Caretaker Committee System and Democratic Governance in Nigeriaas Local Government System: 2003-2014 in Anambra State

Abstract

The nexus between the local government and democratic governance has been keenly explored on intense academic debates Recent debates has aimed at beaming attentions on systems such as poor service delivery lack of accountability corruption non-involvement of the people in policy formulation and implementation poor staffing and total lack of autonomy and by omission leaving out the viral influence of caretaker committees in the debate The paper therefore examined this phenomenon by asking the question as to whether the caretaker committee hindered democratic governance in the local government system in Anambra State between the years 2003-2014 The methodology adopted in the study is thematic i e content analysis The study revealed that the use of caretaker committees to run the affairs of the local governments between the years 2003-2014 has been the basic reason for the colossal failures of the grass root development in Anambra State That the running of the local governments with caretaker committees has had three major negative effects which are - Political - Economic and Social The paper thus recommended for a free and transparent election at the grassroot level devoid of manipulations as was the case in the State