Local Government System Failure in Nigeria’s Fourth Republic: An Exploration of Key Constitutional Challenges and the Exigency of a Paradigm Shift

Abstract

Nigeria has a complex subnational governance system that has outsized impacts on its trajectory. The state is covered with a vibrant but frayed political quilt, consisting of three layers: the federal government in Abuja, thirty-six state governments, and 774 local government areas. Often overlooked, Nigeria’s local governments are disproportionately important; if they functioned well, they would be best positioned to meet people’s basic needs and to build their resilience to cope with everyday challenges. In reality, however, the local government system in Nigeria does not serve the interest of the people. Instead, it can be said that every household is its own local government; sourcing its basic needs: water, electricity, education, and healthcare however it can. Exhausted by local government system failure in which those who govern steal from the governed, the imperative of a paradigm shift becomes exigent. While local government system failure may be a global issue not unique to Nigeria, it is nevertheless crucial to be addressed as it stifles popular participation and fuels democratic backwardness, perpetuates rural development deficits, and engenders grassroots poverty. By hurting governance outcomes at the subnational level, local government system failure breeds and entrenches corruption, which is quietly and chronically suffocating the fourth republic Nigeria democratic experiment. This study is a humble but an academically expedient contribution towards evolving a viable local government system capable of serving its mandate seamlessly.