Sign up to OGP, SERDEC charges Kogi Governor, Yahaya Bello

The Executive Director of Socio-Economic Research and Development Centre SERDEC, Comrade Tijani Abdulkareem has urged the Kogi state Governor Yahaya Bello to sign on to the Open Government Partnership OGP in order to complement his new direction agenda of deepening fiscal transparency and accountability of the state resources.

Comrade Tijani made this appeal at a Policy dialogue organized by the Africa Network for Environment and Economic Justice ANEEJ on “sub-national government adoption of Open Government Partnership OGP” to raise awareness on the need to advance transparency, accountability and citizen participation as a way to deepen democratic governance at the sub-national level.

OGP is a global initiative introduced in 2011. Nigeria was formally admitted into OGP in July 2016, hereby committing to fiscal transparency, accountability and citizen engagement in governance. This has stirred nine states (Kaduna, Kano, Ebonyi, Anambra, Enugu, Niger, Abia, Enugu, and Edo) to follow suit and has led to improved openness and citizen’s trust at the sub-national level.

In 2015 Kogi State scored 12 out of 100 points in the Nigeria State Budget Transparency Survey Report. Tijani said the rating explains the level of secrecy, lack of inclusiveness that have opened doors for corruption and impunity in the management of state resources. He explained that adopting the OGP Principles will justify Governor Bello’s government’s new direction transparency and accountability agenda and help improve public trust, integrity by ensuring that a greater amount of the state resources are prudently managed.