Benue State Governor, Hyacinth Alia, yesterday explained that he was at no time opposed to granting of autonomy to local government councils in the country saying he supported it long before the apex court judgement.

Besides, the governor has bruised aside the allegation that he has squandered over N47.8 billion meant for local governments in the state and that he must account for it The governor disclosed this while reacting to the allegation of mismanagement of council’s funds levelled against him by a group, Defenders of Democracy (DoD).

The group, through its President, Amos Uchiv, had claimed it had carried out investigation in the state’s Bureau for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs which revealed that “out of the N86.2 billion meant for the local governments under Alia’s first year in office, the governor has used only N38, 400, 000,000 (N3.4 billion) to pay workers and pensioners leaving a whooping N47, 880,000,000 (N47.8 billion unaccounted for in the last one year.”