: the security services are not magicians. They mostly rely on credible information from the citizenry to crack even the most difficult nuts.
But this is hardly forthcoming when a section of the citizenry feel they should rather protect the terrorists because they belong to the same religion or tribe. It is for that reason the war against terror is still ongoing in Afghanistan and other places. And it is for the same reason that Boko Haram keeps resurfacing, partnering with foreign powers to continue to remain afloat. Yet, for political reasons, you find members of that same tribe condemning the same forces that have been sacrificing their lives to give them protection.
