Abstract:
The study investigated information needs and resources utilization of state legislators in the legislative libraries in the North east, Nigeria. Six specific purposes on information needs and resources utilization of state legislators and six research questions were formulated to guide the study. Two hypotheses were drawn from the research questions. The design of the study was descriptive survey. The target population was used for the study. The instruments for data collection were the Questionnaire and Interview Schedule. The validation was carried out by three experts. The instrument’s reliability shows an overall correlation of 0.97. The distribution of the questionnaires was done personally by the researcher with the aid of research assistants. Data was analyzed using means and standard deviation to answer the research questions. Also, real limit of numbers was used in taking decisions. The results of the study showed that State legislators need information for their legislative duties of making laws for their respective states. The information needs of state legislators in the North East includes: information on the needs of their constituencies, information about past legislations, political and development issues, local government policies, economic matters, education, public relations, agriculture and non-governmental organizations. The challenges associated with information resource utilization for the information needs satisfaction of state legislators include: unavailability of information resources, lack of internet facilities, distorted and outdated information materials as well as incompetent staff and legislative assistants. Based on the findings the study recommended the following strategies for enhancing legislators resource utilization: acquiring and making available current information sources, as well as assisting the legislators in sourcing of information from other modern information technologies, organizing the library materials for easy access, legislative libraries should engage in information packaging and repackaging, inter library loan services. Provision of adequate funding of the state assembly libraries to stock them with adequate and relevant information materials to facilitate the use of the libraries, capacity building program should be designed and organized for the library staff and legislators to assist them on the use of library effectively, legislative libraries should be provided with a robust internet facilities to assist them in meeting their information needs for legislative duties.
