Grassroots development key to national development, says Soetan

Since democracy is about people and development, the people must always be proactive and participate fully on how they are governed, particularly at the grassroots, the National Coordinator, Democracy Vanguard, Mr. Adeola Soetan has said.

Speaking at the launch of Community Development Charter for Ilaje-Makoko and Otumara by International Press Centre (IPC), with support from ActionAid Nigeria, in Lagos recently, Soetan maintained that democracy without grassroots development is like tea without sugar or honey.

Soetan, who presented a paper on Enhancing grassroots development, through integrating stakeholders in governance, said; “In Nigeria, our attitude seems to suggest that most people see democracy from a cone-shaped structure as against the pyramidal system, a bottom to top approach to development and good governance.”

He stated that community should be the basic unit of development by virtue of the fact that this is where the overwhelming majority of the people live, especially the poor and vulnerable who mostly need the basic essentials of life.

“Since various communities in their varied forms and formats constitute the building blocks of local government, the local government as the nearest to the people becomes the most important tier of government.”

The Director of IPC, Mr. Lanre Arogundade, in his welcome address said without community development, there cannot be national development, reason members of communities must come together to ensure development within their environs.

He noted that if members of communities keep quiet, development might not come to them because if they do not ask questions about projects being executed in the communities, the projects might be executed shabbily or not done at all.

Arogundade however, implored the media to focus more on the grassroots, because if they do, development will come to these communities, thereby helping the people and the nation.

Present at the launch were community leaders from the two communities the charter was meant for, the leaders of the Mainland Local Government and representatives of associations within the council area.