More ideas, not money.
A recent lamentation of most governors today (probably with the exception of Fashola only) is that they have little monthly allocation from the federal purse. This, they argue, is the reason why they fail woefully in the delivery of their own part of the social contract they have with the electorate. Thus, for many of these governors, if only the Federal Government were to increase their allocation – or as the Northern Governors are canvassing – reduce the allocation due oil-producing states, perhaps they would finally be able to build that much-needed health centre instead of buying yet another mansion in London or Dubai. If only.

But this is a lazy argument at best, and a downright nonsensical excuse for the state executives to continue stealing their state blind, while doing little or nothing to justify the trust reposed on them by the electorate.

States are not departments in the office of the Presidency. They are geographically distinct political entities empowered with the authority to self-govern themselves without undue interference from the centre. As self-governing entities, they are saddled with the responsibility of ensuring that the wheels of state keep turning by generating revenue from their various populations, and using same to better their lot. Therefore, when a governor laments that the reason he has not paid workers’ salaries or equipped primary health care centres or maintained the physical infrastructure of his state is because the money he gets from the Federal Government is little, he’s just not being honest. And that’s putting it mildly.

The problem with our state governors is that they are either too damn lazy or are bereft of the required imagination to lead. How else do you explain that a state like Bayelsa which is blessed with natural resources such as clay, limestone and lignite among others – crude oil included – still has over 90% of its budget funded by allocations from the federal government, and way less than 10% funded by internally generated revenue? Or that Abia state, blessed with, among other things, gypsum, igneous rocks and laterite, as well as oil and gas, still has perhaps the most deplorable state of physical infrastructure in the South-East, if not the whole of Nigeria? How on God’s green earth do you explain to the Northerners that the reason their governors abandoned the very agriculture that built their economy was because oil was found in the far-away Niger-Delta? How do you explain to anybody that cares to listen that despite being unbelievably endowed with so many resources, Nigeria ranks low in Human Development Index – in Africa!

The danger here is that, thanks to their governors, most states remain perpetually underdeveloped because as soon as the cheque from Abuja clears, salaries are paid, Local Government Transitional Chairmen are sorted, the First Lady’s office is funded, political jobbers are settled, then that useless, substandard overhead bridge in that little corner of the state will be refurbished again. Life goes back to its normal swing till the next pay day.

As the nation saunters towards yet another round of ‘constitutional amendments’, and as the Northern Governors battle their Southern counterparts over the derivation fund, perhaps it is time we input into our revenue sharing formula, a clause that deducts a certain percentage from what would normally be accruable to states if they fail to develop to a reasonable extent, whatever resources they have. There should also be a constitutional provision that bars any governor or president from seeking a second term if they do not perform up to a certain agreed standard – subject to independent verification, of course. Lastly, security votes, that dubious vehicle through which governors deplete their state coffers without accountability, should be done away with. And while we’re at it, for a period of at least four years, money from oil sales should not be shared. Do this, and we will know those who have what it takes to govern.

As we continue with the business of making Nigeria work, it is my opinion that our governors don’t need more aides, more power or more money. They need only more ideas. Reasonable, practical and workable ideas. In the absence of this, they can all just migrate to hell.
http://goo.gl/ruauZ

This is a post from Gorge Enema's Facebook wall. Yours could also appear here.