Access to local government budgets remains a critical gap in advancing transparency, accountability, and citizen participation at the grassroots level in Nigeria. While previous efforts have focused on assessing Local Government budget copy, there is still limited citizen-led tracking, analysis, and engagement with budget implementation processes across Area Councils.

Building on the success of the 2024 Students’ Open Gov Challenge, which focused on innovative advocacy ideas to promote access to local government budgets, the Open Gov Student Fellowship 2.0 advances this work by shifting from access advocacy to budget tracking, analysis, and accountability action.

This upgraded model will empower students not just to demand access, but to actively obtain, analyze, and track the performance of budgets across the six Area Councils of the FCT, generating evidence for improved governance and service delivery.