By; Dr. IBRAHIM SANI KAITA



Following the success being recorded after the establishment of the Community Watch Corps for the protection of lives and livelihood in Katsina State, Governor Dikko Umar Radda’s administration is now set to launch a community development initiative designed to tackle three core developmental areas – infrastructure, social care, and learning, when a Bill for the Community Development Programme is finally presented and passed into law.



The governor has never been in doubt right from the day he took over as the executive governor of the north-western state that community development would remain a cornerstone of his administration’s belief in making a better future for the good people of Katsina State by building their communities. It is an initiative that must be supported by all for the success of the state.



Under the arrangement, community development centres will be established in all the 361 wards across the state to ensure all the people have access to the benefits of the initiative. If well entrenched, the community centres will become a beacon of socio-economic development and the primary driver of budget implementation in Katsina State.



In preparation towards the successful launch of the programme, three community development zonal hearings for Funtua, Daura, and Katsina Zones were held in September, 2024. This is besides the two-day training workshop organised for local government staff who would eventually participate in ward/local government community development committees. Governor Radda explained while declaring open the workshop that the training was in preparation for the inauguration of community development committees at ward, local, and state levels.



Ably represented by the supervising commissioner of the Ministry for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Alhaji Bishir Tanimu, the governor also pointed out that the community development committees were meant to introduce community-driven approach in the development and implementation of strategic policies for the local government areas and the state as a whole. This is in addition to being an “opportunity to utilise the structure to involve the communities in identifying their needs for the intervention of the three tiers of government”.



The beauty of the initiative is that the community approach is designed to be non-partisan, as all members of the communities, irrespective of party affiliation, will participate in the process. The community approach as designed in model will allow the government to assess the aggregate needs of communities in the state and budget for mega projects to meet those needs.



Interestingly too, the community approach will allow people to be fully included in governance by providing specific needs that will form part of the annual budgets of the state and local government and it will ensure fairness, transparency, and effectiveness in the distribution of resources across the state.



Other benefits of the community development model include that the communities will themselves provide valuable data directly to the government through the community centres, which will help design interventions that can work for them. Additionally, it will allow the government to respond quickly to problems it would otherwise not be aware of in the communities.



For his unwavering commitment towards the success of the initiative, Governor Dikko Umar Radda will himself lead the community development effort as chair of the Programme Steering Committee, which will comprise various commissioners, key stakeholders, and the programme coordinators. In fact, the primary function of the Programme Steering Committee is to provide overall guidance on implementing the community development programme (CDP) and ensure that it meets its objectives.



Also, the state’s Deputy Governor will chair the CDP’s Joint Planning Committee with some local government chairmen from each senatorial zones as members. The committee will coordinate state and local government efforts to implement the programme. It will also work to include all community projects in the budget of each local government as designed by the community development office.



More importantly, each community will have a community-level committee responsible for overseeing the activities of the community centres, as the programme will comprise programme officers and community members to ensure transparency and effectiveness. The programme is expected to promote community engagement by arranging town hall discussions and voting on community programmes in addition to working with the traditional head to validate projects before they are forwarded to the Programme Steering Committee for implementation.



The community centres, which will be established in all the 34 local government areas of the state, will have three offices to deal with specific intervention. These offices are community development office, community support office, and community learning office. While the community development office will deal with infrastructural and economic development, the community support office will deal with social care for the vulnerable, victims and banditry, women, children, disabled persons, and others in need of social support from the government. And the community learning office will promote education and all forms of learning, including moral orientation in the communities.



Equally, the community centres are expected to have two primary functions – project selection and monitoring. Project selection will be through a stardardised template that allows communities to list and prioritise all the projects they want to complete for the coming year. Interestingly, the types of projects will include the construction, rehabilitation of roads, hospitals, schools, and WASH facilities. They will also include the distribution of farming inputs, including fertilizers, economic empowerment tools such as motorcycles, sewing machines, processing facilities, and funding will be provided for development.



Furthermore, the community centres will provide cash support and access to medical care, mental health services, food, and other social service, as well as provide communities with learning materials, vocational education, literacy programmes, moral classes, and other initiatives.



In a nutshell, Governor Dikko Umar Radda’s community development model is all-embracing which in all honesty, needs the support of all for its success in the state and beyond. Like the Community Watch Corps, a security approach which was lauded all over the country, it is the belief of everyone that the community development model will certainly achieve the purpose for which it was initiated.



Dr. Kaita is the Deputy Registrar and Secretary, Institute of Education, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria.