May42020

The one-day Town Hall Meeting on The Nigeria Social Contract attracted various stakeholders representing the Nigerian population. These groups of stakeholders were from various sectors of the society including women’s groups, students, artisans associations, persons living with disabilities, religious pressure groups, media, NUJ(press) and concerned citizens.

Highlights of the day included a Question & Answer session and handled adequately by our expert facilitators and following the discussions and interactions, here are some of the suggestions and resolutions made for tackling our many issues:

1. Government should make the participation people-centered and gender-responsive (women, youth and the vulnerable/disabled).
2. The Nigerian people need to adopt best practices in promoting transparency and accountability in governance. Citizens need to demand that any candidate for office should sign a social contract based on the promises they make to Nigerian citizens. This will be in form of a Social Contract, which would be binding, made open and posted at several public domains for easy monitoring and evaluation of promised projects and programmes. Such that when the candidate returns for re-election, it would be easy to see their report card and determine if they deserve to be voted back into office. 

There was also a group breakout session where all the attendees present deliberated on the 4 key issues in the social contract. These issues were: the responsibilities of citizens, the responsibilities of government, the mechanisms for holding the government accountable, and the possible challenges and suggestions and partnerships to consider. 

Key priority issues that NSCI should address in the area of government’s obligations to citizens as observed at the breakout session including:

• Security of life and property
• Education
• Health 
• Accountability
• Good Infrastructure
• Youth& Women Empowerment 
• Job creation
• Subject to the rule of law
• Respect for Human Rights & the Rule of law (Child Rights, Women’s Rights and freedom of speech)

Key priority issues that NCSI should address in the area of citizen’s obligations to the government:

• Political Education
• Unbiased Votes/ Elected credible leaders
• Payment of Taxes
• Civic Responsibility
• Well structured community (Upholding Law & Order)
• Holding Government accountable
• Social Responsibility

The data captured in this was actively used to prepare NSCI framework document.