There is a new and important reality unfolding in Nigeria’s governance landscape: local governments are gaining greater fiscal autonomy at precisely the time when the federation’s revenue picture has improved significantly.
This convergence presents both an opportunity and a test.
For decades, local governments have complained that their responsibilities at the grassroots were not matched by adequate financial resources or sufficient control over their allocations. The constitutional and judicial push towards local government financial autonomy has therefore been welcomed as a potentially transformative development.
At the same time, the significant increase in allocations from the Federation Account has expanded the financial space available to the three tiers of government.
The question Nigerians are entitled to ask is simple: Where is the corresponding impact at the grassroots?
More money must translate into more development.
Autonomy must translate into accountability.
And increased allocation must ultimately translate into improved living conditions for the ordinary citizen.
The local government remains the closest tier of government to the people. It is where the pothole on the neighbourhood road is encountered, where the drainage that threatens to flood a community becomes a daily concern, where the primary healthcare centre serves as the first point of contact, and where basic sanitation and environmental challenges are most immediately felt.
If local governments now have greater control over their finances, Nigerians should reasonably expect a corresponding improvement in these areas.
This is not an argument for indiscriminate spending. It is a demand for measurable value.
The era when citizens were simply told that money had been allocated should give way to an era in which governments demonstrate what the money has achieved.
How many kilometres of local roads were rehabilitated?
How many primary healthcare centres were upgraded?
How many schools received meaningful intervention?
How much was spent on sanitation, drainage, street lighting and environmental management?
How many communities benefited from potable water projects?
How many young people were empowered with sustainable skills and economic opportunities?
These are the questions that should dominate the conversation around local government autonomy.
The Supreme Court’s intervention on local government financial autonomy was a landmark development in Nigeria’s democratic evolution. But autonomy, by itself, is not development. It is an instrument.
The real test is what local governments do with that instrument.
There is, however, another critical dimension to the autonomy conversation that must not be overlooked: the capacity and quality of those entrusted with governing at the grassroots. Financial autonomy will amount to little if the human capacity required to manage the resources and responsibilities that come with it is inadequate.
The total package for local government autonomy should therefore include a deliberate programme for improving the calibre, competence and professional capacity of those who govern at that level. Those entrusted with local government administration should possess the requisite educational qualifications and relevant knowledge to understand budgeting, public finance, procurement, project management, community development and modern governance.
Beyond formal qualifications, there should also be continuous training and capacity development. Governance is evolving rapidly, and the responsibilities of a contemporary local government chairman or councillor go far beyond attending meetings and approving expenditures. They must understand technology, data-driven planning, environmental management, public-private partnerships, human capital development and the increasingly complex demands of grassroots administration.
Autonomy should therefore produce not just financially empowered local governments, but competent, accountable and professionally equipped local governments.
We cannot give more resources and responsibilities to institutions without simultaneously strengthening the capacity of the people managing them. A bigger purse requires a better-informed and better-equipped leadership.
There is also a need to resist the temptation to interpret autonomy as freedom from scrutiny. Quite the opposite should be the case. Greater financial independence should come with greater transparency, accountability and citizen participation.
The local government chairman who controls more resources must also answer more questions.
Councillors must become more relevant in scrutinising budgets and expenditure. Local government audit systems must be strengthened. Procurement processes must be transparent. Citizens should be able to know what projects are being executed in their communities, how much they cost and when they are expected to be completed.
Technology can make this easier.
A publicly accessible local government project dashboard, for example, can list approved projects, locations, contractors, costs, timelines and implementation status. This would make it considerably more difficult for abandoned or fictitious projects to hide behind bureaucratic paperwork.
There is nothing unreasonable about demanding this level of accountability.
Indeed, it is the natural companion of autonomy.
The recent improvement in federation revenue also deserves closer scrutiny. Increased revenue provides governments with more resources to address infrastructure deficits, improve public services and invest in human capital. But an increase in revenue should not automatically translate into an increase in recurrent expenditure, political patronage or administrative overheads.
The people must see the difference.
Nigeria has suffered for too long from the paradox of governments announcing increased revenues while citizens continue to complain about deteriorating infrastructure and the rising cost of basic necessities.
At the local level, the contradiction becomes even more glaring when substantial allocations coexist with poor roads, inadequate sanitation, dysfunctional health centres and weak social services.
This is why the present moment calls for a new social contract between local governments and their citizens.
Local government autonomy should not simply relocate financial control from one political centre to another. It should bring government closer to the people in a practical and measurable way.
The ordinary citizen should be able to say: Yes, I can see where my local government’s money is going.
There is also a strong case for performance-based evaluation of local governments.
Why should every local government be judged merely by the amount it receives? Why not also judge it by what it delivers?
A local government that efficiently converts available resources into roads, healthcare, sanitation, education, employment opportunities and other measurable public goods should be recognised and encouraged. One that consistently fails to deliver should be subjected to appropriate scrutiny.
This is where state governments also have an important role to play. Autonomy should not become isolation. The three tiers of government must continue to collaborate on projects that require coordinated planning and implementation.
The objective should not be a turf war over who controls what.
The objective should be development.
For the Federal Government, the continuing improvement in revenue should provide room for greater investment in national infrastructure, security, economic productivity and human capital. For state governments, increased resources should strengthen their capacity to deliver quality services. For local governments, autonomy should finally provide the opportunity to become genuine engines of grassroots development.
Ultimately, Nigerians are not interested in accounting terminology.
They are interested in results.
They want to know whether the road to their homes is motorable. Whether their children can access quality basic education. Whether the primary healthcare centre nearby has qualified personnel and essential drugs. Whether their communities are clean and properly drained. Whether their local government can respond effectively to emergencies. Whether young people can find meaningful opportunities.
That is the real meaning of grassroots governance.
As local government autonomy becomes a more established reality and federation allocations continue to improve, the standard of expectation must rise accordingly.
More allocation should mean more development. More autonomy should mean more accountability. More resources should mean more results. And greater responsibility should mean better-qualified and continuously trained people entrusted with the responsibility of governance.
This is not an unreasonable demand. It is the minimum expectation of citizens in a functioning democracy.
Nigeria’s local governments now have an opportunity to prove that autonomy can move beyond constitutional debate and become a practical instrument of transformation.
The time has come for the people at the grassroots to feel the difference.
Autonomy without impact is merely administrative independence. Autonomy with accountability, competent leadership and measurable development is true grassroots democracy.
Oladejo is a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC)
