Abstract

Nigeria is endowed with rich human and material resources yet continues to struggle in the quagmire of underdevelopment. This paper explored the place of human capital development and transparency/accountability in economic development. Correlation and regression analyses were used on the secondary data collected, tested for unit root and autocorrelation, over a period of 13 years.   Transparency/accountability proxies had positive but insignificant relationship with economic development in Nigeria within the period. Curiously but not surprising, human capital development had a positive though insignificant relationship with economic development in Nigeria for the 13 years. It was recommended that the Nigerian government openly reports dealings and allows public scrutiny of the petroleum industry transactions and increase the amount budgeted, while tackling corruption in budget implementations.

Key words: Transparency/accountability, corruption perception index, human capital development, economic development.