Frequent Changes In Local Government Administration As A Bane To Rural Development

For any organization to be productive, it must learn the effective usage of its man power. But research has shown that there is a serious decline in productivity and further quest into the reason for this drop revealed that the error is a wrong thinking and attitude. Because local government affairs do not take place in a vaccum, this wrong thinking and attitude often affects the planning, organizing, staffing, coordinating and budgeting of the council.
This research work x-rays the frequent changes in local government administration as a bane to rural development with reference to Owerri west local government area. This forms the basis of this research efforts geared towards injecting new ideas into local government administration and helping to solve problem arising form frequent regime changes.
The objective of this research aims at how best to reduce the incidence of frequent changes in the administration of Owerri west local government which has always been a log to the wheels of development.
Over the years, Owerri west has been abandoned and left to rot. These local government areas suddenly became a town planner’s nightmare with blocked drainages and ubiquitous mountains of refuse here and there. All these are as a result of the incessant changes in local government administration by successive state chief executives. Looking back at the course of history, we shall be going down a bloodstained memory lane. From the 1970’s till now, government has raped the local people by their laisset fait administration. Having elected political representatives, it is expected that there should have been in existence, functional structures or arms of government at local level through which the elected executives can make representations to state or federal government, take decision at local level, implement existing polices, make bye-laws where and when necessary and take other necessary administrative steps to move the local government for ward but this is not the case as every new administration always want to introduce its own policies and strategies. It is against this background that development at the local level continues to suffer a set back.
To carry out this research work a sample size of 400 was made out of the population size of 300,500 questionnaires were made and distributed to selected respondents, when the data collected from the questionnaires were analysed and presented in tables, it was discovered that:
i) Development projects are abandoned by successive administration in Owerri west local government area.
ii) Council members implement policies without operational guide but as they suit their personal interest.
iii) There is no genuine leader to pilot the affairs of the council.