Governors on Tuesday opposed implementation of the Executive Order by President Muhammadu Buhari to ensure financial autonomy for the state Legislature and Judiciary.
They stated that while the Nigerian Governors’ Forum (NGF) is not against the implementation of the law on financial autonomy, they would not be coerced by the Order.
According to the governors, the President’s Executive Order 10 is not required for the implementation of the financial autonomy they jointly facilitated.
Plateau State Governor Simon Lalong spoke with reporters in Abuja on behalf of the forum, after the NGF’s meeting with visiting French Minister of Foreign Trade and Attractiveness, Franck Riester.
On Monday, Attorney-General and Minister of Justice Abubakar Malami said the Federal Government was determined to push through the content of EO 10. “No going back”, he said in Sokoto.
But Lalong insisted that the Executive order was unnecessary.
Lalong said: “For us the governors, we are saying no. We are going to do implementation. You don’t need Order 10 to force us to do implementation. So, we don’t need Order 10. We are already working on the law of implementation, because the federal government cannot tell us how to implement. We are doing the implementation.
“But, we are not bothered about Order 10. We are talking about the implementation of the financial autonomy law. I was a Speaker. We started it in 1999. Today, I am a governor. And I know how the governors agreed and brought in financial autonomy.”
