The Institute of Local Government Studies (ILGS) in collaboration with Commonwealth Local Government Forum (CLGF) organised Executive Strategic Leadership and Management Course for Chairpersons and Managers of Nigeria Local Government Areas to build their capacities from 25th to 27th November, 2025 at the Institute’s Accra Campus, Ogbojo, Accra.
The course focused on addressing some of the leadership and management challenges that chairpersons, councilors and managers face in performing their functions. The learning objective was for participants to gain deeper knowledge in leadership and management roles in the context of sub-national governance..
The course consisted of 5 taught sessions and one ‘Leadership in Action project’ (Do Shop). Various topics discussed included decentralisation and local governance in Nigeria and Ghana, public financial management, managing municipality as a business, conflict management, community engagement and transformational leadership. During the training, it emerged that, local government leaders need to do more to satisfy the needs of the residents. Though some successes have been chalked in both Nigeria and Ghana, revenue mobilisation and financial management needs to be improved. Participants cited that they appreciated the thought process of the resource persons and their mode of facilitation, the Level of discussion or participation and the interactions of the training. They suggested that more participants should be invited to the training programme especially participants from other African countries to ensure more experiences shared.
Participants had an experiential tour at the Korle Klottey Municipal Assembly and the Kwame Nkrumah Museum which was exciting and educative.