INTERNALLY GENERATED REVENUE AND GRASSROOTS DEVELOPMENT IN NSUKKA LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA, 1999-2022

The expediency for the creation of local government anywhere in the world stems from the need to facilitate development at the grassroots. The extent to which local government in any country performs this task largely depends on the revenues available to such local government. Despite the numerous sources of revenues available to local governments in Nigeria, development at the grassroots in the country has remained an enigma. To this end, this study takes a critical examination of the internally generated revenue and grassroots development in the Nsukka local government area since 1999. In doing this, we hypothesized thus: (1) Official corruption undermined the capacity of Nsukka local government council to generate internal revenues for grassroots development; (2) There is a relationship between the paucity of highly skilled manpower necessary to generate internal revenues in Nsukka local government council and its grassroots development problems; (3) Poor auditing and monitoring of rural development projects contribute to the internal generated revenues and grassroots development problems of Nsukka local government council. To empirically interrogate these hypotheses, the study was anchored on descriptive survey as a method of data generation from primary and secondary sources. Our method of data analysis was based on David Easton’s systems theory and the use of simple frequency tables and percentages. Against the discoveries of the study, we recommended, among others, that a state/local government body outside the ministry and commission should be established and saddled with the responsibility of monitoring the manner under which the Nsukka local governments’ funds are generated and used in execution of projects and programmes at the grassroots.