Regional Imbalance: Development Challenges in West Africa

This edition highlights challenges relating to respect for regional balance in the implementation of development projects in the countries – all having shared but peculiar dynamics. While Niger, a country with nearly 70 percent of its population under 25 faces a critical problem of youth unemployment and underemployment due to a lack of job opportunities, and partly to an imbalance in the distribution of development projects, Mali’s situation is blamed on widespread insecurity. The central regions of the country, particularly Mopti and Bandiagara, are short of equitable development initiatives given the presence of insurgents. And then Nigeria, a multi-ethnic and culturally diverse nation facing many social and economic challenges that include insecurity such as banditry and kidnappings, especially in the northwest region, continued insurgency by terrorist groups in the north-east, and separatist agitations in the south-east.