When members of the public are given the opportunity to participate in local
governance, the benefits are immeasurable. Unfortunately, the structure and
mechanisms for promoting public participation, especially in the context of a
developing country, is underexplored. In this paper, we examine the structure and
mechanisms for public participation in two randomly selected communities within
Lagos Mainland Area of Lagos State, Nigeria. Specifically, we measure public
participation in terms of the quality of interaction among the members of the
community, as well as the interaction between the community and the Local
Government Council. Selected Heads of Traditional Councils in these communities
were interviewed using semi-structured interviews. The findings show that “face-toface†relationship is a dominant strategy for promoting public participation within t he
Makoko/Iwaya communities. Consequently, we established that the potential of ICT in
the promoting of public participation is far from being explored in these communities.
The corresponding policy implications are discussed and recommendations to enhance
the use of ICT for promoting public participation are suggested.