POVERTY ALLEVIATION PROGRAMME AS A BASIS FOR GRASSROOTS TRANSFORMATION: THE NIGERIAN EXPERIENCE

D.O. Okibe (FHNR)

Department Of Public Administration

The Federal Polytechnic, Kaura-Namoda

E-mail:- dookvan@yahoo.com

ABSTRACT

Poverty has always posed and still poses as a menace against the transformation of the grassroots. The wide spread of  poverty have remain one of the most notable features that challenges the development processes in Nigeria especially at the grassroots in spite of all the efforts and resources which successive government in Nigeria have committed for many years in fighting poverty. The central theme of this paper is to highlight the efforts in term of policies and programmes that the Nigerian government has embarked upo n for grassroots transformation. The paper began with the conceptual clarification of the word “poverty” and after which went further to illustrates the major factors that inhibit the attainment of grassroots transformation in the country. The paper also make use of poverty indicators such as literacy level, access to safe water, nutrition, infant and maternal mortality as well as Human Development Index (HDI) to establish the poverty status of Nigeria. The paper equally give some options of what should be done, such as improving the general welfare and provision of more social amenities to the rural populace for there to be a transformation at the grassroots.