World Bank approves $27m incentive for 20 states under Governance Reform Programme

Twenty Nigerian states have received a combined $27 million in performance-based grants under the World Bank-supported Human Capital Opportunities for Prosperity and Equity-Governance (HOPE-GOV) programme after meeting key governance and public finance reform benchmarks.

The incentive payments, announced by the Federal Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning, are funded through the $500 million HOPE-GOV credit facility, which is designed to strengthen governance and improve the delivery of basic education and primary healthcare services across the country.

Speaking during a strategic retreat for state Commissioners, Permanent Secretaries, and Directors of Budget and Planning in Abuja, the National Coordinator of the HOPE-GOV Programme, Dr. Assad Hassan, said the disbursement followed an independent assessment of participating states’ compliance with the programme’s reform targets.

According to Hassan, the states were evaluated by an Interim Independent Verification Agent (IVA) against four “Year Zero” Disbursement-Linked Results (DLRs) focused on improving fiscal transparency and accountability.

The assessment measured states’ compliance with requirements such as adopting comprehensive work plan guidelines for basic education and primary healthcare budgets, implementing harmonised budget guidelines and a unified chart of accounts across local government areas, and publishing Citizens’ Budgets for the two critical sectors within stipulated timelines.

Five states—Bayelsa, Borno, Kano, Kebbi and Yobe—emerged as the top performers, each receiving the maximum incentive of $3 million after meeting all the core requirements relating to education and healthcare planning.

Other states earned varying levels of funding based on their performance across the different reform indicators, including the adoption of harmonised local government accounting systems and the publication of Citizens’ Budgets.

Dr. Hassan explained that the 16 states that did not qualify for the incentive failed to meet some of the programme’s requirements, including uploading required documents to official government websites and complying with statutory deadlines. He also cited weak coordination among ministries, departments and agencies as a major obstacle to implementation.

To improve future performance, he said the programme secretariat has introduced a technical support initiative to help underperforming states strengthen their institutional capacity ahead of the next assessment cycle.

The Year One verification exercise is expected to commence next month, with the programme placing greater emphasis on addressing staffing shortages through the recruitment, deployment and performance management of teachers and primary healthcare workers.

The HOPE-GOV programme is one of the Federal Government’s key reform initiatives aimed at improving governance, transparency and service delivery while ensuring that public resources are more effectively directed toward critical sectors such as education and healthcare.