There can be no significant development in any country without functional and adequate human capital development. The reasonability of every government is determined to a larger extent on the ability of the government to better the lives of its citizens through the development of sound macroeconomic policies that will reduce poverty and inequality, controlled growth rate of population, attainment of high per capita income, programmed external borrowing and so on. The cumulative effect of these is to a greater extent the elimination of poverty and inequality in a nation. On the contrary, the major issues of critical concern in Nigeria in particular and developing nations in general are weak and poor policies resulting into high level of poverty and inequality. In view of the above, this paper seeks to examine the relationship between Government Policies, Human Capital Development, Poverty and Inequality Reduction thereby examining the policies of various regimes in Nigeria and how these policies have affected level of inequality and poverty in Nigeria. The following questions were raised to guide the writing of this paper. 1. What is meant by the following concepts: governance, poverty, inequality, human capital development? 2. What are the causes of poverty in Nigeria? 3. What are the possible solutions to human capital development problems, inequality and poverty? 4. Can Nigeria meet the targets as set by MDGs by 2015?
The methodology adopted in this presentation is theoretical in approach. It is important to note that as laudable as some of these policies and programmes were, the sincerity of their establishment and poor implementation mechanism were the major causes of failure of these policies, resulting into high level of poverty and inequality in the society. In view of this, the paper therefore recommended that there should always be sincerity in the establishment of policies, faithful implementation of transformation agenda, NEEDs, MDGs, and other supportive programmes, full and proper implementation of Universal Basic Education and other structural levels of our educational policy to mention just a few.
Keywords: Governance, Human Capital Development, Poverty and Sustainable Development.
