Institutional Control Measures, Fiscal Transparency And Accountability In Nigeria: A Public Service Behaviour Modification Assessment

The study was carried out to investigate the relationship between institutional control measures aimed at entrenching fiscal transparency and accountability in the conduct of public service business and public service response. In essence how have public servants responded to the fight against corruption in Nigeria? This was based on the need to assess the effectiveness of institutional efforts aimed at entrenching transparency and accountability in the public sector. A sample size of 3000 was carefully selected from employees of the federal, state and local governments, resident in the South-south Geo-political region of the country in the ratio of 2:2:1. This was premised on the need to extract meaningful data from a spectrum of public servants in the country. Data for the study was collected via a structured self-administered questionnaire distributed to the sample units. The statistical results indicated that there exist a significant relationship between institutional efforts geared towards enshrining fiscal transparency and accountability in the administration of public funds and the response of public servants. We found this result to be consistent with the existing body of knowledge that institutionalizing fiscal transparency and accountability in the administration of public sector leads to a change in the conduct of public service employees which ultimately leads to good governance. The study showed that the public service in Nigeria is not insensitive to the positive impact of a well entrenched system of fiscal transparency and accountability framework. Against this background, we proposed that the ultimate gains derivable from the fiscal transparency and accountability framework can only be optimized in Nigeria through enacting enabling laws, building strong institutions, taming of policy summersault, non interference, and moral regeneration. More needs to be done to fully entrench the system in our national code of conduct so as to derive the gains of a well administered public service in line with best practices.