Local Government administrations stand greater chances of achieving grassroots developments if they harness the opportunities offered by public-private-partnership arrangements.
With such strategy, various aspects of governance that have posed difficulties over the decades reducing the capacities of local governments to bring relief to the people can be resolved.
These were some of the recommendations of the Special Adviser to President Bola Tinubu on Media and Public Communication, Chief Sunday Dare, who spoke on Wednesday at the annual lecture of TheGazelle News.
Dare, who was the keynote speaker, said he witnessed, some ten years ago while serving as the Chief of Staff to now President Tinubu, how the former Governor of Lagos state called a meeting of local government chairmen to open their eyes to the opportunities that were available if they entered into public-private-partnership deals.
According to Dare, that admonition to the council chairmen then had yielded fruits with many of the councils in Lagos state today boasting of landmark physical infrastructure which they, alone, could not have been able to achieve.
Speaking on the theme: Driving Grassroots Governance with Public-Private Partnership (PPP): The Gains, the Pains, and the Prospects, the presidential aide said “PPP must be viewed as a governance philosophy.”
He described it as a “framework for collaboration between government, private businesses, civil society, and local communities to solve public problems.”
He argued that PPR arrangements have offers expansion of resource Access, driver efficiency and also foster innovations.
In the end, these cause what Dare called “ripple effects” in the economic life of the communities.
Dwelling on how the current administration has revolutionalised local government administration through autonomy, Dare said the decision by the Tinubu administration to grant autonomy to the councils was borne out of the realisation that “every nation rises or falls on the strength of its communities.”
True development is not merely measured by the architectural marvels or skyscrapers in our capital cities.
“This is why grassroots governance matters. Local government councils were never conceived as mere administrative outposts. They were designed to bring government to the doorstep of the citizen—to make it visible, responsive, and accountable,” the presidential aide noted
He said while responsibilities of local governments continue to mount with growing population and other factors, the resources to manage the administrations are not in abundance noting this is what calls for the governments to look inward to adopt strategies that will help them out of the difficult situations.
“One truth is clear: while the government cannot do everything alone, it must ensure that everything gets done. This is the promise of Public-Private Partnership,” Dare added