Delta 2023: Edevbie reveals plans to make local governments more effective

By Chizitelu Chukwujindum

The leading Peoples Democratic Party aspirant for Delta 2023 Governorship, Olorogun David Edevbie, has said part of his modernisation agenda is to make the local government councils more effective in the development of local communities and delivery of social services to the people.

The process, he said, will entail working with the local governments to raise their financial capacity, supporting the local councils to pay off debt owed pensioners and installing ICT backbone in all the 25 local government areas to aid digitisation of their operations and boost computer and digital literacy in all communities of the state

“The local governments are an essential tier, created to bring government and development closer to the people and local communities,” Edevbie pointed out.

“One of the reasons why there are infrastructural deficits across the country is because our local governments have lacked the financial capacity to embark on meaningful projects and programmes for the development of their local communities. This has created a disconnect in the chain.

“As it is presently, any meaningful projects in various communities are funded either by the state or federal agencies, but we know that the local governments if empowered, are in a better position to take development to the hundreds of towns, villages, hamlets and settlements. Their poor capacity to deliver on this has led to a situation where many inner and remote communities have been left out of development, which in turn retards integrated and overall growth of society.

“Part of our modernisation plan is to reverse the situation by breathing more life into the local councils. The long term solution would require a change in the constitution by allocating more resources to the Local Government in line with their responsibilities. Meanwhile, things can be improved by synergising more with them and helping them to strengthen their financial base to enable them to perform better and fund more responsibilities.

“The Councillors, for instance, have to be empowered to make greater input and play more active roles in the development process of their local communities. That is why we have councillors, in the first place.

“We also will have to help relieve the local governments on indebtedness to retirees and pensioners which they have accumulated due to paucity of fund.

“There are various ways to achieve this and I undertake that within one year in office, we would have supported them in paying off the debts on pension and gratuity.
This is important to ensure that persons who have given a good part of their years in government service do not retire into penury.

“The other thing I would like to do is to install ICT backbones in all the local government areas. Besides helping to digitise the operations of the local councils, the idea is to provide greater internet access to support computer and digital literacy across our communities, no matter how remote they may be.

“The digital revolution is already here with us, and we cannot afford to take the back seat and merely watch. It is a fast-changing world driven by information, knowledge and technology. As a government, we must provide our people with the enablement to key into the revolution to ensure their relevance and effective participation in the knowledge-based global economy.

“Our vision is to support our people to acquire greater expertise and become big drivers in the digital and technological hubs. That will expand their scope not only in creative enterprises and entrepreneurship but as well as for their demand by blue-chip companies and industries.

“Already, our young persons are increasingly embracing Internet technology and are very active in the digital space, but it is important that we support them to direct their zeal towards more positive, more productive and more gainful ways of using digital technology.”