National President of NULGE
[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE) has raised alarm over the alleged new tactics of the state governors to steal local governments’ funds.
The National President of NULGE, Ibrahim Khaleel, told The PUNCH that the state
governments had come up with another means of siphoning money from the local
governments’ accounts despite the Nigerian Financial Intelligent Unit (NFIU) financial
guidelines.
Also, NULGE has written a letter to all the nation’s 774 local governments’ chairmen on August 9 to alert them to the fact that the governors might be planning fresh style to steal the LG funds.
It warned the council bosses and workers against helping the governors to steal the LGs’ money.
The NFIU had directed the state governments to stop tampering with local government funds.
The NFIU had on May 6, 2019 issued the ‘Guidelines to Reduce Vulnerabilities Created by Cash Withdrawals from Local Government Funds throughout Nigeria.’ By this, governors have been stopped from tampering with the funds meant for local government areas.
The guidelines took effect from June 1.
But Khaleel accused the state governments across the country of forcing local governments to pay levies to them from the fund apportioned to the councils from the federation account.
He said local governments were being asked to contribute to the running of some projects in states which ordinarily were the responsibilities of state governments.
When contacted on whether the council workers had reported any governor to the
NFIU for the alleged diversion of the LG funds, the unit’s spokesman, Sani Tukur, confirmed that the NULGE has reported the governors, adding that NULGE had reached out to the unit officially on the issue.
–Punch–