Ayodeji Abass-Aleshinloye, former chairman of the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON) in Oyo, says freezing the state account over the unpaid N3.5 billion entitlements of sacked council chairpersons was caused by Governor Seyi Makinde and other state officials’ arrogance.

“The lesson from this judgment is that the government must always allow the rule of law to thrive,” Mr Abass-Aleshinloye stated. “There should be less arrogance on the part of the executives, especially when it comes to legal issues.”

Justice A.O. Ebong of the Abuja Division of the Federal High Court had, on December 15, issued an order freezing the accounts of the Oyo government in 10 commercial banks in the country.

Mr Ebong gave the order while ruling on a garnishee proceeding initiated by the local government chairpersons sacked on May 29, 2019, by the Oyo governor.

The former council chairpersons and councillors had, in 2021, got a N4,874,889,425 judgment against Mr Makinde and other officials and agencies of the state.

Reacting to the judgment, Mr Abass-Aleshinloye said it was unfortunate that 27 out of their members who took the government to court had died in the course of pursuing their entitlements.

He attributed their death to a lack of money to take care of their health challenges, adding that their passing away was avoidable.

“We got a judgment that the state government should pay us our entitlements, but they refused to pay at that time and were just wasting our time,” he said.

Mr Abass-Aleshinloye, ex-chairman of Oluyole LGA, expressed sadness over situations where Supreme Court judgments were disobeyed with impunity.

“We got a judgment at the Supreme Court, only for it not to be obeyed. It is very unfortunate that we have to go to court to freeze government accounts,” he said.

The former ALGON chairman called on other state governments to learn from this development and shun the habit of sacking democratically-elected council chairpersons and councillors to avoid this development.

(NAN)