THE IMPACT OF PUBLIC SECTOR ACCOUNTABILITY ON NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIA

Abstract

This study examines the impact of public sector accountability on national development in Nigeria: A case study of Edo State. This study adopted the survey research methodology to source for data from a sample of 400 respondents from the three senatorial districts. The study adopted chi-square statistical instrument was uased to analyse the hypotheses. The result revealed that there is significant relationship between public sector accountability and local development process in Edo State. The result also shows that there is significant relationship between public sector accountability and national developmental project plan in Edo State. Similarly, the result revealed that there is significant relationship between challenges of public sector accountability and national development in Edo State. The study recommends that the Edo state government should take an efficient and effective planning control measures and prudent management of their resources and also to increase the salaries of all staff and members of the state government so as to motivate their efforts towards the discharge of the duties assigned to them in other to achieve the stated objective(s) of the state government that geared toward national development. The state government authority should endeavor to look into its administrative activities regularly and then prosecute any officer(s) found embezzling public funds and also make the head of the account office answerable for any such misappropriation. Another strategy for improving compliance in government should be in the area of strengthening the external and internal audit functions within government agencies through continuous training and retraining.

Keywords: Public Sector, Accountability, National Development, Local Development, misappropriation.