Factors Responsible for the Slow Pace+ of Rural Development In Nigeria A Study of Three Representative Local Government Councils In Enugu State of Nigeria

Abstract

Nigeria, even in this 21stcentury,is still regarded as an under-developed country. Various efforts made so far by successive governments in Nigeria prior to and after Independence in 1960, to develop this country have proved a dismal failure. Nigeria today remains a third world country despite enormous resources at her disposal viz; a variety of rich mineral deposits in every region of the country especially in the Niger Delta, tremendous manpower base, very good and fertile agricultural land and climatic conditions well suited for all year round agricultural purposes. Efforts expended in the past by past successive governments in the country have been geared towards a systematic and integrated urban-biased development at the expense of the rural communities. The urbanization phenomenon, instead of boosting the developmental status of the country, turned out to improvise the country the more with its attendant economic and social chaos in the form of un-employment, urban slums, rural-urban migration, loss of man-power needs at the rural areas especially for agricultural production, to mention but a few. This in turn resulted in the loss of the enviable groundnut pyramids of the then Northern Nigeria, the cocoa/rubber plantation of the West and the vast Palm plantation/produce of the former Eastern Nigeria. Most able-bodied rural dwellers soon moved to the urban towns to secure white collar jobs that are often not available and when and where available, they are usually ad hoc in nature, at the detriment of the rural areas where, nevertheless, 75% of the populace still resides. The urban development syndrome of our past governments hardly had any beneficial affect on the rural dwellers thus diminishing rather to improving their standards of living in particular and the country’s march to progress and development in general.Thus a World Bank Report in 1996 which described Nigeria as a rich country but at the same time that the people of Nigeria are poor, remain up to this day a paradox. For sure Nigeria has not been able to put its productive capacity into effective use. Hence successive governments in Nigeria since 1976 have changed emphasis from urban-biased to rural- biased development. Consequently most policies in the country are now fashioned towards achieving a rural biased development in a deliberate attempt to raise the standard of living of the rural populace hence the change from a ‘parliamentary’ to a ‘presidential system of government in 1984 and the creation and empowerment of 774 Local Government Areas in Nigeria as rural development centres, by virtue of the 1976 Local Government Reform, the 1976 Local Government Edict and the revised 1978 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. The tilting of the Federal Allocation Formula twice since 1976 in favour of the Local Governments (rural development centres) are all geared towards a quick realisation of this noble gesture of developing the country through the rural set up. However, after more than two decades of the introduction of these deliberate policies in favour of a comprehensive rural development in the country, rural development, in Nigeria, still remains ‘a mission impossible’. The people of Nigeria, especially in the rural communities, are still very poor. What might be the cause(s) of this stranger-than-fiction story? Is this another cock and bull story of ‘water here, water there, but none to drink? Your guess is as good as mine. In an effort to un-ravel this mystery, the term local government area has been inter-changeably used in place of rural development centre hence, chief executives of rural development centres have been simply referred to as local government chairmen and vice versa.