Re: Tinubu okays N108b for states to tackle flooding, erosion, by Adewuyi ADEGBITE

Re: Tinubu okays N108b for states to tackle flooding, erosion, by Adewuyi ADEGBITE

Adewuyi Adegbite sends this piece via ayekooto05@gmail.com.

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu government is no doubt doing everything humanly possible to tackle myriad of problems facing this country though many may not see the results yet because of the hardship resulting from its economic policies. However, this should not becloud its positive impacts on the nation. One thing I realize is the president in most of his policies puts the cart before the horse as exemplifies by the news regarding the above caption. What I think is that some of his ministers are not doing their jobs. If not , one should not wait till the time calamity comes before finding solutions. This malady is not peculiar to the federal government but state governments have their own faults in this regard. And until this trend stops, the work of the Tinubu government would not be appreciated by the people. National Assembly is also guilty because it appears that they are not performing their oversight functions. As regards the flooding, ecologists and weather forecasters have been warning about impending flooding in many states of the federation and it appears the warnings have not been taken seriously. If the stakeholders concerned have taken the warnings seriously, the disaster that happened in Borno state could have been averted. Governor Zulum of Borno state is an hard working governor no doubt. However, how the flooding caught him napping is a conjecture. He has to set up a panel of enquiry to unravel how the dam which over flowed its banks happened without being detected by the ministry of water resources or the department concerned. This step could avert future occurrence and the officials called to question to serve as deterrent for othersfond of negligence of duty. In my own opinion, Asiwaju Tinubu rather than throwing billions of naira to states to tackle problems, he should call to question how the resources sent to the states for particular function is spent. We are in a democratic setting which guarantee separation of power and independence of of the states, nonetheless, not calling the states government to question would bring calamity to the nation and scarce and hard earned resources of the federal government would be wasted, whereas the federal government has its own functions to address. I don’t think there is no state that does not collect ecological funds. The question is what are they using the fund to do? Aside, the National Assembly collects constituency allowances to tackle problems in their constituencies which included flooding and other disasters from happening. I could remember that former majority leader in the house of representatives, Hon Mulikat Adeola Akande and Senators Abdufatai Buhari and Ayoade Adeseun used the ecological funds to channelize many rivers in Ogbomoso zone. If others could be using their funds as these political office holders did, many of the life-threatening disasters could have been avoided. #108 billion is a huge money that could be channeled to other areas of development if our leaders have been sincere in their duties to the nation. The ball is in the court of Mr. President in this regard. For Asiwaju Tinubu, the experience is there, he has the will, he is a tactician and loves the nation to the hilt. However, if he has to write his name in gold, he has to step on toes. Local government autonomy is a case study. He has incurred the wrath of many state governors who have turned the local government allocations into a conduit pipe to misappropriate the resources meant for the grassroots. On this he has written his name in gold. He should do that in other areas of governance drawing the hands of the clock of this nation back. Instead of throwing money around to be misappropriated by many governors, the federal government should cushion the effects of the flooding on Maiduguri victims and set up a panel to unravel the cause. This flooding was highly reported in the international media and the world is watching on how re-occurrence could be stopped.