Political Leadership and Infrastructural Development in Nigeria. A Study Case of Buhari’s Administration 2015-2019
CHAPTER ONE
Objectives of the Study
The aim of this study is to assess the extent to which political leadership has promoted infrastructural development in President Buhari’s administration between 2015 and 2019. However, the specific objectives of this study are:
- To examine the extent to which political leadership has enhanced infrastructural development in President Buhari’s administration between 2015 and 2019.
- To study the challenges hindering infrastructural development in Nigeria since the return to political leadership from 2015 to 2019.
- To identify ways through which political leadership can foster infrastructural development in President Buhari’s administration.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
REVIEW OF DEFINITIONAL ISSUES
The Concept of Political leadership
Political leadership creates a sovereignty for people and organizations around the world with common goals and objectives. Stabilization deals with controlling the fiscal balance, the balance of payments and external payment deficits and maintaining a low rate of inflation. For the purpose of this work, External sector liberalization includes foreign trade, investment and exchange rate liberalization and depends upon various factors like the dependence of the economy on foreign trade, financial sector liberalization on external account e.t.c. It expects trade to act as an engine of growth. If a country’s dependency on foreign trade is limited, internal liberalization has a greater importance in influencing the growth of the economy.
The issue of political leadership has generated three different schools of thought. The first school, being the proponent of political leadership (pro-political leadership), believes that it is the best thing that could happen to the world. They believe it has brought about a lot of benefits to the entire world. These benefits include, access to modern technologies that are not available domestically, exchange of fruitful ideas, access to goods and services at relatively cheaper rates compared to the domestic economy, it encourages specialization and competitiveness, enhances modernization, access to latest information and frontier of knowledge. The school argues that all these put together would enhance the economic activities in any country and thereby accelerate economic growth and development.
The second school of thought (anti-political leadership) believes that the advent of political leadership has really brought more havoc than good to many economies. The school argues that political leadership encourages dumping of goods and services in countries that are not competitive, especially those, in the developing countries world. It is also observed that it discourages local production of goods and services, given that the goods produced in less developed countries cannot compete favourably with those of the advanced countries. Then domestic industries would be forced to go out of business, thereby leading to massive retrenchment and thus, increased unemployment level in the country.
The Concept of Good Governance
According to Omotola (2007), the concept of good governance is problematic. For one, it is value-loaded and therefore subjective. Its inherent meaning may largely be a function of the intents and purposes of the analyst and what is good to one person may not be good to the other. However, Ozigbo (2000) is of the opinion that before one discusses the concept of good governance, it is very significant to examine the context of the term „governance‟. For him, “governance denotes how people are ruled and how the affairs of the state are administered and regulated”. Governance therefore means how the politics of a country is carried out. In like manner, the World Bank Report of 1989 defined governance as the exercise of political power to manage a nation’s affairs. It is on this note that Ansah (2007, cited in Adagba, 2009: 378) defines governance as “encompassing a state’s institutional and structural arrangements, decision making processes and implementation capacity, and the relationship between government officials and the public”. This definition is inclusive of the people and in other words, public authority is expected to play a vital role in creating conducive and enabling environment to enhance development.
CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Introduction
This chapter contains the methods of data collection, study area/sample design of this research, the population, sampling procedures and techniques, instruments of data collection, data presentation and analysis to encompass the bulk of research methodology. The study therefore, made use of both primary and secondary methods of data collection. The primary method entails survey research in which the researcher intends to utilise the distribution of questionnaires and carry out in-depth interviews with selected stakeholders in the region.
Types and Sources of Data
Sources of Data Collection
The research relies on both primary and secondary sources of data.
THE PRIMARY SOURCES: This includes survey questionnaires, in-depth interview schedule and focus group discussion (FGD).
THE SECONDARY SOURCES: This will depend on materials from published and unpublished sources, text books, journals, available conference proceedings/papers, newspapers, maps, reliable internet sources and official documents related to the topic under study.
The reason for the choice of these categories of respondents is predicated on the nature of what they do and their vast knowledge on the issue under study. Again available official reports from the Independent National Electoral Commission were examined for the purpose of complementarity. The justification for these two sources was for the purpose of one complementing the other so as to strengthen the findings of the study.
Instrument of Data Collection
This study employed the use of qualitative data based on the quality of information and not necessarily mass data. As such, in-depth interview and questionnaires were used to elicit information in order to achieve a holistic understanding of the respondents‟ point of view.
IN-DEPTH INTERVIEW
Unstructured questions for in-depth probing of respondents were used and the respondents involved selected stakeholders ranging from party leaders, chiefs and top government functionaries from the area under study. The interviewees were chosen based on their role, knowledge and involvement in politics and local administration of the study area. Their wealth experience of the democratic and infrastructural activities of this region gives a great credibility to the research.
CHAPTER FOUR
ANALYSIS OF THE EFFECTS OF POLITICAL LEADERSHIP ON INFRASTRUCTURAL
DEVELOPMENT IN PRESIDENT BUHARI’S ADMINISTRATION, 2015-2019
Introduction
This chapter contains the presentation and the analysis of data collected through both secondary and primary sources on the subject under study in the light of which deductions or findings are drawn and verified for and against the propositions posed in chapter one.
The data presentation and analysis encompass both qualitative and quantitative descriptive analysis as the data collected in the field are presented by tabularisation using the frequency and percentage tools of the SPSS package. This entails a method of transferring data from the information gathered to statistical form and then systematic examination conducted on such data for further interpretation and analysis.
Hence, to that effect, the information contained in the data gathered from the questionnaires are coded in a code sheet, thereafter, an onward transfer of information is summarized in a tabular form using the SPSS tool. The tables, too, are sectionalized based on how the information are categorized in the questionnaire. The information contained in the tables are further explained literally in line with the specific objectives of the study beneath the tables for better understanding and clarification.
However, the use of quantitative descriptive analysis advanced in this study is anchored on simple percentage statistics that sums up the mass of information generated from the field work. Appropriate analysis is therefore applied to help discover the relationship between democracy and good governance and how they both contributed or vice versa to development in President Buhari’s administration between 2015 to 2019.
CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Introduction
This chapter summarises the report of this study and concludes the work with a set of recommendations on the Effects of Political leadership on Infrastructural Development, an Assessment of President Buhari’s administration between 2015 to 2019.
Summary
The crux of this study has been to examine the effects of political leadership on infrastructural development in President Buhari’s administration between 2015 to 2019, covering the three administrations/tenures of Muhammadu Buhari and Prof Osibanjo respectively.
Drawing from the assumption that political leadership foster infrastructural development, the statement of research problem was set to inquire the extent to which political leadership has or has not enhanced infrastructural development in President Buhari’s administration between 2015 to 2019. To that end the research question, objectives and the assumptions were all set in line for the purpose of that investigation.
The extant literature reviewed in the chapter two of this study centres very significantly on the various variables investigated in this study to include, political leadership and good governance and their complementary effects on infrastructural development taken into cognisance. Also, the study reviewed and examined literature on the democratization process in Nigeria by examining and correlating the return to political leadership in President Buhari’s administration in order to show the level of achievements advanced within the timeframe of the study, that is, 2015-2019.
Having used a two stage Sampling Technique (Simple Random and Systematic Sampling Method) respectively to draw up a sizeable population for the field work, the study however, created the understanding on the infrastructural development in President Buhari’s administration from historical point of view. This necessitated a good understanding of the area under study, hence it builds on the appreciation of the subsequent results gathered from the field.
Moreover, using In-depth Interview (IDI)and questionnaire administration, and using documentary method of analysis of some of the existing materials or literature relevant to the study,the study has come up with some major findings that political leadership has so many effects on infrastructural development, even though so much has not been achieved in President Buhari’s administration within this period under study.
Also, it was gathered from the study that corruption is the major hindrance among other challenges bordering on leadership and governance as hindrances to political leadership in fostering infrastructural development in President Buhari’s administration.
Conclusion
The democratic dispensation in Nigeria and even across many countries of Africa and at the international community today has become fundamentally vital to the future of many countries. Both at micro or macro levels, governments have been charged to genuinely abide by the rules of governance that make development an integral part of it especially with democratization going round many countries who willingly accept or are being made to accept the liberal type of democracy.
It is pertinent to note that, there is no doubt that political leadership promotes infrastructural development. However, this cannot be achieved if political leadership is not backed by good governance, the two variables which are seen to be complementary asare harbingers to the realization of infrastructural development in every democratic society.
However, given a situation where certain aspect of governance are allowed to go wrong and not address the ideals of the principle of democracy and good governance, the actualization of the so much desired dividends of democracy and political leadership remains in jeopardy. Corruption, bad, unresponsive and visionless leadership cannot give political leadership a free hand to foster socioeconomic development, especially as has been revealed in President Buhari’s administration under the period of study and Nigeria as a whole.
The recent past experience in Nigeria shows that democracy can and would thrive given the fact that the positive attitude from leaders in managing the affairs of government well would enhance trust from the entirety of the masses. In this way, democracy will have its true meaning and realization of its basic characteristics, that is, people-oriented, responsiveness, all-inclusiveness and majoritarian support. Many challenges have therefore been identified to hinder the growth of democracy in Nigeria, particularly in President Buhari’s administration and these challenges are closely tied to bad governance and bad leadership.
However, at the core of the actualization of democratic governance is leadership and it must be noted that across the various states of the federation, people continue to clamour for true, sincere, transparent and responsible leaders, who would pilot the affairs of government and drive the cause of infrastructural development to its maximum realization. Leaders and the ruling elite therefore, must be braced with the task of governance and convincingly show the commitment to governance. Whether, democratic governance is more development oriented or not, its basic tenets and principles must be adhered to, so as to foster the desired infrastructural development.
RECOMMENDATIONS
Based on the findings revealed by this study, the following recommendations are advanced.
- Leadership and governance should be taken as key areas of priority to drive the growth of democracy in order to advance infrastructural development.
- Corruption should be sincerely and adequately tackled as urgent as possible.
- Government must ensure that people are well politically educated especially from the grassroot.
- Furthermore, government must try as much and as urgent as possible to address the rising unemployment in President Buhari’s administration and Nigeria as a whole. Vocational training and skill acquisition programmes must be advanced especially at the grassroot so as to further empower the masses technically and otherwise.
- Good and responsible representation must be encouraged from the grassroot, especially in President Buhari’s administration. Representatives politically elected must be held accountable by the people and a better public participation be encouraged in order to carry the people along.
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