The Ondo State Governor, Mr. Rotimi Akeredolu, has frozen accounts of the 18 local councils in the state through a circular signed by the state government.
The 18 chairmen and 203 councillors of the councils were members of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), who were elected into the offices after winning the April 2016 poll.
The Guardian reports that salaries of the political appointees in the 18 councils had been stopped as their names have allegedly been removed from the payment voucher of the government.
The affected appointees include secretaries of the councils, personal assistants, special advisers, chiefs of staff, among others. Consequent upon this, a source, who pleaded anonymity, said that the chairmen would not be able to have access to the accounts of their respective councils again until further notice.
“The government has frozen the councils’ accounts since last week and all the council chairmen are aware already.“The implication of this is that the chairmen have been rendered powerless financially because they will not be able to take or spend any money from the council’s purse henceforth,” the source said.
Meanwhile, chairman of the Ondo State chapter of the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria, Mr. Bayo Alarapon, confirmed the development, saying the association had not yet decided on the next action on the matter.
Alarapon, who is the chairman of the Akure South Local Council, said, “We have not really gone into the matter, but we are already into it and whatever we decide later, we will let the world know.”
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