Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari has said that some state governors are actively involved in encouraging corruption in their various local governments; a development which he said had made development at the grassroots level impossible.
This statement was made by the president during his meeting with members of the Senior Executive Course (SEC) of the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS). In explaining his point, President Buhari also went on to state his personal experiences in fighting corruption and his discoveries on the way certain state governments treated and continued to treat local governments.
According to the president “What they do, in my personal experience, if the money for the Federation Account is about N100 million, they will send N50 million to the chairman but sign that he received N100 million.” He explained that the governor would then go ahead and pocket the balance, sharing it with fellow conspirators.
The president called the practice horrible and vowed to put a stop to it, starting with a promise to act on the NIPSS report presented to him on strengthening local governance.