Sunday Edition — 774 Reasons To Look In The Mirror

EDITOR'S NOTE

Every disagreement starts the same way: pointing at the other person. In this week's essay, Gbadebo Adeyemi opens in a marriage counsellor's office to show how quickly blame becomes a reflex, then turns that same instinct on Nigeria's relationship with its own government. Tracing the billions allocated to Nigeria's 774 local governments each year, he makes the case that real accountability starts with a question most people never bother to ask: where did the money go? It's an essay about counselling, but really, it's about the mirror.

NIGERIA'S PROBLEM IS YOU

 

So, marriage counselling. I know, I tend to always come with analogies, but please just indulge me. Imagine that you are a licensed therapist, a job most of us do without licenses. You come into the office after spending a ridiculous amount of time in traffic, shameless plug to read my previous article, and look at your calendar. Your first appointment for the day is a married couple; this is your first session with them. Per your policies, your assistant has asked them to fill out a form designed to give you an idea of why they scheduled a session. The first question is, "why have you scheduled a session with us?" The answer is simple and straight to the point: "on the verge of divorce!". They even added an exclamation mark to let you know it's serious. You let them in, and after chuckling at the fact that they somehow are wearing matching clothes, you open with a question: "so, what went wrong?". Let's freeze the frame here, what do you think the response will be, after you tell them the customary "one at a time please"? Most likely, they will, in some way, start their responses with the words "he" or "she", implying the other person is at fault. Most likely, neither of them will start their statements with "I".

The thing about the picture painted in the first paragraph is that it applies to almost all relationships we have in life, be it a parent-child relationship, friendships, and even with your colleagues at work. In each relationship, when a situation occurs, the human instinct is to defend. This also applies to our relationship with the government.

This can apply to different facets of the government at large, but for the purposes of this article, we will talk about local government. In 2023, 2.53 trillion naira was disbursed to local governments across Nigeria¹. In 2024, it became 3.77 trillion². In 2025, 5.35 trillion³. Why is this important? Well, President Buhari did a lot of things, things we will continue to discover over time, but one of the arguably good things he did was that he granted financial and administrative autonomy to local governments⁴. Effectively, local governments can do as they please.

Nigeria has 774 local governments, and the allocation given to each local government is not the same for various reasons, but for context, between July 2024 and June 2025, the local government receiving the least funding from the federal government received 3.48 billion naira⁵. That local government, with financial and administrative autonomy, received 290 million naira per month. On the other side of the spectrum, the local government with the highest allocation in the same period was Alimosho in Lagos, receiving 29.3 billion naira⁵. That's 2.4 billion naira per month.

Before I go on, it is very important for me to add that there have been times where the funding for the local governments, shall we say "got stuck" in the state and/or the federal account and didn't reach the local government. Multiple times to be honest. Which is why, in 2024, the federal government took the states to court. The Attorney-General of the Federation filed suit against the Attorney-General of Abia State and 35 others, effectively, every other state in the country, asking the Supreme Court to settle, once and for all, whether governors could keep holding on to money that belonged to local governments. In July 2024, the Supreme Court ruled that they couldn't: LGA funds must go directly into LGA accounts, not through the states first⁶.

This is not something to be glossed over if you know the history of Nigeria. By the mere fact that Nigeria has largely been under military rule in its existence, the need to ensure control has always been intertwined with leadership. After the coup of January 1966, for example, the federal military government abolished the regional police forces that had existed until then, folding them into a single, centrally-commanded Nigeria Police Force⁷. Till today, the police force is managed centrally, with the state governors who are technically responsible for the safety of all citizens in their states, not having power over the police or the military in their state. And, clearly, it has not worked. The police officers are poorly trained, given subpar living conditions, largely unfit from what is seen on the roads, and grossly underpaid. And though it has been clear for decades that it does not work, the power is still central. Since Nigeria returned to democratic rule in 1999, a bill to create state police has been proposed and has failed to pass at least twice: once in the 8th National Assembly, and again in the 9th⁸. It took until the 10th National Assembly, in June 2026, for both chambers to finally pass a version of it, and even that isn't law yet: it still needs to be ratified by at least 24 of Nigeria's 36 State Houses of Assembly before it takes effect⁹. I say all of this to say, Nigerians who have power and control are not the best at giving it up; truth is that most likely, you included.

Back to the allocations given to the local governments, it is important to understand what they are for: development. Per the 1999 constitution as amended, the allocation is for¹⁰:

	•	Economic and infrastructure functions - effectively the construction and maintenance of roads, streets, drains, and also living areas like gardens and open spaces,
	•	Education - establishing and maintaining primary and pre-primary schools,
	•	Health and social functions,
	•	Agriculture and environment, including provision of public transportation.

So, in 2025, on average, local governments across the country received 6.9 billion naira directly to their accounts, for the above and more. So, at this point, what does this have to do with you? And what does it have to do with a mirror?

Well, one of the most important things in any democratic environment is requesting information. A simple "where did this money go", goes a long way. If, for instance, you see that your public hospitals don't have electricity, the public schools in your area don't have desks and chairs, the roads which lead to hours of traffic have not been fixed, there are no living areas where people can just exist, it may be wise to ask a few questions. And, the framework exists to ask those questions...kind of. The framework being, the Freedom of Information Act. To ensure transparency and accountability, Goodluck Jonathan signed the act in 2011¹¹ which gives Nigerians the legal right to access public records and information held by government at federal level, and as of 2025, at state level, based on the Supreme Court ruling in April 2025¹². But of course, Nigeria being Nigeria, with reference to the paragraph about power, the governments will do whatever they can, including ignoring you, to avoid answering those questions.

So, the local governments now have financial control in a way they never have, to build facilities to enrich their environments, moving away from the remnants of decrees from the military heads, with legal backing for citizens to request information in ways Nigeria has never seen. But still, it's not working... And the truth is, it is not working by design. But the good news is, there is a difference between something not working, and something that can't work. The former is true; the latter does not have to be.

The system can be re-designed within its design through voting, locally. Today, more than any other time, it is arguable that the most important election for you to participate in is the local government election. Think about what that means, on average, you are giving someone 6.9 billion naira to spend every year to build your local government for the betterment of your community. The power that the government has is enormous every day, almost every day. The power is enormous until that one day of elections, a day that even they, regardless of whatever they do in the background, are not 100% certain of its outcome. This is true today, largely because we have assumed that it is true, but does that have to be the case? Or, in a re-design, can we have the power that we need to make change every day?

Let's go back to that counselling office. The truth is, one party is usually more at fault than the other, and usually, the person who has less blame is not completely absolved of blame. More does not equal all. And, that's how we need to look at all our relationships, I would argue, including the one with the government. It's not a matter of them, he or she, it's a matter of us. It's a matter of attention, a matter of constant and consistent questioning, a matter of looking out for our neighbours and educating them, a matter of understanding that your vote is your power, but your power is useless without ensuring that you and your immediate environment are aligned on where you want to go together, as a community, as one community. The system is not designed to favour everyone, it can be rigged, no pun intended, to favour some over others, but it does not mean that it cannot be reversed. This is what I always try to tell her...sorry, wrong message, wrong office.

"Every day is for the thief, one day is for the owner". This may be true today, but it doesn't have to be.

Writer's Note: Please o, I didn't call anybody a thief. It's just a saying. Please.