The Association of Local Governments (ALGON) said the 774 local governments are to open dedicated accounts with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) for the direct disbursement of allocations to them from the Federation Account.
ALGON National President, Bello Lawal Yandaki made this known at the weekend in Katsina State in an interview with newsmen where he allayed fears arising from the delay of the direct disbursement of the funds to councils.
Furthermore, Yandaki hinged the delay to the failure of councils to submit necessary bank details to the Federation Accounts and Allocations Committee (FAAC) required for facilitating the payments.
“The CBN is presently awaiting directives from the Federal Government to open local government accounts for the respective states, which can be done between 24 and 48 hours for each.
“I am a member of the sub-committee that was set up to trash out contentious grey areas, and we have already met relevant stakeholders, including labour unions, local government chairmen, NULGE, and so on.
“There’s a general agreement that the commencement of direct federal revenue allocations to LGs will be this January.
“Hopefully, we are just rounding off meetings and making submissions to the Federal Government for implantation and there’s no set timeline,’’ he said.
