The crisis over the control of local government councils in Osun State seems to have no end in sight as the State Government has dragged the Federal Government to the Supreme Court over inability to access the local government allocations for the month of February, March and April 2025.
The suit marked SC/CV/379/2025, filed by Musibau Adetunbi, SAN, has only the Attorney General of the Federation, Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, as the sole defendant.
In the suit, Osun government seek order of the Supreme Court to compel the federal government to release the seized local government funds to it and for further orders restraining the federal government from withholding, suspending and seizing local government allocations for Osun State.
InsightMedia gathered that funds had been deposited in the accounts opened by the reinstated Chairmen of the All Progressives Congress with the Central Bank of Nigeria.
Sources revealed that the Osun State government has been unable to access the funds as the Central Bank used the details of the reinstated Chairmen of the All Progressives Congress to open the accounts.
It would be recalled that a letter surfaced online in April when the CBN requested for the judgment that reinstated the APC Chairmen before it would go ahead with the account opening.
Speaking with InsightMedia, Media Aide to Hon. Abiodun Idowu, the ALGON Chairman of the APC, Yusuf Ayandayo confirmed that the funds are in the CBN accounts.
He alleged that the Accountant General of Osun State, Rasheed Alabi has been blocking APC Chairmen from opening accounts by writing all commercial banks in the not to honour any account opening requests by them.
“We’re aware that our allocations are with the CBN. I mean the accounts opened for us. The State government is trying to access but they can’t and that’s why they (State government) filed the suit.
“The Account General of Osun State has been blocking us from opening commercial accounts. He wrote a letter to all commercial banks in Osun not to honour any requests from us to open accounts.”
When asked how he got that information, he simply said, “we were told when we got to the banks”.
Background to the Crisis
The tussle for the control of Osun local government started on February 10 when the Court of Appeal sitting in Akure upheld the appeal filed by the Chairmen elected on the platform of the APC in 2020.
The judgement, which was delivered just few days before the local government elections slated for February 22, 2025, became a subject of controversy among political actors in the State.
Following the judgement, AGF Fagbemi and the Inspector General of Police advised the Osun State government and the Osun State Independent Electoral Commission to suspend the elections and allow APC Chairmen to complete their term which is expected to end in October.
However, the OSSIEC went ahead to conduct elections and announced winners. The winners, who are PDP members, were sworn in by Governor Ademola Adeleke on Sunday, February 23 at the Government House in Osogbo.
Since then, the two groups have continued to battle each other for the soul of the councils and this has paralysed activities at the Council Secretariats for over three months.
The Osun State chapter of the Nigerian Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE) has ordered members to withdraw their services since that February, citing insecurity at council Secretariats.
Government declines reaction
All efforts to reach the Osun State Government for reaction and clarification failed as the Commissioner for Information and Public Enlightenment, Oluomo Kolapo Alimi did not pick calls.
Calls to the Spokesperson to Governor Adeleke, Olawale Rasheed were unanswered while message to his WhatsApp were not answered too.
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