A think tank, Agora Policy, has launched a Local Governance Accountability (LGA) Portal to improve transparency, accountability and citizen participation in local governance in Nigeria’s 774 councils.
The portal was unveiled yesterday during the graduation of the second cohort of the organisation’s Policy Writing Fellowship and the launch of two digital platforms under its Policy Support, Deepening and Engagement (PSDE) project, supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
The portal provides historical and current data on Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) disbursements to local councils, profiles of local government areas, information on elected officials and data visualisation tools for research, analysis and civic engagement.
At the event, the special adviser to the President on Policy Coordination and Head of the Central Results Delivery Coordination Unit, Hadiza Bala Usman, described the initiative as a timely intervention that could help make local governments more visible and accountable to citizens.
She noted that national development should not be measured solely through macroeconomic indicators but also through the effectiveness of governance and service delivery at the grassroots level. “If service delivery fails at the local level, citizens experience governance as distant, ineffective or absent,” she said.
Usman urged citizens, journalists, researchers, civil society organisations, and public officials to actively engage with the portal and utilise the data available there to promote accountability and improve governance outcomes.
“Transparency is only the beginning. D ta must be used. Citizens must engage with it. Journalists must interrogate it. Researchers must analyse it. Civil society must translate it into advocacy. Public officials must treat it as an opportunity to improve performance and rebuild trust,” she stated.
Executive Chairman of the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB), Dr Abdullahi Usman Bello, disclosed that the federal government had completed the verification of asset declarations submitted by high-risk public servants as part of ongoing efforts to strengthen integrity in public service.
According to Bello, the exercise covered 19 ministers, 37 permanent secretaries, 20 heads of agencies, and 32 other senior public officials classified as high-risk officers.
The CCB chairman further announced that the Bureau’s Online Asset and Liabilities Declaration System had been fully developed and was ready for deployment and testing.
“As part of our ongoing efforts to strengthen integrity and accountability in public service, the Code of Conduct Bureau has completed verification of asset declarations for high-risk public servants,” he said.
Executive Chairman, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ola Olukoyede, said the initiative is a “game changer” as it promises to lift the veil of opacity that forecloses scrutiny of public expenditures at this tier of government.
“For decades, releases to local governments from the federation account, management of internally generated revenues and expenditures by the councils have been under a mighty cloak of secrecy. A d, where records are inaccessible, where citizens cannot interrogate what was received against what was spent, and where elected and appointed officials operate without the discipline of public scrutiny, accountability takes flight,” he stated.
