By Peter Duru, Makurdi

The 23 Local Government Areas, LGAs, of Benue state are said to be enmeshed in over N10 billion judgement debts and court garnishee orders.

The Special Adviser to the Benue State Governor, Bureau for Local Government and Chieftancy Affairs, BLGCA, Dr. Dennis Akura who made this known weekend in Makurdi said the issue constituted a huge challenge and burden at that tier of government.

He said he inherited the situation but modalities had already been put in place to ensure that the debts were gradually paid off to avert a shutdown of the system.

Dr. Akura who assured that the present administration was determined to make the difference in the lives of the rural dwellers by repositioning Local Government administration in the state informed that the Governor was not prepared to settle for less.

He said: “When I came in, the marching order I got from Governor Hyacinth Alia is that he wants a Local Government system that will work and positively impact the lives of the rural dwellers.

“And one of the issues I met was that of garnishee orders and judgement debt. The Local Government system was owing about N10billion as judgment debt and we had alot of garnishee orders.

“It was a very big challenge that could hurt the administration. So Governor Alia directed that a garnishee and judgement debt committee be formed. The committee is housed in the Ministry of Justice and Public Order.

“It is made up of government lawyers as well as lawyers who had judgements against the state and local governments.

“It was discovered that most times the Local Governments do not put up appearances in court in Local Government cases.

“And for that reason judgments were always entered against them. So we have overhauled the legal departments of the local government to ensure that every local government has a sound legal department.

“What this implies is that the Ministry of Justice will draft lawyers to every local government to run the daily affairs of the legal departments. This we have done in trying to check and also reduce incidents of judgments entered against the local governments system in the state.”