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From Godwin Tsa, Abuja
A Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Alex Izinyon, has urged the National Assembly to enact enabling laws to give adequate effect to the judgment of the Supreme Court on local government autonomy.
He lamented that despite the efforts of the apex court to ensure smooth administration of the local governments, the National Assembly has failed to live up to expectations. On July 11, 2024, the Supreme Court had, in a landmark judgment, declared that funds accruing to the local government areas in the country should be directly paid into their accounts for smooth LG administration.
According to Izinyon, as expected, the decision attracted several accolades from laymen, jurists, scholars, legal pundits and legal practitioners. He said as also expected, there is the other side of the divide who differ entirely.
“Their contention primarily, is that it amounted to judicial legislation and making pronouncement against the principle of federalism. Even politicians also had their day and say,” he said.
The senior lawyer, in his view, looked at the judgment from the perspective of the apex court being a court of law and policy in the course of balancing the socio-economic and political issues, in reaching the final decision in the interest of justice.
“The Supreme Court of Nigeria indubitably and constitutionally remains the final court of the land. They are final in all ramifications of finality in any dispute that are brought before it. This is because there is no other appeals after their judgment, except to God Almighty, where no mortal can file processes and argue same and return to us mortals, alive.
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“This brings to mind the words of the famous jurist and legal icon Chukwudifu Oputa of blessed memory, quoting the American jurist Robert Jackson in Adegoke Motors Ltd., V. Adesanya & Anor (1989) 3 NWLR (PT.109) 250 AT 274, PARA G on the finality of the Supreme Courts judgment where he puts it pungently thus: ‘We are final not because we are infallible; rather we are infallible because we are final’.
“The Supreme Court as a court of law and policy, over time even though final, have taken into consideration social, economic and political factors or called it the reality of time in arriving at certain decisions as a policy court. These are decisions that have a larger touch on the society as a whole, like the Nigerian citizens as a whole.
“The Supreme Court over the years has given laudable judgments as a policy court. These can be located in books and articles which are not the task of this space. I shall, however, pick a few to drive home this issue – the Supreme Court as a policy Court,” he said.
“After all, the cases referred to this piece where the governors have been sacking unconstitutionally, the democratically elected local government areas of the states, nothing had happened to correct these illegalities for many years by the National Assembly.
“Would it have served the interest of justice to allow the perpetual bastardisation and economic iniquities against councils by these governors? The emphatic answer is a NO. The Supreme Court as a policy court, indeed, considered this issue rightly.
“What is left is for the National Assembly to proceed with the enabling legislation to give teeth to this profound decision and make other adequate safeguards by legislation to ensure proper accountability and the relevant authorities to beam their search light in case the councils fall short of this golden opportunity.”
