Local Governance and Regional Crisis in Nigeria: Rethinking Governance Dimensions to the Crises In the Niger Delta Region

Abstract

The fact remains that the Niger Delta region of Nigeria is faced with worrisome challenges that have devastated the environment and collapsed the local economy of the region. The region for quite some time now has been riddled in large violent pattern of conflict with palpable hatred, scorching fury and mayhem. Attempts have been made by scholars to locate the source of the crises of the region. Bulk of the contributions on this issue attributes the crises to external factors such as the activities of oil industries, i.e. the exploration and exploitation of oil which excludes the aborigines from the oil wealth. Others argue that the discriminatory revenue sharing of the federal government accounts largely for the challenges in the area. While these external factors may seem convincing as the causes of the problem of the region, they are causally deceptive and attempt to shift attention away from the core cause of the region’s nightmare. They are merely the symptoms of the problem and not the core causes of the problem. The aim of the paper is to rethink the source of the problem of the Niger delta region. Data was gathered through focus group discussion, participant observation and secondary sources. Analysis was by simple polemics. The paper submits that the cause of the Niger Delta challenges lies largely in the internal governance which is sufficiently depraved. It recommends among others that leadership at the region should be subjected to thorough reorientation and that the electoral process should be organised in a modern form to guarantee the election of leaders who are pro-people.

KEYWORDS: Governance, Niger Delta, Internal Leadership