The supremacy battle between Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State and his predecessor, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, over who makes appointments into the Local Government Areas and the Local Council Development Areas was on Tuesday laid to rest when the latter bowed to pressure from the Governor’s Advisory Council, a decision making body consisting of Tinubu, Fashola and other top members of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Now, the party is to appoint replacements for the outgone council chairmen thus overriding the instruction by Fashola that the council managers should take over temporarily pending the appointment of five people each including a Director as the Executive Secretary.
The plan by the APC had been to hold power at the grassroots in other to have an advantage over other parties in the 2015 general elections. However, because of the political calculations between Tinubu and Fashola, concerning who succeeds the governor, Fashola made moves to hold on to the councils as part of his structure.
But at a meeting of the council in Lagos, the members were able to convince Fashola to relinquish his stand and to adopt the Transitional Council decided upon by the APC for the progress of the party in the State.
In what seems like a confirmation on Tuesday, Fashola said the State Government would soon constitute a Transition Councils to manage the Local Governments following the recent expiration of the tenure of the former council chairmen.
The governor, who spoke in an interview with journalists at the Nigeria Police College Parade Ground, Ikeja venue of the 5th Year Anniversary of Uniformed Voluntary Clubs in Lagos State Public Schools, said the Transition Council, to be comprised of politicians, would hold forth during the transition period when the process of conducting voter’s registration update and ward delineation would be concluded preparatory to the State holding elections.
The governor, who also spoke of the Federal Road Maintenance Agency (FERMA) Task Force now deployed on the State’s and federal roads reportedly to manage traffic, condemned the creation of a parallel and unlawful traffic agency to manage traffic on State and Federal roads in Lagos saying such creation amounted to a misuse of the Subsidy Re-investment and Empowerment (SURE-P) programme funds.
The governor noted that since the agencies authorized by law to manage traffic on the State’s and Federal roads – the Lagos State Traffic Management Agency (LASTMA) and the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) – are fully on ground in the State, the deployment of some men and women in black uniforms on the same roads must be for purposes other than traffic management.
He expressed regrets that instead of re-investing the fund, which, according to him, was the savings on the subsidy following the expenditure of over N2 trillion, to empower Nigerians and improve their lives, it is now being dissipated on political organizations in wanton desperation to win elections adding that such misuse of the funds was a total departure from its purpose of improving the lives of Nigerians.
Governor Fashola told newsmen: “it is for Nigerians and Lagosians to now ask themselves honestly whether the Federal Government and President have been honest with us, because they said this SURE- P money, would be used to improve the life of Nigerians.
“I know that in the season of elections, you will see all sorts of misbehaviour. The reports were brought to me that they were men of FERMA, I think that is what they have done with SURE-P money.
“They told us that the savings were going to be used to improve our lives, so you see how it is improving our lives, setting up an organization that has no law two or three months before elections; an organisation that does nothing,”
He pointed out that SURE-P money should be going into the repair of Federal Highways in the State such as the Tin-Can Island – Apapa- Oshodi Expressway where, according to him, a container fell and crushed a car on Monday as a result of the dilapidated nature of the road.
Warning Lagosians that the black uniformed men may be on the roads to precipitate confusion, Governor Fashola declared: “this is a method that has been tried before in 2006 and the results it produced were roundly defeated; so if they go back to a method that does not work, we will not be provoked, we expect that at some point in time commonsense will prevail.
“They have no right to manage traffic ; the only agencies empowered by law to manage traffic in Lagos is LASTMA and Federal Road Safety on Federal roads, and citizens should just resist them and refuse to cooperate with them,” Fashola said