Lawyer and human rights activist, Liborous Oshoma, has criticised the federal government for seizing N130bn local government funds belonging to Osun State, supporting the demand for the release of the seized funds to Governor Ademola Adeleke.
Speaking on Monday during an interview on Arise Television, Oshoma said this was happening because Nigerian had a feeding bottle system of government.
Recall that Governor Adeleke had demanded the immediate release of over N130 billion in statutory allocations allegedly withheld from the local governments of the state.
Reacting, Oshoma said, “Everyone rushes to Abuja at the end of the month to suck from a feeding bottle.
“When you practice a federal system of government, truly, revenue should be generated from the bottom to the top, not the idea of the federal government gathering all of the revenue while the states and Local Governments queue up to collect.
“It’s like the state and local government will queue up. You take your own, you take your and that’s why it is happening. And so if you are not in line with the government at the centre, you just miss a line, or you fall out of line a little bit, then they can use this technicality oh yes, there were issues with the local government election that you conducted.
“The government cannot consistently hold on to funds meant for local government and then talk about democracy and preach integrity. The option available to President Tinubu is to order the Minister of Finance and the Central Bank Nigeria, CBN, to release the allocation meant for thes local governments.
“And then you cannot begin to look for a political solution, to say, well, a tenure was subsisting before it was truncated. Pay them for the time or for the duration of the unexpired term of their tenure. And then you can start on a clean slate.
“But to consistently hold on to the funds is not right because it is the ordinary people of Osun that are suffering and they are not the governor.”
