The The Reconfiguring Local Governance and Community Participation in Africa: An Empirical Analysis from Nigeria and Ghana
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Abstract
In the modern day government, local governance, decentralization and democracy are the major significant towards developing the communities across the world. This paper examines the initiative of the central government to decentralize the significant responsivities of responsive government to local government through the local governance which are growing across the world. The paper argues that democratic decentralization as a means of transfer of power and resources from central government to lower units of government to deliver downwardly accountable and responsive local representation have entirely produce stronger local institutions for mass participation, local governance and community development. The methodology adopted was purely secondary data which involved a broad desktop literature review from various scholarly sources, document analysis, newspapers, text books, and policy analysis within the framework of the subject matter. The outcome of the study shows marked differences in the vulnerability factors and the management local governance in term of citizens’ participation through their communities. This paper also revealed that in the pursuit of local governance, Ghana followed a sequence of administrative, political, and fiscal decentralisation whereas Nigeria pursued a political, administrative, and fiscal decentralization. As a result, Ghana has made a little progress but more than Nigeria’s, in strengthening LG institutions. The paper concludes that the demands of good governance and modern local governance is to enable conduit for effective and efficient local governance for better development for the citizenry.
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