1.1 Background of the study
Policies are vital to the success of all human endeavors. They guide the actions and activities of government; clarify existing conditions and objectives, and articulate relevant actions and strategies to achieve the desired goals. Policies involve taking necessary actions, evaluating the outcomes and impacts and drawing lessons to guide the future conducts and performance to the benefit of the public. The essence of public policy is geared at addressing public needs and issues of great importance to government. Every good policy is a guide towards development. Policy is the key of every administration, because every organization has an objective mapped out to be achieved, the achievement of the objective or objectives depends on the policy formulated and its method of implementation.
In Nigeria, policy suffers greatly. One thing is to formulate policy and another is to implement it. Nigeria is known for policy making, Nigeria had no difficulties with planning and formulating policies, the problems are usually with the implementation. Policy failure corresponds to worsening of living conditions. Nigeria’s poor socio-economic conditions since the attainment of independence can be ascribed and traced to policy failure which have adverse effect on the living condition of the people and have negatively affected the economic and political system of the country. (Ogunsola, 2008:58).
Policy making and implementation are complementary, it is a well-known fact that the Federal character towards policy has affected policy making and implementation in Nigeria, the selfish interest of politicians has influenced policy making and implementation in Nigeria, and adequate steps need to be taken by policy makers in the policy making process, to formulate policies that will address developmental problems in Nigeria. Policy, once formulated, should be implemented, and pragmatic management style should be adopted in the area of policy implementation to achieve set objectives and tackle the problems or issues at hand.
Policy formulation and implementation are complementary facets of the policy process. Unless we cultivate this complement, and take a holistic perspective of the policy process, we can hardly guarantee the desired policy results. (Ogunsola, 2008:58).
Nigeria’s policy suffers greatly when it gets to implementation. Huge resources and funds are provided annually in the budget for socio-economic policies (Atinuke, 2008:10). Despite this provision, when it comes to the implementation of policies, there exist a number of setbacks due to lack of political will to execute policies and corruption. Policies are intended to reduce or ameliorate the sufferings of the people but as it is now, the reverse is the case.
According to (Elaigwu, 2008:72), Niger Delta region is regarded as the goose that lays the golden eggs for the nation. A region that is endowed with enough mineral resources, that is a blessing to the nation has been neglected, marginalized, deprived, and largely underdeveloped as a result of lack of comprehensive plan and policy framework. This has forced the youths in the region to engage in illegal mode of agitation, to fight for their rights. Militancy and other criminal acts have affected activities in the region and also affected the economic activities of the nation and have created security problems in the region.
Niger Delta crisis assumed “frightening dimensions with the emergence of social movements and militant youths that began to challenge not only the Nigerian state but also its policies, attitudes and activities of multinational oil companies in the region (Ojakorotu, 2009:2).
The militants’ illegal actions or activities such as pipeline vandalisation, attack on oil installations and multinational companies facilities or equipment, kidnapping, killing of security personnel to mention a few, affected the economy of Nigeria, by reducing oil production, collapsing of economic activities and causing unemployment.
The government of former President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua on June 25, 2009 announced a 60day Amnesty Program for militants in Niger Delta region. The aim was to disarm, demobilize and reintegrate militants who responded to the call.
According to Amaize (2009:5), the activities of militants in May 2009 and subsequent attack by the militants in Gbaramatu Kingdom in Warri South Local Government Area in Delta State resulted in the death of over eleven soldiers and led to the adoption of the Amnesty Program as a solution to the perennial conflict in the region.
MEND listed their demands and basically they fall into four categories. The first was greater political participation of the people of the region in the political affairs of the country. The second had to do with lack of participation in oil and gas industry, third issue was socio-economic development; fourth demand had to do with de-militarization of the region (Asuni, 2011:4). There are cases where oil wells are owned by northerners and they never considered developing and investing in the region where they generate income from.
Policies towards the establishment of industries has to be formulated and the trainings undertaken by ex-combatants through the Amnesty Program can only be successful if there are industries that will employ them after their training programs.
For there to be effective disarmament process, government need to understand the fact that if they fail to implement policies that will lead to socio-economic development, the ex-militants will go back to the trade they are known for. For this reason, the Amnesty Program must be effectively implemented for socio economic development of the region.
1.2 Research Aims
The aims and objectives of this research are in three-folds, which are;
1- To identify the socio-economic barrier on implementation of the amnesty program in Nigeria.
2- To identify how other factors affect the implementation of the amnesty program.
3- To identify the failures behind the amnesty program.
1.3 Research Question
The research question of this study is:
1- What are the failures behind the amnesty program in Nigeria?
1.4 Methodology
1.4.1 Case Study Research Method
The study adopts case study research method. There are multiple definitions and understandings of the case study. According to Bromley (1990:302), it is a “systematic inquiry into an event or a set of related events which aims to describe and explain the phenomenon of interest”. The unit of analysis can vary from an individual to a corporation. While there is utility in applying this method retrospectively, it is most often used prospectively. Data come largely from documentation, archival records, interviews, direct observations, participant observation and physical artifacts (Yin, 1994:2).
The amnesty program was introduced due to developmental issues in the Niger delta region which made the host community to glamour for change and improvement. For example marginalization/neglect, environmental degradation, oil multinational companies. Due to this interest the case study research method was applied to the work in order to give a deeper understanding about the amnesty program in Niger delta by relating different events which has led to the failure of amnesty program in Nigeria. This research is designed as a case study of Nigeria’s amnesty program, and gathers data on failure of policy making and implementation through articles, journal, books etc.
In addition to support the case study, I used questionnaire to back up my findings in other to get concrete facts about the failures on amnesty program and moreover it is relatively easy to analyze. The questionnaire was categorize to show the failure behind amnesty program such as corruption, socio economic development, ethnic conflicts which is related to chapter four (4).
1.4.2 Research Design
The research is designed as a case study of Nigeria’s Amnesty Program, and gathers data on perception of policy making and implementation in Nigeria through a quantitative survey. The research design for this study is a descriptive-design type. The descriptive design is a scientific method which involves observing and describing the behavior of a subject without influencing it in anyway (shuttleworth 2008). Therefore, descriptive design will be employed in the study.
The population of this study is Delta State. Delta state has three senatorial districts and 25 Local Government Areas. In the Population of 2006 and Housing Census, Delta state is comprised of 2,069,309 males and 2,043,136 females totaling 4,112,445 (DSBS, 2015:41). However, five Local Government Areas were selected for this study, owing to the large size of the state; they include Sapele, Ughelli North, Aniocha South, Ukwani, and Warri south
Table 1: Study Population
Source: (Nideref.org, 2015)
1.4.4 Sample and sampling technique
A sample of 250 respondents was taken from the total population of the selected local government areas are Delta Central, Delta North, and Delta South. The sampling techniques employed was the cluster sampling which refers to a type of sampling method where the researcher divides the population into separate groups, called clusters and then, the population is being chose from simple random sample of cluster (Onlinecourses.science.psu.edu, 2015). Analyses would be conducted based on data acquired from the sampled clusters of this work. All the respondents were above 18 years of age.
1.4.5 Validity and Reliability of Research instrument
Validity determines the extent to which the instrument truly measure or how truthful the research generally determine validity by asking series of question as related to the research study and will often look for answers in the research. Validity also involves collecting and analyzing data to access the accuracy of the instrument.
The questionnaire will be drafted and designed with assistance from expert from the field of psychology in the institution. The draft will be given to the supervisor whose suggestions and corrections will also be incorporated into the report.
While on reliability, some of the instrument shall be given to some randomly selected part of the sampled respondent and their responses collated for the purpose intended for the research.
The instrument used for the primary data collection was a questionnaire made up of two sections, A and B. Section A contained eight questions for the bio-data of respondents, while section B contained 20 questions in four items, which the respondents were expected to respond to at their disposition by agreeing, disagreeing or remaining undecided. The sample of the questionnaire is provided in appendix A.
1.4.6 Data collection
Data collection employed the use of questionnaire (a total of 250) which was written in English language. Due to the fact that most of the respondents were foreseen to have little interest in reading, the questions were read to the respondents in easily understood way. Local language was used by the administrator to explain the questions and its purpose to illiterate respondents.
The respondents that were met in the right mood were given the questionnaires and they answered with little or no supervision. Some totally refused to answer the questionnaire and some went away with the questionnaire for reasons best known to them. This administration was done randomly in five Local Government Areas which featured Police Stations, Schools, Post Offices, Car Parks, and Churches.
Due to the area of focus of this study and the jurisdiction of interest which is my state in Nigeria, a colleague in Nigeria, who is an expert in Data Collection and a professional in dealing with huge information in coded form was involved to help administer the questionnaire, collect, code and sent it to North Cyprus through email. While this research began during the month of February, the questionnaire was formulated by the researcher, vetted by the supervisor before approval and sent to Nigeria for administration in the population sample. The questionnaire administration, collection and coding took place between 3rd of May and 25th of June 2015.
1.3.7 Data analysis
A total of 250 questionnaires were taken to the field of survey and successfully distributed in the five Local Government Areas. About 243 questionnaires were recovered back from the field; the analysis includes the use of descriptive analysis to express the frequency distribution of the respondents in areas of their personal information.
1.5 Structure of Study
This work is set into 5 chapters which would simply be sequentially labeled. The first chapter envelops the introduction which gives the overview of the main points of this thesis. It carries along with it the background of study which has set the general tone and theme of this study. The statement of problem is embedded in this chapter coupled with study of research aims, research question, and outline of study.
Chapter 2 discusses the literature review. It examined the status of socio-economic development as it relates to Nigeria: Analyses of socio-economic indicators are GDP per capital, poverty, employment, education. It shall explain the Conflict in Nigeria, and link it to ethnic conflict, as it affect Niger delta, causes of ethnic conflicts in Nigeria are: poverty, manipulation forms the part of this chapters. Included as well in this chapter is the theoretical framework.
Chapter 3 the Amnesty program in Nigeria: history, stages of amnesty program in Niger delta, Government efforts in Niger delta, and the results of amnesty program till now.
In Chapter 4 the failures behind amnesty program in Nigeria is explained: this failures are corruption, socio-economic development, ethnic conflict, sustainable peace and development. The component of the case study research method and the supplement of detailed analysis of survey carried out through questionnaires forms the results of the study. All these things are wrapped in one word, 'methodology'. That is what this chapter is all about.
And chapter 5 contains further research and conclusion.