AN EXAMINATION OF THE SOURCE AND USES OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT FUND IN NIGERIA (2000-2004)

Local government is that level of government nearest to the people. It is said to be corner stone of the government system in any country. The federal government believes that it is only through an effective local government system that the human and material resources of the nation could be mobilized for local government with its objectives is aimed at standard and stabilizing the function and financial resources at the local government level and to encourage initiatives and leadership potential. The basic procedure of local government is revenue mobilization and its effective utilization especially more that there is no comprehensive study on sources and uses of funds in the local government. The current trends of inefficiency and ineffectiveness of the local authorities should be considered with the frame work of available resources. If the financial resources of the local of the local government are boughant and viable than this will go a long way in communicating strength and solidity to offer superstructure of government authorities. There is no discipline on the part of the leadership, management and staff of the local government in collecting revenue efficiently and also try to put them into effective use. In the tight of the above, the researcher major objectives as regards this research work was to identity those sources of finance available to local government, their uses and problem associated with their finance in Nigeria using Ezeagu central Local government development Council ad my case study. The problem associated with sources, uses of local government finance was critically examine in this project. In handling the above research work primary and secondary data was used. The sources of primary data were by the use of questionnaires and oral interviews, while the secondary data sources are text books. The analysis of data was based on percentages. It is on the strength of the finding that recommendation and conclusion was made.