Can you be over empowered?

Surely the answer should be no but when trying to work with communities in a post- (nay restate that in the current times, hot-) conflict society who have had years of humanitarian aid and relief and have experienced the International community giving handouts and free food, and incentives to be educated, incentives to work, incentives to grow crops etc etc - the answer is more like 'Yes'.

When approached with an education project, admittedly lacking a hardware element, (but in the current climate who wants to be out in the open in the districts with a digger for hours?) the communities reject it on the basis of it not providing them enough hardware benefit. They don't want simply the education (why am I surprised at this when schools are being burned down across the region and less and less children are going to school?), knowledge is nothing, tangible, physical things are all.

They know how the system works, they know, or think they do (little do they know that no one wants to work down here because the security is too poor) that they can hold out for another International contributor to turn up and offer them cash to participate, build them something that they don't get taught how to use, build them something that the insurgents then burn down months later. They have been empowered to think for themselves, to advocate for what the community needs, to speak up. But have they, and by this I think I really mean the usual influential ones who are in positions of local leadership and don't necessarily represent the voice of the people, have they been over empowered or over indulged or should I cut them some slack as they've had it hard for almost 3 decades or am I just vexed because some communities have rejected our project?