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ACCOUNTABILITY IN PUBLIC SECTOR A PRECONDITION FOR ECONOMIC GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER ONE

1.0     INTRODUCTION/ BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

1.1     THE NEED FOR ACCOUNTABILITY IN PUBLIC SECTOR

At, the onset of the oil boom in the 1970’s, many were convinced that the era of scarcity has given way to abundant resources. A major problem was how to plan for the societies to be confronted with the vast increases in material wealth and leisure. The national priorities shifted rapidly as Nigerians embrace the increased material wealth with poor planning and abundant waste. The cost of running the government enlarged bureaucracy and social programme increased tremendously as money realized from the oil boom was squandered with impurity. Inflation, affluence and ostentation life- style became the habits of Nigerians.

A decade later, in the 1980’s the fail i8n oil prices presented a big blow on the Nigerian Economy. The financial plight of the nations’ book on crises, inflation, lack of liquidity and unfavorable balance of payment forced the government to introduced several economic survival package such as: the economic stabilization and reconstruction of policy, by the shagari administration and numerous reforms and commissions set up to bring spending sanity on the populace to a lower level for improvement of the situation in the near future. For these reasons accountability or the demand for public offices to give account of public resources, be it funds, properties, public statement, personal behaviors, actions, performance will continue to be of great concern to government policy makers.  

As the public continues to feel an increasing painful economic pinch, the management practices of public officers will be under great scruting. If government and public officers cannot account for the way they use resources, then there will be a complete loss of confidence and trust on programme, necessary resulting to general apathy and discontent among the populace and even a breakdown of law and order. Thus, the inherent problem, facing the government is to device ways and means of making public officers accountable to the taxpayers for the scarce resources under their care and for their actions while discharging their duties. In essence, accountability in public administration refers to efficient management of resources for the general welfare of the citizens. This idea will be fully developed in the proceeding discussions. However, the modest intention of this paper is to examine several government policies aimed at inhibility accountability among public officers, determine environmental factors that militate against accountability, and postulate strategies for prudent financial management and propriety among officers. Pursuit of these objectives wills necessitates relevant discussions of accountability corruption, as a mechanism for controlling waste, property values and efficiency in the management of public of fund. In Nigeria today, accountability has become of great concern to both the government and the taxpayers. Accountability to public administrators refers to prudent in financial or materials management of scare resources. It connotes the idea of doing more with little and being able to account for every aspect   of the resources involved in the process.

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