Institutional Reforms and Mechanisms for Public Financial Accountability in Nigeria: Finding a Recourse to Horizontal Arrangement
- March 14, 2019
- Posted by: RSIS
- Categories: Political Science, Public Administration
International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS) | Volume III, Issue III, March 2019 | ISSN 2454–6186
Olubunmi D. APELOKO1, Celestine O. JOMBO2
1PhD, Department of Public Administration, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife, Nigeria.
2Department of Political Science & Public Administration, Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba Akoko, Nigeria, and Doctoral Candidate in Political Science at the University of Kwa Zulu-Natal, South Africa.
Abstract: – This paper examines the various institutional reforms and mechanisms put in place to engender public financial accountability in Southwestern Nigeria. The paper utilised both primary and secondary sources of data collection to interrogate the roles of some public institutions and mechanisms for engendering probity in the management of public funds. The primary data were sourced through questionnaire administration and conduct of in-depth interviews (IDIs). A total of 512 copies of questionnaire, constituting 40% of the whole population, were administered to different officers in the selected MDAs. Also, a total number of 49 respondents were selected for interview. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyse the data collected. The results showed that various institutional reforms as well as other mechanisms put in place to engender public financial accountability comprises the inclusion of grass-root people into budget preparation (47.3%), strengthening of legislative oversight (57.6%), adoption of ICT and modernization of both internal and external auditing (62.4%). The paper concludes that there were reforms in financial accountability institutions and mechanisms in all the sampled states through which democratic consolidation was ensured at different degrees.
Keywords: Accountability, Institutional Responsibility, and Public Governance.
I. INTRODUCTION
Literature is replete with evidences which show that both internal and external factors usually combine or sometimes separately propel changes or the need for reforms in the administrative apparatus, political fundamentals, economic base and social variables in countries around the world. This is predicated on the need to have consolidated democratic governance where financial accountability is a towering priority (Olsen, 2015; Dowdle, 2017; Mulgan, 2017; Bundi, 2018).
