By Victoria Ojeme

ABUJA- United Nations Development Programme, UNDP, has canvassed autonomy for local government councils in the country as part of measures to promote good governance at the grassroots.

This, the UN agency believes, could be actualised through the virile and proactive platform of Association of Local Government of Nigeria, ALGON.

This was contained in a report released weekend in Abuja, entitled Consolidated Report of Assessment of Good Urban Governance in Nigeria, presented at a national dialogue organised by the UNDP in collaboration with UN-Habitat and National Bureau of Statistics.

The report recommended the autonomy, political and finance of local governments in order to enhance their capabilities for service delivery to the citizenry as well as review of budgeting system to relate it to service delivery.
The UNDP findings was released at the end of a three-year study on Good Urban Governance, GUG.

, which was conducted through UN Habitat, in collaboration with the National Bureau of Statistics, NBS, said the local government system would only be able to satisfy the basic needs of Nigerians if it was autonomous.