Legislature Advocates for Financial Autonomy

A public forum held in Abuja recently provided another opportunity for the financial autonomy of the legislature at state levels to be put on the front burner of national discourse.

A recently organized forum in Abuja has discussed the issue of financial autonomy of the legislature at state levels.

Financial autonomy grants the state assemblies the liberty to directly access budgetary allocations devoid of permission from the executive.

At the forum, Deputy President of the Senate and Chairman of the Senate Committee on Constitutional Reform, Ike Ekweremadu, disclosedthat financial autonomy “is the most important constitutional empowerment required by the state Houses of Assembly for effective leadership for the interest of democracy and development”.

The National Assembly (Senate and House of Representatives) has been observed to struggle to attain its current level of self-reliance which has aided the National Assembly’s discharge of its constitutional duty of checks and balances at the federal level.

Though the Legislature at the national level has not put to use its constitutional authority to impeach a President or Vice President, it has evidently exercised its other functions

However, the discharge of the National Assembly duties is contrary to that obtainable at the state level, where the legislature are strongly attached to the executive governors.

The Governors control the access of the legislature and judiciary to budgetary allocations.

According to vanguard, from their elevated positions, the governors deny the legislatures their capacity to manage the budgetary allocations. This has made the legislature unable to effectively hold the governors accountable since the governors have some control over them.

This definitely does not suitable our democratic process.