Towards a Stakeholder Model for Institutional Voids: Integrating Host Communities in the Corporate Governance of Nigerian Mining Companies

Mining is both beneficial and detrimental to the environment, society and economy. Nigeria is blessed with many natural resources. However, host communities suffer greatly from social, economic and infrastructural underdevelopment due to mismanagement of mining activities. This thesis contends that Nigerian laws do not sufficiently protect the host communities’ rights. The study assessed the effectiveness of Nigeria’s mining regulatory regime and corporate governance system in promoting and protecting host community rights. The study finds that most regulatory systems are ineffective and have allowed corporations to get away with environmental degradation and infringement on the rights of hot communities. To build and maintain an organised corporate governance system, establishing a legally justifiable and acceptable corporate governance system and an organised market mechanism for developing and emerging economies is necessary. Consequently, this thesis proposed a model of corporate governance for Nigeria that recognises stakeholder rights, specifically those of host communities, are considered. The integrative stakeholder model, a synthesised theory of corporation law, was suggested in the thesis. The suggestion is a different contextual framework for corporate governance in Nigeria. It may be possible to envision more corporate responsibility actions based on the integrative stakeholder model's hypotheses. In-depth consideration was given to how much host communities should be permitted to participate in manging the mining business alongside the directors and shareholders. This thesis establishes that incorporating ISM into Nigeria's institutional and legal mining regime in support of host communities' participatory development will, among other things, promote environmental sustainability, peaceful coexistence, more informed decision-making, economic sustainability, and social sustainability. This thesis also demonstrates that a more cooperative regulatory framework for mining that prioritises a fair compliance and enforcement model can have the desired regulatory impact and ensure a revolutionary sustainability outcome. The host communities will likely have a voice and a chance to meaningfully address issues and hold other stakeholders accountable once they are acknowledged as stakeholders and actively involved in the corporate governance system of mining companies in Nigeria. This was a desk study, which involved a wide-ranging document review. The study examined and analysed government policies, regulations, journal articles, government reports and information from mining corporations.