Lawmakers, governor at loggerheads over legislative autonomy in Anambra

Lawmakers in Anambra State are at loggerheads with Governor Chukwuma Soludo over the financial autonomy of the state legislature.

Sources revealed that Soludo has refused to implement the State Legislative Autonomy Act which was passed by the state assembly during the administration of former Gov. Willie Obiano.

The State House of Assembly July 2021 passed its Legislative Fund Management Bill to facilitate and strengthen the implementation of financial autonomy for the state legislature.

Obiano graciously accented to the bill and made it law before he left office on March 17, 2022.

Soludo was said to have told the House in one of their meetings that he was not going to implement the law to allow financial autonomy for the state assembly.

He was quoted as saying that his predecessor did not sign the act in good faith and vowed to challenge the passage of the Legislative Fund Management Act in court.

This has reportedly put a sharp division between him and the state assembly members.

On Tuesday last week, there was a debate on the issue I the house members where members were angry that the speaker is not doing anything to compel the governor to implement the act so that they can manage their funds and stop being a rubber stamp.

Some of them lamented that the Governor who said that he was coming to run a transparent government is kicking against the financial autonomy of the state legislature.

They said that while he reduced their allowances, his security vote remains as high.

At the plenary last week, some of the house members walked out on the Speaker when it became obvious that he was not ready to fight for the implementation of the law because of his reelection bid in 2023 and hope of retaining his position as speaker.

Apart from the speaker, some members of the house who picked the ticket to return to the assembly are not also keen to fight for the implementation of the Act.

Many of them have wondered why the governor does not want the financial autonomy for the state assembly despite his posture.

The majority of the members are therefore threatening that unless he implements the law, they will not approve the list of Transition Committee chairmen forwarded to the assembly by the governor.

They are also threatening to withhold legislative approval from the revised budget currently before them.

A source said that majority of the members may pass a vote of no confidence on the speaker if he continues to be a rubber stamp to the governor.