N238.4 Billion Missing: Where Are Osun's Local Government Funds?

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When Suliat Oyetunji was in labour, the nearest health facility in Oore, a village close to Iragbiji in Osun State’s Boripe Local Government Area, could not help her.
For months, she struggled to get proper antenatal care at the Oore Primary Healthcare Centre (PHC). She said health workers were often not there when she visited, making her go to Iragbiji, which is about four kilometres away.
When it was time to give birth to her twins, there was no reliable care at the centre. She ended up giving birth at home.
“Whenever I went to the PHC, nurses were not always available,” she told DevReporting.
Her story highlights a sad truth for Oore residents. Just having a health centre does not mean they can access healthcare. When DevReporting went to the facility, it was locked.
Similar issues came up in other communities in Osun that DevReporting visited. But between January 2025 and June 2026, the state’s 30 local government areas received over N238 billion in allocations.
During this time, Boripe LGA got N8.41 billion, averaging about N467 million every month. Ife East received the highest amount at N9.56 billion, while Ifelodun got N6.53 billion.
Despite these billions allocated, people in many communities still complain about poor basic services. Some have had to fix things on their own, while others struggle to get essential services.

Okebode Faces Similar Issues

In Okebode, Atakunmosa West LGA, the Abebi Afilaka Health Centre has problems like drug shortages, lack of staff, and no reliable electricity. Ayoola Odunayo, a healthcare worker there, shared the struggles they face when helping pregnant women.
“In fact, we use the flashlight of our phones to deliver pregnant women because there is no power supply,” she said. “We also do not have the necessary equipment or drugs. In addition, we need more beds for our patients.”
Adebowale Adeorike, the secretary of the Okebode palace, said a community member paid to repair the maternity centre after a storm damaged it in 2019.
“When it happened, we wrote to the government requesting help, but all we received were promises. Nothing was done,” she said.
The community member later renamed the facility Abebi Afilaka Maternity Centre after his mother.
In Olugunna, Osogbo LGA, Folasade Adeleke said residents lost faith in their health centre due to drug shortages and unqualified staff.
“This health centre is not a health centre. They cannot give medications to our children if we take them there for treatment,” she said.
Ms Adeleke, who has lived in the community for over 35 years, added that none of her children was born at the facility because residents do not trust it for maternal care.

Flooded Roads Leave Communities Stranded

For people in Odofin, a community in Ifelodun LGA, rain can stop movement completely.
Sulaiman Adeyemi, a resident since 2002, said the lack of drainage makes the road prone to flooding.
“There is no drainage in this community. That’s why floods take over the road. Whenever it rains, vehicular movement stops for the flash floods to wash away,” he said, adding, “Only community efforts of sand-filling the road have kept it in this shape.”
He remembered the last time the road connecting Odofun to Inisa was repaired was over 15 years ago, when former council chairman Bola Ajao stepped in.
“There are big houses down the road, but bad roads have forced many residents and property owners out,” he said.
Isa Afolabi, a commercial motorcyclist, said the community’s problems go beyond roads to water supply, electricity, and healthcare access.
With little help from the government, residents have also had to pay to replace stolen electricity cables. He added that the community has no public health centre and relies on private facilities for medical care.
In Ikire, Irewole LGA, Oni Oluwaseyi said floodwater washed away a bridge on a road linking the high court area to Apomu, leaving it in bad shape and forcing farmers to take longer routes to market.
“If the government can fix this road that links Apomu to Ikire, this area will rapidly develop,” he said.
In Ilobu, the headquarters of Irepodun LGA, Taiwo Ishola, who has lived in the Konda area for over 40 years, said the community has been in poor condition for more than a decade, with rain worsening the issue and exposing properties to flooding.
“Whenever it rains, we cannot use the road, and the bridge is also bad. When it rains, it destroys people’s properties,” he said.

Schools Struggling to Keep Pupils

The problems also affect public education, where some communities say lack of staff and poor facilities limit children’s learning. Our reporters found public schools dirty and littered with faeces.
In Oore village, DevReporting saw that the only public school had been renovated but still lacked enough teachers.
The Baale of Oore, Adekunle Mudashiru, said the renovated school needed more teachers to serve its pupils.
“We have only one teacher in the school who is also the headmaster. We need at least five teachers,” he said.
He noted that Oore has about 1,200 residents, while the school previously had about 120 pupils. However, some parents have moved their children to private schools due to the teacher shortage.
Omotayo Timilehin, a former pupil of the school, said the lack of basic learning facilities made it hard for him to continue his education there. His parents eventually transferred him to a school in town, about 10 miles away.
In Abiri-Ikoyi, Isokan LGA, the condition of CAC Primary School has also raised concerns. Tajudeen Olowookere, a 1999 graduate of the school, said its state has worsened a lot.
“This school was beautiful before I graduated in 1999, but the situation now is worrisome. I feel really bad. From the building you see, you cannot say this is a school now,” he said, urging the government to fix the school so pupils can learn better.
The Odofin of Ikoyi land, Adejare Abdulfatai, also complained about the bad state of public schools, saying many are roofless and dilapidated. He urged the government to help.
The situation is the same at Okebode, where residents said the primary and secondary schools also struggle with a lack of teachers employed by the government.

Other Issues

Beyond roads, healthcare, and education, access to clean water is still a worry in many communities visited by DevReporting.
In Ikoyi, Ajisafe Abdulafeez said the town has not had public water supply since 2010. For years, residents have relied on wells, streams, and boreholes set up by the community to meet their water needs.
He added that some communities in the area have also been without electricity for two years.
In Okebode, Mrs Adeorike said a government water project has stopped working, forcing the community and its leader to find alternatives.
The failure of water infrastructure is also clear in local markets, where traders and customers struggle with inadequate public toilets.
Adetomiwa Bolanle, the Iyaloja of Oba Oyegunle Market in Ikire, said the market’s public water system no longer works properly, and the public toilet has stopped working.
“The toilet the government made for us no longer works. There are no general toilet facilities in this market, and that’s not fair enough,” she said.
Some traders have made private arrangements for water, but these are not enough for the whole market, DevReporting learned.
Adesokan Adeola, a trader at Obada market in Ikire, said: “People who need to defecate in this market will have to go to their houses or neighbouring houses to do so,” adding that some go to a nearby landfill.
“The market’s access road also needs fixing and widening,” she added.
For traders, these problems come with declining sales and financial stress. Mrs Adesokan, who sells textiles, said she has started selling other goods because of low demand.
“I sell textile materials, but I now also sell salt and condiments to prevent hunger. Everyone is complaining that there’s no money,” she said.
She remembered a time when more business activity in the market meant public workers had received their salaries or that government funds had arrived. That pattern, she said, has changed.
Meanwhile, the Babaloja of Olobu market, Azeez Ajagbe, said roads in the market have been washed away by floods, and public toilets and water facilities are lacking.

BudgIT Reports Gaps

The worries from residents match findings by BudgIT, a group that checks public spending and service delivery.
Between January and June 2026, the group tracked 28 primary healthcare centres across 10 LGAs in the state. None of the centres met all the required standards.
Joshua Osiyemi, Head of Tracka at BudgIT, said only one of the 28 centres had an ambulance, three had laboratories, and just four had doctors. Twelve had working water facilities.
Mr Osiyemi said these findings are especially concerning given the increased funding for primary healthcare through the Basic Health Care Provision Fund (BHCPF). He noted that funding had increased from around ₦300,000 to ₦600,000, while facilities with high patient volumes received about N800,000 every quarter.
“These are funds that should improve the services and quality of healthcare you get,” he said.
BudgIT’s checks on school projects also raised concerns about delivery. Of the 13 projects monitored, eight were completed, two were ongoing, and two had not been started. The group reported a case where money was paid for a school pit latrine, but the facility was never built.
Mr Osiyemi said BudgIT submitted a Freedom of Information request to the Osun State Government for an explanation about the project but had not received a response at the time of the interview.
Beyond the projects checked, he said the group found schools without roofs or furniture, with some pupils still sitting on the floor to learn.

Background

Beyond the gaps in service delivery noted by residents and monitoring groups, local government management in Osun has faced a long political and legal fight over who controls the councils and their money.
The fight goes back to the local government election on 15 October 2022, which saw APC chairmen and councillors elected across the state. The Federal High Court in Osogbo later annulled the election, saying it violated Sections 29 and 32 of the Electoral Act 2022.
After the court ruling, the Osun State Government led by Ademola Adeleke held another local government election on 22 February 2025, resulting in new council officials. But just before the 22 February election, a 10 February ruling by the Court of Appeal, Akure Division, had been seen by the APC as reinstating its sacked local government officials.
Attempts by APC officials to take back council secretariats led to violent clashes, resulting in reported deaths, including that of Remi Abass, a former chairman of Irewole Local Government Area, and six others on 17 February 2025.
For the family of the deceased, the impact of the crisis is very personal. His younger brother, Abbas Oladipupo, said the family is still coping with the loss of their breadwinner and urged the government to ensure those responsible are punished.
The leadership crisis in Osun became more complicated after the Supreme Court ruling on 11 July 2024, which affirmed local governments' financial independence. Competing political interests began to fight for control of council accounts and allocations, raising questions about who can manage the funds.
At the same time, workers under the National Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE) went on a long strike, disrupting council activities. Although they have since returned, uncertainty over control has continued.
In June 2026, the Federal High Court in Osogbo dismissed a case by the APC-elected chairmen seeking an extension of their term, stating that their three-year term ended in October 2025. The APC disagreed with the ruling and appealed.
With competing claims to authority across the state’s 30 local government areas, questions remain about who is in charge, who controls the funds, and how financial independence can lead to good governance. Even with billions of naira in federal funds for the councils, transparency and accountability in the use of the money are still major concerns.

Auditor-General: I Can’t Access LG Accounts

While political players argue over control of local government funds, Isiaq Awotunde, the Auditor-General for Local Governments in Osun State, says he has been unable to get the bank statements needed to audit the money.
Mr Awotunde said over N238 billion in local government allocations has piled up over almost two years, but he cannot access the financial records to see how the money is being handled.
“As the auditor-general for local governments, I am supposed to watch over public funds. Almost two years now, we are hearing about our money, but we cannot touch it,” he said.
He explained that during the fight over local government management, he was asked to confirm the real signatories to the councils’ accounts.
After verifying, he submitted the details to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and United Bank for Africa (UBA), where, according to him, the funds are kept.
But getting the bank statements has been hard.
“I told the CBN to give me the bank statement of some specific months. They turned the letter down,” he said, adding that the bank wanted the specific account number for which he sought the statement.
Mr Awotunde then informed the state government and worked with the Ministry of Justice to submit another request to the CBN.
He said the state’s attorney general provided him with two lawyers from the Ministry of Justice to write another letter to the CBN. “Till now, we have not heard from the bank,” he said.
The auditor-general argued that his duty to check public money should not be affected by the ongoing fight over local government management.
“Politically I cannot say anything about that, but based on my professional area, I must be able to access it. Whether directly or indirectly, it is public funds; we need to audit it,” he said.

N238.4bn Allocations Traced to 30 LGAs

According to data from Amoye, a civic-tech chatbot for open government created by Insight Initiative for Community and Social Development (IICSD), federal allocations to the state’s LGAs from January 2025 to June 2026 amounted to N238.4 billion.
But while the PDP-led LGA leadership claimed it has not received any money since its election, the APC-led leadership confirmed opening new accounts with UBA but said it could not confirm how much had been paid into those accounts.
Adegoke Ogunsola is the APC-faction chairman of Irepodun LGA and the legal adviser to the state’s chapter of the APC-led Association of Local Government of Nigeria (ALGON).
He said: “Yes, we followed the instruction by the CBN to open accounts in commercial banks. We approached many banks, but they declined to open accounts for us because the ruling party in the state warned them against dealing with us. Only UBA agreed to open the accounts for us. But even as the chairman of my LGA, I cannot tell how much is in the account because I do not receive alerts when it is credited.”
The state’s Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Dosu Babatunde, called the opening of new accounts for local councils an irregularity. He criticized both the CBN and the commercial bank for acting illegally.
Mr Babatunde said: “To run the accounts of councils, there are officials like the directors of finance and personnel management who are constitutionally authorized to run them. But the APC-led chairmen now went to look for non-staffers of local governments- strangers, maybe vulcanizers- and appointed them as councils’ treasurers, and opened new accounts for the councils, and are running them.”
He added that the state government had to go to court for an order to stop the bank from releasing more funds to the APC-faction chairmen.

Bank Remains Silent

In response to an enquiry by DevReporting, UBA, through its Group Head of Media and External Relations, Ramon Nasir, said it could not comment on the issue because it is before a court.
“The case is sub judice. It is before a competent court for determination. We cannot make any comment so as not to run foul of the law. Our position on this issue has been clearly stated by our legal representatives on this issue before the courts,” Mr Nasir said.

Political Interests Consume Local Government Funds, Says Alabi

Mojeed Alabi, a prominent APC member and former Speaker of the state’s House of Assembly, said the issues facing local governments have been building for years. Drawing from his time as a former secretary of Ejigbo Local Government in the early 1990s, he recalled when councils graded rural roads, built culverts, maintained health centres and maternity facilities, provided wells, and awarded bursaries.
“It would surprise you that in Ejigbo Local Government alone, we had three graders,” he said.
Mr Alabi blamed the decline of local government performance on the increasing use of council resources for political interests.
“Once you start spending a lot of money to pay a political office holder, there will be little left for development,” he said, adding that recurrent spending makes up over 80 percent of local government expenses, leaving little for development projects.
“If you decide to use public funds for the enrichment of the rulers, there will be little left for development. If you want to use it for development, there will be little left for personal gain,” he stressed.
On financial independence, Mr Alabi said direct fund allocations to councils will not guarantee accountability without proper public oversight.
Commenting on the situation in Osun, Mr Alabi acknowledged that the political dispute over local government leadership has disrupted council operations. He noted that the impact of the crisis on council activities cannot be ignored.

Residents Take on Government Duties

In many communities, residents say they have had to use their own resources to tackle problems they believe the government should solve.
In Ilobu, for example, Olufemi Saibu, a professor of economics at the University of Lagos and president of the Ilobu Development Union (IDU), said the group has become a way for residents to pursue infrastructure and development projects.
“In terms of infrastructure and so on, people see IDU as the best way to meet their needs,” he said, adding that the union has helped push for infrastructure for government agencies and supported projects involving schools, primary healthcare, roads, and other basic services.

Political Crisis Clouds Local Government Duties

Meanwhile, political players and experts point to an ongoing dispute over who controls local government operations and resources in Osun.
Abdulrasheed Olaoluwa, a traditional titleholder in Ede, said the crisis has created confusion over who should run local councils.
“The current local government system has become confusing, and we don’t know what’s going on anymore,” he said.
He noted the dispute has affected Ede North and Ede South local councils, causing delays in project delivery.
Having served in local government before, he said councils are crucial because their work and projects directly affect rural communities.
Sikiru Ajibade, the PDP-faction chairman of Irepodun Local Government, also blamed the political situation for limiting their access to funds.
“Since we were elected in February 2025, we have not been able to use the local government,” he said. “The elected chairmen of local governments have no access to the allocation, and that has been a major setback for development.”
Mr Ajibade compared this to his short time as caretaker chairman, during which he said his administration tarred two roads, each about 1.5 kilometres long, built a facility for Federal Road Safety Corps officials, and provided a public toilet with a borehole and prepaid electricity meter at a market.
For Tajudeen Lawal, the APC chairman in Osun State and a former chairman of Ife East Local Government, the political crisis has stopped local governments from having full independence.
He said, “Although allocations are being released, we do not currently have full access to those funds. What is available is mainly for salary payments, and salaries alone cannot drive development.”
He added that the state government is collecting revenues that local governments would normally earn from markets, motor parks, and other sources.

Local Government Should Provide Basic Services

Damilola Agbalajobi, a former Head of Political Science at Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), said local government is the level of government expected to give essential services close to the people.
“Those resources should be used to improve infrastructure, strengthen security, and provide basic services so that people can enjoy the benefits of democracy,” she said.
She noted that the political crisis in Osun has made it unclear who is actually in charge of local government, making it harder for people to know who to hold accountable.
“More importantly, it raises serious questions about accountability. If funds are being sent to local governments, where are those resources going?” she asked.
Ms Agbalajobi added that paying salaries alone does not show effective governance.
“Effective governance is measured by providing security, protecting lives and property, having functional healthcare facilities, quality public infrastructure, and other essential services,” she added.