MDB Results 2026 · Nigeria · A Series
Kofi in the Niger Delta
Kofi goes to Nigeria with his mother. The place the buildings on Pennsylvania Avenue were built to serve.
Kofi spent six days visiting the institutions that fund development. Then his mother — Chika, from Benin City, Edo State — said: “I am going home. And I want to take you with me.” His father said: “Your mother knows things the genies do not.”
This series is what development looks like from the ground. Not from Pennsylvania Avenue. From Benin City. From a road in the Niger Delta. From a sub-project that a community remembered. From a man who spent two weeks in a jungle cabin because he was doing his job.
The Series — Nigeria, Benin City, Edo State
Benin City · Published · April 2026
Kofi and His Mother Land in Benin City
Twenty billion dollars. The same twenty collapses. A poster on a fence that nobody in Washington has answered.
The plane descends over the Niger Delta. Gas flares on the horizon. A poster beside the road asks the question. A thirty-year take-or-pay contract in dollars. Three arms of the World Bank Group, advising the same government from three different sides of the same deal. The boys on the wall. The window that has not opened.
SEEFOR · Niger Delta · Coming
The Palace of the Oba
The heart of the city.
The ancient kindgdom of Benin ruled West Africa for 600 years from 1180 till 1897. The red brick walls have been there for hundreds of years. The Oba is in residence and is a revered figure in Nigeria. The palace conveys just one word – Authority. Chika takes Kofi to take a look at the palace. It is from this exact place that around three thousand bronze objects were taken to Europe. These are the Benin Bronzes – the most exquisite of which are in museums in Europe. Getting them back to where they belong has been an ongoing challenge.
SEEFOR · Niger Delta · Coming
The State Employment and Expenditure for Results Project (SEEFOR)
Four states – Edo, Delta, Rivers and Bayelsa. 4,100 sub-projects.
Chika takes Kofi to meet Toju Onaiwu — the project coordinator for SEEFOR in Edo State. What the project actually was. What it took to achieve what it did. What employment-for-results means when you are on the ground, not in Washington. The ICR and ICRR behind the numbers.
SEEFOR · Monitoring · Coming
How Do You Monitor 4,200 Sub-Projects?
A GPS unit in a flood. A man crossing a river to photograph a small bridge. Beneficiaries on camera.
Data collection led by Eng. Mustapha Abdullahi. Trained and guided all state teams. Every single sub project mapped. GPS. Citizens feedback. Compeletely independent Third Party Monitoring. A live database accessible to anyone. Even today. Five years after the project ended.This was combined with a massive communication outreach done by CJ and the State Coordinators. Photography. Beneficiary films. TV programs. Highly visible program. — What monitoring and evaluation means when it is not a box on a results framework but a person with a GPS unit in a boat. The Facebook pages as living documentation: SEEFOR Edo, SEEFOR Delta, SEEFOR Bayelsa.
SEEFOR · Public Financial Management · Coming
Kofi and the Contractor
When the Boss at the top wants things to work – contractors get paid without having to run around – and believe it or not – even Oracle works well..
The improvements in revenue collection, cash management and getting funds directly to service delivery units. The Governor who was an investment banker and knew what good PFM can achieve.
Scratch · Published · April 2026
Kofi & The Photgrapher
He was doing his job. The road outside Benin City. Day 15: Toju was having breakfast with him at the Protea Hotel.
30 November 2019. Scratch was heading to Asaba when the car cut them off. In less than five seconds he was in another vehicle with a beanie over his head. Two weeks in a small village near the airport. A Federal Court of Appeal judge. A man who told them he was a photographer. They said they would get a native doctor to confirm it. The native doctor confirmed it. Then listen to him tell it himself.
Accountability · Coming · April 2026
What Happens When Something Goes Wrong
The ICR mentions $1.8M ineligible and a suspension. None of the 15 ISRs mention it. Zero ISRs across 2,000 active projects mention an ongoing integrity concern.
Kofi reads the ICR and finds the fiduciary review finding on page 37. He asks Toju. Then he goes through all 15 supervision reports looking for one word. He does not find it. His mother brings the INT annual report data: 2,958 complaints, 429 investigations, 26 sanctions. 99 staff for 2,000 projects. The supervision system and the integrity system run on parallel tracks that never meet in public.
Trust Funds · Coming · April 2026
Where Did the Other $78.4 Million Go?
The ICR covers $200M. The EU contributed $78.4M through a trust fund. Different accountability system. Same roads.
Kofi notices the number does not add up. The ICR rates $200M of IDA. The EU’s $78.4M is in a trust fund: a financial report to the donor, no IEG rating, no published outcome assessment. But the European Court of Auditors has inspection rights — and uses them with contract-level granularity, asking about VAT on individual contracts in remote communities, after the project team is disbanded and the office is closed. The World Bank administers over $100 billion in trust fund assets. The accountability architecture is thinner than what applies to IDA.
Fiduciary · Audit · Coming · April 2026
Who Is Auditing the Auditors?
Nigeria’s supreme audit institution is rated D by PEFA. The Bank is running multi-billion dollar programmes through the same system.
Nigeria’s 2019 PEFA assessment rates external audit and legislative scrutiny at D — the lowest possible score. Africa performs lowest of all regions on public financial management. The Bank’s own diagnostics say so. And yet the theory of “use of country systems” asks those same institutions to provide fiduciary assurance on billions of dollars of development lending. Kofi reads the fiduciary risk assessment. Then he reads the PEFA. He asks his mother: are these the same country?
Winding Up · Coming · April 2026
The Last Morning in Benin City
The gas flares are still burning. The grid is still collapsing. The contractor on the scaffolding got paid. Both things are true.
Kofi and his mother sit with the full picture before he leaves for the airport. The good and the bad. 18,680 employed. Zero satisfactory outcomes in transport, energy, or MTI/DPOs. The kidnapping. The trust fund gap. The person designing the new FCV strategy. The former Country Director of Nigeria. The totem pole. And the question his mother asks him to carry back to Washington.
SEEFOR = State Employment and Expenditure for Results · World Bank & EU project, Edo, Delta, Bayelsa and Rivers States, Nigeria · Task Team Leader: Parminder Brar · One of 12 governance projects in Sub-Saharan Africa rated Satisfactory on all five IEG dimensions, 2000–2021. One of two in Nigeria.