The South East Development Commission (SEDC) was created by an Act of the National Assembly and signed into law by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu in July, 2024. The governing board was inaugurated in February, 2025 with Mark Okoye as the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer. Former minister of Labour and productivity, Chief Emeka Nwogu was named the board chairman. The inauguration signals a crucial journey to sustainable growth and development of the region.
The mandates of SEDC include developing infrastructure, attracting investment, tackling ecological challenges, boosting human capital, and driving systemic economic transformation across the five South-East states of Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo. The establishment of the commission was a major policy thrust of the federal government intended to address the long decades of neglect, under-development, abandonment, and obvious marginalisation of the South-East geopolitical zone.
The commission is widely acclaimed as a fundamental response to the lingering regional grievances and government’s under-investment in the region since the civil war ended. The commission is a latent force designed to unleash uncommon and enormous socio-economic revival on the region.
The commission’s responsibilities span across planning, coordination, financing, and implementation of independent developmental strategies in support of state or regional capacities. It plays a well-defined complementary role of filling gaps in infrastructure, enterprise support, environmental remediation, and human capital development for the benefit of the entire region without necessarily assuming the roles of state governments.
In simple terms, the commission’s thematic and strategic areas of focus centre around: infrastructural development – particularly construction of rural link roads, establishing viable transport networks, and enabling access to energy. Others are economic empowerment and entrepreneurship support; environmental sustainability notably on erosion control, ecological restoration and stability. Human capital development comes in forms of skills acquisition, youth empowerment programmes, and education, security and regional competitiveness.
The vision of SEDC is strongly weaved around positioning the South-East as the preferred investment destination in Africa by 2035. Its mission is to drive sustainable development, economic growth, and unity through strategic investments and empowerment initiatives. The drive reflects the desire of government to move the region to the path of glory and integrated development; one that unlocks the potentials of the private sector, attracts capital, provides jobs, and advances innovation.
As the regional frustration gave way to optimism, the questions on the lips of many are: Is the SEDC prepared to fulfil its core mandates? What do the people expect? And what must the commission do differently to avoid repeating the familiar culture of developing smart paper proposals and what seems like good intentions but ultimately ends as a failure at implementation stage?
An unbiased glance at the nation’s experience with intervention agencies such as the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) reveals recurring and staggering organisational drawbacks which SEDC must endeavour to avoid. Endemic corruption, political interference, board and leadership changes carried out at the instance of top level political elites and forces undermine progress and desired outcomes.
Weak systems have always made accountability difficult; if not impossible. It largely suffocates operational structures and efforts aimed at project assessment, monitoring and transparency. In Nigeria, commissions have more often than not embarked on white elephant projects with little or no direct impact on the lives of people. Functions of ministries, agencies or state governments have been duplicated to serve the ulterior motives of some individuals. Strategic implementation plans have remained largely on paper without clear or well defined effective pathways for success.
Another challenge is lack of fiscal discipline and delays in release of funds for already identified projects. The above are common features in Nigeria’s public sector. A sad reminder that institutions designed without a well-defined and robust project implementation pathways are bound to fail despite good intentions.
In light of the above; what should the commission do differently to avoid the failures of its contemporaries and deliver impactful results for the people? First, the commission should deliver on short-term project quick wins at the heart of its mandate. Delivering on projects like bad roads which abound in the region and initiating a rail network connecting the region creates first announcement impact. Second, there is the urgent need to prioritise transparent approaches and accountability in SEDC business. By so doing, the commission should be regularly willing to open its books for independent audit and often update citizens on milestones accomplished against budget lines. In this digital age, publishing project dashboards and procurement records in real time supports transparency and kills suspicion.
Third, the commission will accomplish more when it totally divorces itself from meddling into obvious partisan politics perhaps to satisfy some pecuniary interests. Fourth, one of the biggest threats to institutional credibility and general performance is elite and political capture of a system. When this happens, the overall interest is sacrificed on the altar of the greed of a few. This pitfall should be avoided while the commission’s leadership and strategic planning must be protected from undue partisan influence.
How could this be achieved? Experts recruitment should be transparent and merit-based. Tenures of board members should be protected with the backing of the law. This will discourage intentionally laid operational landmines and undue interference with board room decision making process from the powerful and mighty. There should be a strong global provision discouraging conflict-of-interest among staff while discharging their duties.
The commission represents hope and that hope must be alive in addressing regional infrastructural gaps, economic restoration and pride of the people. There is no gain reiterating the fact that, feeding on hope devoid of meaningful action is a morass akin to the usual fake political promises. Therefore, to genuinely transform the South-East region, SEDC must cultivate the culture of maintaining integrity in business, fiscal accountability, effective governance, and production of tangible results. The people of the South-East are not merely asking for good intentions and motivational speeches. They expect better outcomes which refect in more job creation, provision of new infrastructure, upgrade and expansion of existing ones, regional stability, and sustainable growth.
Sunday Onyemaechi Eze, is a lecturer, Department of Mass Communication and Head, Internationalisation and Partnership, Coal City University, Enugu
