THE Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE), Osun State chapter, has raised alarm over what it described as “unprecedented abuse of power” by key Federal Government officials in the handling of the state’s local government allocations.
Speaking at a press conference in Osogbo on Sunday, the state NULGE president, Dr Nathaniel Ogungbangbe, accused the Minister of Finance, the Accountant-General of the Federation, and the Attorney-General of the Federation of unlawfully releasing Osun’s local government funds into accounts operated by sacked All Progressives Congress (APC) chairmen and councilors.
According to him: “Today, we have it on good authority that these three principal officers of the Federal Government have released the Osun State Local Government Councils’ allocations for the month of March, 2025 to September 2025 to the illegal bank accounts opened by court-sacked APC chairmen and councilors. We find this development very scary and alarming. Paying local government allocations into privately opened and illegal bank accounts of politicians is unbelievable, bizarre and unprecedented in the history of public administration in Nigeria.”
Dr Ogungbangbe explained that the controversial accounts were opened with United Bank for Africa (UBA) without due process. He argued that the action of the federal officers amounted to a violation of both the constitution and judicial pronouncements, noting that the Federal High Court had on May 15, 2025, ordered all parties to maintain the status quo, a directive which the Central Bank of Nigeria had acknowledged as binding in their court filings.
The Osun NULGE president stressed that both the Federal High Court and the Court of Appeal had sacked the APC chairmen and councilors, while new elections had already produced fresh leaders. He warned against undermining the rule of law, insisting that the Attorney-General of the Federation could not overrule the courts.
Meanwhile, Osun State chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has chided the state chapter of NULGE, saying the union was interpreting court judgments. The party’s Director of Media and Information, Chief Kola Olabisi, said in a statement in Osogbo that, “It is also not true that the said federal allocations are paid into the account of any of our local government council chairmen or any of the APC member or chieftain, but into the local government councils’ accounts.”
However, the state Chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), said it noted the admission by the state chapter of the APC that it had received federal allocations due to local government councils in the state. In its immediate reaction, the PDP challenged the APC to disclose the accounts into which the allocations were paid and the signatories of the accounts. PDP chairman Sunday Bisi described the earlier statement issued by the APC as an admission of crime against the people of Osun State.
