The Causes of Digital Divide in Nigeria: The Context of the Nigerian Law Reform Commission

Abstract: Digital divide is the gap between individuals who have access to and can use the internet and ICT devices and those who do not. In this thesis, factors such as income, education, positional categories, electrical power supply, digital literacy etc. are identified as contributors to the cause of digital divide in Nigeria. The quantitative research method was adopted in order to measure those variables identified as factors that contribute to the digital divide in Nigeria, the context of the Nigeria Law Reform Commission(NLRC). Survey questionnaire was used as a technique in collecting the empirical data. Out of two hundred and eight (208) employees that work in NLRC, we received empirical data from a sample population of 112 participants. We used six factors to test the hypotheses we formulated for this thesis: economic factor, human factor, technological factor, government factor, organizational factor supported the tested hypotheses while the geographical factor did not support the tested hypotheses as it opposes what was obtainable in literature. Our findings reveal that Nigeria is predominantly at the first level of the digital divide and the factors mentioned above are the causes.