Every senator and every member of the House of Representatives who voted to create a regional ‘development’ commission in Nigeria claim it is a game-changer that will radically transform the geopolitical zone concerned. But they know that’s not true; they know it’s yet another unaccountable federal agency that will induce the squandering of public funds and do little to support regional development. Similarly, every president who signed into law a bill to establish a regional ‘development’ commission knew he only fostered another opportunity for patronage politics and all types of corruption and abuse of entrusted power. Yet, none of this has stopped the proliferation of regional ‘development’ commissions in Nigeria, with each of the country’s six geopolitical zones having a ‘development’ commission.
“Yet, evidence from the long-existing regional ‘development’ commissions shows that they are mere extractive institutions created to serve the interests of a small elite. Put simply, the ‘development’ commissions do not exist to advance regional development, regardless of what their ‘mandate’ says.”
All over the world, the tried-and-tested way of promoting regional development is to devolve powers to the regions through democratic, transparent and accountable regional governments. The idea that a federal agency can replace a regional government is a perversion of true regionalism, which is about regional autonomy. However, those enthusiastically establishing regional ‘development’ commissions in Nigeria assert that they are the answer to the developmental challenges of the geopolitical zones. Yet, evidence from the long-existing regional ‘development’ commissions shows that they are mere extractive institutions created to serve the interests of a small elite. Put simply, the ‘development’ commissions do not exist to advance regional development, regardless of what their ‘mandate’ says.
I have read the acts establishing the four existing regional ‘development’ commissions, namely: Niger-Delta Development Commission, North-East Development Commission, North-West Development Commission and South-East Development Commission. I have also read the bills for the remaining two: South-West Development Commission and North-Central Development Commission. Broadly speaking, they all have the same functions. For instance, each is mandated to “conceive, conceptualise, plan and implement projects and programmes for the sustainable development” of its region. Each is also required to “identify factors inhibiting the development” of its region “and assist the member-states in the formulation and implementation of policies to ensure a sound and efficient management of the resources” of that region.
To be sure, the establishment of the regional ‘development’ commissions is a tacit recognition of the imperative of regionalism in Nigeria; it is a tacit acceptance of the principle of what economists call agglomeration, namely that contiguous states are far more viable if they pool their resources together to achieve economies of scale than if each is on its own. That agglomeration, that brings together states within each geopolitical zone to accelerate regional development, is, at face value, the functions of the regional ‘development’ commissions.
However, in reality, the commissions undermine the principles of regionalism and agglomeration. This is because top-down federal agencies tasked with receiving and managing funds from the federal budget and foreign donors are not credible, efficient and effective means of promoting regional development. If anything, given Nigeria’s prebendal politics, the so-called ‘development’ commissions merely create opportunities for presidents and governors to give jobs to, and enrich, their relatives, friends and associates, with little consideration for genuine development of the regions they are supposed to serve.
Think about it. The acts establishing the regional ‘development’ commissions say they should spend their funds on “the cost of administration; the payments of salaries, fees, remuneration, allowances, pensions and gratuities payable to the members of the Board; the payment for all contracts; and the payment for all purchases”. If you are wondering why the regional ‘development’ commissions are drain-pipes on public funds, it’s because they embed the three components of the fraud triangle: opportunity, rationalisation and pressure.
First, with the enormous amount of public money available to the commissions, the opportunity for corruption, including through contract and procurement frauds, is huge. Second, with the total absence of transparency and accountability in how the commissions operate, there is always the justification that one could embezzle public funds without being caught. And third, those appointed to the commissions’ boards and staff are under pressure to return the favour and do the bidding of their benefactors, including by syphoning away the commissions’ funds for private benefit.
This is not theoretical. Everyone knows about the scandal-ridden Niger-Delta Development Commission (NDDC), which was established in 2000 and is believed to have received nearly N7 trillion to date. The NDDC says its mission is “to facilitate the rapid and sustainable development of the Niger-Delta into a region that is economically prosperous, socially stable, ecologically regenerative and politically peaceful.” Can anyone truly say that the NDDC is anywhere near achieving any of those goals today, 24 years after its creation? Of course not.
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In 2019, President Buhari instituted a forensic audit of the NDDC “to get to the root of the problem undermining the development of the Niger-Delta region.” The audit found, among other things, that, by 2021, more than 13,000 projects and programmes initiated by the NDDC had either been abandoned or were incomplete. In 2022, the then EFCC chairman, Abdulrasheed Bawa, said that “the statistics of NDDC abandoned projects is very alarming”, adding that many NDDC staff embezzled and mismanaged public funds.
Yet, Godswill Akpabio, current Senate President, who was the Niger-Delta minister at the time, is now supporting a bill to establish a separate South-South Development Commission (SSDC). The bill’s sponsors argue that the NDDC is a “resource-based commission” that includes all oil producing states across three geopolitical zones – South-South, South-East and South-West – unlike the zonal-based ‘development’ commissions. So, they insist, South-South needs its own ‘development’ commission! Of course, there’s no justification for having a South-South Development Commission alongside NDDC, which, as everyone knows, covers mostly the South-South states. Surely, SSDC, if created, would simply be another opportunity to pillage public resources.
What about the North-East Development Commission (NEDC), which has existed since 2017? A recent World Bank study revealed “a major gap in terms of the availability of necessary quality systems and processes that would enable the NEDC to achieve its statutory mandate.” The review said NEDC was not “a strong and functioning body” and faced many “areas of capacity shortfall that are currently bearing on it”, including “weak bottom-up accountability and transparency.” Put simply, NEDC is not institutionally, strategically and functionally capable of advancing genuine development of the North-East region.
Yet, despite the demonstrably acute failure of regional ‘development’ commissions in Nigeria, President Bola Tinubu signed the North-West and South-East ‘development’ commission bills into law in July. And he will sign the bills for the North-Central and the South-West into law once he receives them. So, each of Nigeria’s six geopolitical zones will have its ‘development’ commission, but to what effect? Well, nothing but wastefulness!
Last week, Tinubu renamed the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs as the Ministry of Regional Development, with a mandate to “monitor” not just the NDDC but all the six regional ‘development’ commissions. But if the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs could not stop corruption and underperformance in NDDC, how could it, just with a new name, stop corruption and underperformance in six regional ‘development’ commissions?
Let me reiterate the point: the universal route to regional development is to devolve powers and resources to regional governments. Sir Keir Starmer, the UK prime minister, said: “My Government believes that greater devolution of powers is at the heart of a modern dynamic economy and a key driver of economic growth.” As a result, the government introduced a Devolution Bill to give new powers to the UK’s nations and regions.
So, if Nigeria is serious about regional development, it needs democratic, accountable and viable regional governments, not so-called regional ‘development’ commissions. They are antithetical to true regionalism!
