…discuss S/Court ruling on LGs autonomy
By Lawrence Olaoye, Abuja
The Nigerian Governors Forum (NGF) has met with the Traditional Rulers Council of Nigeria (TRCN) to discuss a bill seeking to specify roles for the traditional rulers in the country.
At a joint briefing by Ogun state governor, Dapo Abiodun and the Etsu Nupe, HRH Yahaya Abubakar, after the meeting chaired by the NGF Chairman and the governor of Kwara state, Abdurahman AbdulRazak, Abiodun said the meeting was convened at the instance of the governors.
He said the meeting resolved that the bill on the constitutional roles for inthe traditional rulers currently before the National Assembly be circulated round to allow inputs.
He also disclosed that the meeting resolved that “a joint committee of governors and our traditional rulers should be set up, and that committee should seek to ensure that the various remarks and comments that were made from those that are here present that reflect the desires of those that they represent, should be included to make for a robust document and memoranda should also be called for and received, and all that should be synthesized so that whatever document will be presented to the National Assembly will be a very comprehensive,a very inclusive document that seeks to empower our royal majesties.”
“We further deliberated also on the issues of peace and security, food security, and all other emerging threats . The participation of our traditional rulers was also, again, underscored. More so, since they are the closest to the grassroots. And fortunately , we are blessed with many of them who are extremely experienced , extremely lettered, extremely knowledgeable, and we have our retired soldiers that indeed their contributions at that level cannot be overestimated, and a lot of reference was drawn from what obtained in the past.
“Some remarks were made, and rightly so, that our traditional rulers, being close to the grassroots, know their communities better than those of us in government that are higher up. They know the miscreants. They know the families of everybody. They are able to better participate in community policing. They’re able to better provide us with intelligence that will also aid and help our law enforcement architecture.
We discussed and talked about the issues of state policing. We talked about the issue of Gender Based Violence, and of note was the initiative of His Eminence, Sultan, who has a foundation that has done quite a lot of work in that respect.”
He continued “We spoke about the impact, or otherwise of local government autonomy on traditional rulers. The idea was to inform them of what the Supreme Court ruling indeed means, so that they have a better understanding of the impact of that ruling when implementation commences.”
The Etsu Nupe in his remarks said the TRCN chaired by the Sultan of Sokoto, H.E. Abubakar Sa’ad, was happy for the meeting noting that it was the first of its kind.
The Etsu Nupe said he had already submitted a bill to the National Constitution Amendment Committee detailing the proposed constitutional roles of traditional rulers
He disclosed that the meeting also discussed the funding of the TRCN adding that a 15-man committee chaired by the Imo state governor, Hope Uzodinma was set up at the meeting to look into the issues raised at the meeting.