Leadership and Good Governance: The Nigerian Experience

Leadership and governance have been recognised as imperative for the attainment of the the political, economic and social objective of any political community. The significance of leadership to governance is seeing in the fact that good leadership sets the tone and standard of governance. This paper engages in the conceptual examination of the nexus of governance and leadership and with heavy reliance on secondary data, analyzes its phenomenon in Nigeria. Findings reveals that the history of Nigeria is replete with governance and leadership that in most cases lacked vision, mostly engrossed with corruption and political bickering leading to the enthronement of maladministration and mismanagement of public resources, and consequently insecurity, economic setback and abject poverty. A vibrant civil society committed to ensuring free and fair election leading to the enthronement of political leaders founded on distinct sound value systems and with a probe for probity and accountability is imperative if good governance and leadership is to be attained in Nigeria