Modernisation, Urban Renewal and the Social Cost of Development

Abstract

Within the global development wave, urban renewal is seen as remedy to insecurity. Therefore, no reasonable government would leave strategic cities in disorder. But the question is: whose needs should first be addressed in acutely poor societies? Homelessness and hunger arising from demographic displacements and joblessness are the immediate result of urban renewal and genrtification. ‘The poor-indeed’ bear most of the brunt. Almost all natural cities in the world are first established by ‘the poor-indeed’. If modernization must force the poor out of their heritage, provision for resettlement should be made available, affordable and timely. Examining the displacements in places like Maroko, Lekki, other cities in Western Nigeria and the FCT, the welfare of the poor and menial workers, has been the social cost of development. With government acting as facilitators, the new occupants of the ‘hijacked cities’, though having the fund, neither have any link with, nor make any contribution to ease the resettlement plights of the displaced poor. The paper submits that development understanding in Nigeria has been elitist. It contends that with time, elite-fostering development that forsakes the plights of the ‘poor indeed’ will only serve to exacerbate insecurity. To be meaningful, development programmes for countries such as Nigeria where the wealth of the rich results from the poverty of the poor, should first seek to salvage the ‘poor indeed’ as current experience under some of the state governments. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2013.v4n10p318