Analysis shows fiscal decentralisation promotes economic transformation in federalist countries like Nigeria and South Africa, indicating potential regional growth.
Many countries develop through the increase of their economic resources, which naturally exist in most countries. On the other hand, some evidence shows that countries can develop through fiscal decentralisation, which promotes this growth through regional growth via significantly viable economic transformation. In Africa, for example, federalist countries such as Nigeria and South Africa show greater capacity for regional transformation through indicators of great relevance in themselves. Evidence also shows, for example, greater economic transformation through fiscal federalism. South Africa, for example, has less significant decentralisation but greater capacity to collect tax revenues. The analysis shows that Nigeria, for example, has a fiscal base in only a few states, with 10 states naturally having greater capacity for economic transformation, which suggests that there is less complexity in tax revenue collection, thus restricting economic development particularly in these states. Political decentralisation in African federalist countries does in fact lead to greater political turnover and greater political plurality among its political actors, which are naturally the political parties. Although there is de facto fiscal decentralisation, particularly in Nigeria and Ethiopia, there is nevertheless a greater lack of economic development in all territories, with the exception, for example, of states with greater economic concentration such as Lagos and Abuja.
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Nerhum Sandambi (2025) studied this question.
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