People Power?

Earlier this year we conducted a survey of 40 local governments in 13 states across the country. In two weeks our research teams interviewed over 1,000 respondents in local communities and local government offices, holding focus group discussions and meeting local government officials. Finding local government officials to speak to was challenging in some places (as expected) and not as much in others. Local people were quite happy to answer questions and talk about the difficulties posed by a lack of decent social services, but their cynicism was overwhelming. In response to broad questions about whether they were involved in planning for local government development, citizens said that they had not been involved in planning for development projects nor for the local government budget. A number of them said they did not complain to their local government about issues affecting their community because they felt that even if they did, it would not yield any results. It’s quite clear that a key issue we need to address is civic education for citizens as a means of civic empowerment. We need to recognize the strength of the power that we hold and how that power can change the way that we live.

-Lanre