Overcoming The Local Government Challenge In Bayelsa State

Bayelsa State has a local government challenge. How to make the local councils truly become the third tier of governance in a State that is so environmentally disadvantaged as to make rural development a far fetched reality. Out of the original 8 local government councils, namely Brass, Kolokuma/Opokuma, Nembe, Ogbia, Sagbama, Yenagoa, Ekeremor and South Ijaw {G8}, another 24 was created. Like Lagos State these 24 were not federally recognized but nevertheless funded by the State. These local Councils also maintain bank accounts and run overdrafts from Banks. As their monthly wage bill climb these councils often resort to accumulating outstanding payments to contractors just as the State may delay subventions while awaiting delayed federally collectible revenue. It is a chain that the Banks fill with relish The local governments have to worry about deductions at source on their allocation in the State and at the Federal levels, aside from the debt burden reported to have peaked at N669 million from the G8 as far back as June 2007.As for the G24, another N374 million. These are debts from political activities. Imagine yourself a local government chairman whose election or appointment came by an’ act of God’ as it is often claimed, and deep within you, you know that god. Then the allocation from the Federal government has been announced for the month and the amorphous local council Chairman’s association decides to schedule a frivolous political program and levy you N50million. You know it is your party acting under this umbrella for accounting purposes and that your ‘god’ is there. Before you can say Jack Robinson they have withdrawn it at source. But thanks goodness that means that regulatory search light is reduced until there is another political tithe to pay. So when you have no where to complete the teachers wage bill you can owe them or you borrow from bank or you can owe contractors. This was the situation that Governor Timipre Sylva met and began his local government reforms kicking off with a staff audit that exposed so many ghost workers and interests. There followed financial streamlining and regulation through the Local Government Ministry. Cheques were no longer to be signed by chairmen alone but the Directors of Personnel management ,who executed the coup while the Chairmen were out of power, became the helmsmen .And the Government comfortably prolonged the inauguration date of a newly elected Chairmen. Now After much pressure the new reform will be put into real test when the Local Government Elections come on stream next May. Meanwhile those who maintained three or more jobs at the local councils while living big in Yenagoa and doing part-time on political insurrections were ostensibly suddenly dried out. General liquidity arising from declining crude output and therefore federal account downturn went so low that the State Radio Station closed its transmission having failed to secure a 10 million naira reprieve for basic equipment.. The Due Process sat tight on payments scrutinizing everything, watched over by Revenue Watch International, and the locals acting under the BEITI group. It was reasoned that the State would have become so indebted had it not adopted the Local Government Reforms and transparency within its trying periods, but the period presented some of the most potent political opposition that a State government would witness in Nigeria. You know about the Abuja agitations. You know about protracted peace meetings between political interests where truth were so easy to tell because it was backed by reality in transparency. So there appears to be a consensus to to support the Government through this new post Amnesty phase of peace and prosperity. yet the local government burden remains even if postponed. The challenge does not end in improved liquidity, as the Honorable Commissioner for Local Government ,Chief Owei-Zala wrote in his “Blueprint for overhauling the local government system and administration” in 2007,The performance of the local Government Councils is dismal and bereft of fiscal discipline” and he recommended reforms which are ongoing to boost fiscal discipline. However what the commissioner did not say is what he intends to do with councils that have no LEEDS document under which they can be regulated and partnered with by stakeholders. Funding without planning is expected to end in Bayelsa State with the release of the Bayelsa state sustainable Development Strategy Paper but that of the local councils are yet to be prepared or yet to be published in the State website. My little experience working with a firm on the LEEDS project in Bayelsa state last year revealed the wrong attitude of the councils that their plan will be written by someone else and delivered to them. It was of course difficult to reach the local government councils without personal risk by way of River transportation that is comparable to the early ancients. With Militants everywhere not particularly wearing badges around it was always lethal to go asking questions in the local governments in order to gather baseline data so much of the work is done in Yenagoa which predisposes the work to unreliability. The entire staffs of the local governments are probably still resident in the capital so they can rush home when news of inspection filters into town. To run a local government system that overlooks the terrain problems is to deceive one perpetually. There will be no substitute to federal government intervention through the Amnesty fund to develop River Transportation in the Niger Delta so that the Nations image can take a leap upwards, for as long as tourists are confronted with this neglect and cannot confirm the truth of what they are told without risking their own lives image branding is a joke. How can you convince a visitor that a good federally supported Rivers transportation in the reverine is too much to ask for? So is the argument that the federal government can fund local governments and leave the monitoring to the States and go to sleep only waking up to withhold revenue at source! How can the National planning commission sit down in Abuja to plan for the local councils broad based policies such as recommending the LEEDS approach but has no implementation measure to see it through? As far as the local governments stand, we have constructed a very big money drainer for Nigeria and you can see how the oil funds are wasted in duplication, in glorifying corruption yet you cannot but notice the watery argument that its real value may even lie in balancing between the educationally disadvantaged areas and their counterparts. All these schemes are making it impossible for the Niger Delta to receive the attention it deserves and even when the money come in, it is wasted under the most over bloated contortions of negative development. And so is the local government condrum in Bayelsa State. Pour in more money and it guzzles it through a network of Abrakadabra and the money returns to its source within a matter of days. Either it comes through recommendation of bankers to provide loans or over drafts, or political donations, or levies or delays in release of funds until the principal has been traded from above or fixed for some time or through the political cleavages that has been prepared in form of notes from above for the local council chairmen to take away the money on arrival. The States fare no better in this direction especially those who embrace transparency and still have to maintain their political commitments. It is in this light you will understand what governors like Timipre Sylva is going through at this moment of low liquidity. You would also understand his reluctance to allow Local Government election in such a system and why there is so much underdevelopment in the rural areas, despite the billions of naira poured into this bottomless pit. Furthermore you can understand why the local government councils re not keen to plan their own development except prodded from outside. It does not matter because all is a charade in a system that has no control nor boundaries. People can intervene in your State from anywhere under the guise of security or local government affairs and lift money meant for local development and meanwhile you sit there taking the questions and rap from the public and press. Unless other councils and states in the Niger Delta can join together to take their destiny in their own hands by way of joint economic commissions, the present hemorrhage of funds will continue. The political implication is that like today most elections in the Niger Delta Region are packaged from outside and any political leader seen to be attempting to be wise will be easily removed from the outside. The challenge that lies before this administration is keeping its vow to develop the Niger Delta Region through the present lopsided local Government system and these calls for the extraordinary approaches to Local Government reform being undertaken by the Timipre Sylva administration to date.