Professional Assessment of Open Data Initiatives in Nigerian State Governments

Open government data initiatives can improve transparency, enable civic innovation, and attract investment, yet their implementation maturity across Nigerian state governments is uneven and insufficiently evaluated. This study professionally assessed open data initiatives in six Nigerian state governments: Lagos (SW), Enugu (SE), Rivers (SS), Plateau (NC), Kano (NW), and Borno (NE). A structured assessment framework adapted from the Open Data Barometer was applied through structured interviews with state government data officers, documentary analysis of open data portals, dataset completeness audits, and user surveys with civil society and private sector data consumers. Dimensions assessed covered data availability, accessibility, format quality, metadata completeness, licence openness, and active use by downstream consumers. Lagos scored highest overall (64 out of 100) due to the most comprehensive portal and richest dataset collection. Borno scored lowest (18 out of 100) with minimal published datasets and no active portal maintenance. No state had published open data on budget execution with monthly granularity. Health and education data were available in four states but in non-machine-readable formats in three. Civil society use of available data was documented in Lagos and Enugu only. The study concludes that open data maturity across Nigerian states is generally low with significant inter-state disparity. Recommendations include federal government providing a standardised open data portal template, NITDA enforcing minimum dataset publication requirements, and state governments publishing budget and procurement data as priority transparency datasets.

Keywords: open data, state governments, Nigeria, transparency, data accessibility