Governor Nasir el-Rufai of Kaduna state has advocated for local government financial autonomy, just as he submitted a bill to Kaduna State House of Assembly to ensure autonomy of the legislative arm of government.
The bill is to enable the Assembly function more effectively and efficiently, having suffered from long years of military rule, el-Rufai said in a statement made available to Blueprint in Kaduna.
“We must preserve our democracy, work consciously to develop it. And part of that development is granting it financial autonomy, we fully support it. Even before these bills.
“Kaduna State House of Assembly will tell you that we have great respect for their financial autonomy and solvency. The agitation for the granting of financial autonomy to state Houses of Assembly is a welcome development across the country.
“Our bill is going to the House today and I hope it will be passed very quickly so that we can put in place the necessary framework as soon as possible. Governments must develop the legislature and we can only do that through better funding and sharing of ideas will enable all the state assembly service commissions to come and brainstorm and come up with better ways to support the legislature.
‘’So, I call on my colleague governors not to be scared of anything but to do what is right and things will work better in the interest of everyone. We are elected to serve the public and not to protect our personal interests,’’ he noted.
“Kaduna state government believes in doing what is right, we believe in experimenting, we believe in looking for solutions. If some thing is not working very well, look for a solution, try the solution and if it doesn’t work, adjust it. The governments are there to serve people, nothing is personal, nothing is permanent.
“So, one should always collaborate with others to find solutions to problems and if those solutions don’t work, we improve on them. We believe in that strongly, we have taken many chances, we have experimented with many things and most of them have worked.’’
