This study looked at Reforming Public Administration and Territorial Governance in Nigeria: Strategic Priorities and African Union Alignment. The research specifically explored the issue of administrative modernization, restructuring of territorial governance and Nigeria's adherence to governance frameworks of the African Union (AU) including the African Union Agenda 2063, African Peer Review Mechanism and the e governance agenda. For the purpose of this study, a qualitative documentary research design was used, which was based on secondary data that were collected from government policy documents, African Union reports, academic journals, and institutional publications over the period from 2025 to 2026 related to the governance reforms. The data were interpreted in terms of content and patterns across governance reform clusters using thematic and content analysis. The results of the study indicate that administrative modernization is in the process of developing moderately, approximately 58 percent of federal institutions have implemented a digital governance system and 35 percent have fully integrated an automated human resource management system. There has been partial improvement in territorial governance restructuring—around 42 percent of the reforms in fiscal decentralisation have been advanced, and the implementation of other reforms on local government autonomy is delayed because of continued discussions. Nigeria complies with about 55 percent of the governance principles of Agenda 2063, with certain areas of full compliance being weak institutional structures for enforcement and policy inconsistency. The study suggests that while Nigeria has been able to make a great leap forward in reforming institutions in public administration and territorial governance, the reforms are not uniform and widely integrated within the institutions. It also confirms that there is a developing alignment with the governance structures of the African Union, although this is not yet fully realised. Thus, the need for continued institutional engagement, improved policy implementation mechanisms and better intergovernmental coordination to achieve better governance results and deepen continental integration.

Keywords: Public administration reform, territorial governance, administrative modernization, African Union alignment