Why states go to Abuja monthly for printed banknotes to pay civil servants – Olisa Agbakoba

Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Olisa Agbakoba, has said that states go to the federal government monthly for printed banknotes to pay civil servants because of the concentration of power at the centre.

The former President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) said that the office of the President wields too much power that does not promote the needed development in the states, hence, the need for devolution of power.

“The thesis behind my policy document is ‘Let’s fix the constitution’ and we can only fix the constitution by looking at the nature of our federalism,” he said during an interview on Channels Television’s Politics Today.

“It’s too strong, Abuja is the competition. Everyone wants to be in Abuja because all the power is in Abuja. There’s no power in my local government where I come from in Onitsha.

“If you want economic prosperity, involve more of the political leaders in the process. We have 774 local governments and 36 governors who are idle, maybe Lagos and Rivers. Other states are bankrupt. They depend on printed money from the Central Bank (of Nigeria), they are absolutely physically deficit, they can’t function. They have to come to Abuja every month for printed banknotes to go and pay their civil servants…The only way to make it (Nigeria) work is to devolve power from the centre down to the states.”

Agbakoba said President Bola Tinubu has the capacity to drive the process that will lead to the emergence of a new constitution that will be acceptable to Nigerians.

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