By Joshua Egbodo
Abuja
Speaker, House of Representatives, Hon. Yakubu Dogara, has urged the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON), and the National Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE), to hold the state House of Assemblies responsible if the local government autonomy bill failed to gather the required number of ‘yes’ votes.
The Speaker stated this yesterday while receiving an award jointly presented to him by the two bodies at the National Assembly, Abuja.
Addressing his guests, Hon. Dogara said the ongoing scourge of human trafficking and slave trade will become impossible if local governments are given opportunities to provide developmental activities in the grassroots.
He called for developmental activities at the grassroots, which, according to him, can only be achieved when local governments are granted autonomy.
The lawmaker sought the support of all stakeholders and Nigerians to lobby their state legislatures to approve the proposed law seeking to grant autonomy to local governments.
“Recently, I was in Rome where we discussed about human trafficking and modern slavery. You need to see the kind of conditions that our citizens are subjected to. Some of you may have watched the footage on CNN where human beings like us, were auctioned, some for as low as $400. For me, I have never seen something that has jolted me really as this inhuman treatment of others by human beings….
“But the fact is that Nigerians even form a disproportionate number of individuals or persons that are being trafficked. So, we have the responsibility to address that. And how do we address that when some of these our brothers and sisters are running away? First of all, from conditions that are even worse than death and for some of them, like I said before, death is even better than life, and when an individual reaches that conclusion, it is very difficult to tame him, and all because of lack of opportunities.
“So, if we don’t free the grassroots, we don’t free the local government to provide developmental activities in the grassroots, chances are that opportunities will continue to narrow. And instead of providing conditions that make human trafficking impossible, we will be lagging behind and whether we like it or not, people will continue to flee conditions that they think will not offer them opportunity in life. Everyone is in search of opportunities to realise their God-given potential in life”, Dogara said.
Earlier, leader of the joint delegation, Mr. Ephraim Iyke, described Speaker Dogara as a reliable man of integrity and a man of the people, who had shown serious commitment towards the development of local governments.
Mr. Iyke pointed out that it was in realisation of all his contributions to the upliftment of the grassroots that the joint union decided to give him an award as a sign of appreciation.
