Holding governments accountable becomes harder when civil society organisations in Nigeria spend more time complying with regulations than addressing the problems affecting their communities.

Development Diaries reports that the European Union (EU) and Global Rights recently launched the 2025 State Ranking Dashboard and an end-of-project report on strengthening the regulatory environment for civil society organisations (CSOs) in the country.

At the launch in Abuja, the Head of Cooperation at the EU Delegation to Nigeria, Massimo De Luca, said Nigeria’s civic space continues to change with shifting political and regulatory realities, making stronger dialogue between government, regulators, lawmakers and civil society increasingly important.

Civic space determines how easily citizens can organise, advocate and hold public officials accountable.

But for many CSOs across Nigeria, registration requirements, reporting obligations and increasing scrutiny from security agencies have become obstacles that consume time and resources that should have gone into serving communities.

The issue now is whether the problems identified by the dashboard will lead to reforms or simply become another report documenting challenges that everyone already knows exist.

Federal and state agencies regulating nonprofits, the National Assembly, and security agencies all shape how much civic space actually exists in practice through the laws they make and the way they enforce them.

Nigeria’s constitution guarantees freedom of expression under Section 39 and freedom of association and peaceful assembly under Section 40.

But when lawful organisations spend more time complying with administrative obstacles than addressing the problems affecting the citizens they were created to serve, those rights exist more on paper than in practice.

And the burden falls unevenly, as women-led organisations, disability-rights groups, youth organisations and small community-based groups often operate with the fewest resources, making them the first to struggle when registration procedures become complicated, reporting requirements become expensive or official scrutiny becomes excessive.

The EU and Global Rights describe the dashboard as a tool for dialogue, but citizens will judge its success by whether governments remove the barriers it has identified rather than simply discussing them.

CSOs should use the rankings to demand clear, time-bound commitments from federal and state authorities while publishing regular scorecards showing whether promised reforms are being implemented.

The National Assembly and government agencies responsible for regulating civil society should also publish implementation plans with measurable deadlines for removing unnecessary registration, reporting and administrative barriers identified by the dashboard.

Civic space improves when governments remove obstacles preventing citizens from organising, not when those obstacles become the subject of another report.