Public Service Reform Initiatives: Ignoring the Highfaluting; Igniting the Low-hanging

 

Being a paper presented by Dr Adetolu Ademujimi at the Maiden investiture of Rotarian Royal Bunmi Alade, FCTI, FCA, Permanent Secretary, Ondo State Ministry of Physical Planning & Urban Development by Rotary Club of Akure Royals on Friday 21st December 2024 at SITA Hall, Akure

Protocols

Compliments of the yuletide season to everyone in the room. It’s heartwarming to be here to felicitate Rotarian Royal and Chief Bunmi Alade, a distinguished bureaucrat whom I have been privileged to be acquainted with for about a decade as one our admired “Ogas” in public service of Ondo State. It is also a spec of honour for my humble self to have been requested to deliver a lecture on a burning topic of public governance at his maiden investiture by Rotary Club of Akure Royals.

If efficiency, transparency, accountability and adaptability are the expected outcomes of Nigeria’s bureaucratic machinery – the public service, then the subject in consideration is necessary and urgent, but with a caveat recommending a detour from previous approaches.

A popular song by one of Nigeria’s finest music artists and producers, Young Jon (once nicknamed the “wicked producer”) with a famous line chorused as “big big things ni mo like, (ya-ya ya)” is a metaphoric representation of the gargantuan initiatives often conceptualized and implemented as public service reforms at both Federal and subnational levels in this country. Such reforms have a penchant for ignoring low-hanging fruits to embrace highfaluting interventions.

Profusely, I thank my teachers at Kings College, Lagos, who taught me, among other things, never to leave the various little things undone while in pursuit of the very large stuffs. In medical school at Olabisi Onabanjo University, my training was that I should always exhaust the ‘common’ ailments while forming a list of differential diagnosis based on history and physical examination of my patients, before I think of the big (and ‘uncommon’) diseases. A similar mindset ought to be utilized when canvassing and planning public service reforms.

While canvassing for a reform of our governance structure in Nigeria, the public service must not be spared a concurrent rebirth because political office holders do not solely administer the public service. It is not surprising, therefore, that SERVICOM, a public service reform initiated in 2004 at the federal level and numerous other beautiful concepts across the subnational authorities over the past decades reflect an obsessive-compulsive policy action by Presidential and Governorship office holders. They desire public service reforms but appear to execute these using highfaluting formulae.

The emphasis, thus, is that public service reforms are welcome. In doing so however, it is imperative to avoid setting up grandiloquent reform initiatives that parade bulky guidelines with plenty grammatical constructions that are pleasing to the cameras. It is important to avoid pumping hundreds of millions or billions of naira down the drain in the name of “well-branded” reforms with little or no improvement in public service delivery to show for it. In my considered opinion, two shenanigans prompt this call for urgent low-hanging remodelling of the country’s public service to achieve tangible results.

Firstly, a former State Governor once privately aired his observation that the public service (perhaps in his State or the Nigerian Federation generally) was (and still appears) a mere welfarist platform for mass job-creation. His opinion insinuates that the relevant authorities consider the public service system as an employment machine for civil servants and not a needed efficient machinery. Although this employment strategy may mean well to drastically reduce the unemployment rate in Nigeria, it has created multiple institutional challenges for the public service that we contend with daily.

Secondly, the educational philosophy of Nigeria is as though the sole aim of schooling is not to ‘educate’ but to merely produce persons who can just read, write and flaunt academic qualifications to guarantee them eight-to-four jobs in the public service and private sector. Trust the private sector however to drill job applicants beyond their academic profile before onboarding them. On the other hand, the government sector is majorly (or only) interested in ‘certificates’ at the point of entry, especially for middle level and high cadre civil servants. Unfortunately, a public service that places greater premium on the recruitment of civil servants based on their Polytechnic & University degrees or Masters & Ph.D qualifications than skills (problem-solving, ICT, creative-thinking/reasoning, tact, strategy, personal effectiveness & efficiency) for enhanced productivity will keep Nigeria’s social service sector in the dark. Who suffers this backwardness? All of us!  

Yet, the Director-General of the Bureau of Public Service Reforms sometimes in June 2022 revealed that about 720,000 public servants were on the monthly payroll of the Federal Government and reports had it that the Federal Government had a 2022 budget of N3.88 trillion (that’s a monthly average of over N300 billion) to service the salary needs of this humongous human resource profile. With the new minimum wage that was recently approved and implemented across the country in the third quarter of this year, personnel cost of the Federal government is estimated to be N6.56 trillion in 2024 (59% increase from year 2022).  Anecdotally, all the 36 States, Federal Capital Territory (FCT), and 774 Local Government Area (LGA) Council Secretariats have a combined civil servants’ strength of about 4 million that the Governors and LGA Chairmen struggle to pay their salaries and other emoluments. These humongous monies shouldn’t be thrown away as salaries with unacceptably little results as Returns on Investment (ROI).

Chief Bunmi Alade, Permanent Secretary, Ondo State Ministry of Physical Planning & Urban Development who was inaugurated as Charter President, Rotary Club of Akure Royals today 20th December 2024

Consequently, my appointment as one of the ‘Change Ambassadors’ (each representing a Ministry, Extra-ministerial Department & Agency - MEDA) under Ondo Service Improvement Project (ODSIP) - an Ondo State Public service reform initiative managed by the Department of Public Service Reform & Development (DPSR&D) - placed a reformer’s burden on my shoulder to which my pen & paper are ever willing to respond. Also, being asked by an innovation-loving & experienced bureaucrat, Chief Bunmi Alade to deliver this paper today, is worthy of commendation. The celebrant has commissioned my humble recommendations for a major reform of Nigeria’s public service institution that has been dubbed a slow-to-adapt system. My dispassionate response via this lecture is one poised to positively impact the Federal, State and Local government public service machineries.

Without mincing words, Information & Communication Technology (ICT) skills & platforms are the most needed 21^st century competences for a revitalized public service. As a practical step forward, I therefore posit that low-hanging reforms would be seen to have been done if at the Federal, State and Local levels of government, all government-owned primary, secondary and tertiary schools, hospitals, MEDAs etc. could implement the following 15 tangible operational re-engineering actions in record time.

I. Inclusion of ICT skill in the eligibility criteria for intake of new civil servants on Grade level 8 and above - Basic Proficiency of Microsoft Office Package (Word, Powerpoint, Excel) that is physically demonstrable during the recruitment process.

II. Prompt and compulsory week-long (first 5 working days) orientation programme for all new civil servants – Civil service rules; Office/School/Hospital practices (depending on your MEDA); MEDA’s mandate, clients, strategies & routine programmes; proposal writing; memo drafting; email etiquette etc. should be comprehensively explored.

III. Written Job Description (JD) for every new civil servant – To clearly state departmental role, unit responsibility and individual duty. Mention JD (a universal acronym in Human Resource – HR parlance) among Federal, State & LGA civil servants in Nigeria and you’ll be amazed that it is an unpopular phrase. Is it difficult to have each MEDA develop a written (electronic version that can also be printed if you wish) JDs for each position within?

IV. Institutional front desks manned by trained officers – Like the landing/reception space for potential clients within the MEDA’s physical structure from where they can be appropriately directed to relevant offices/service points. It only requires a chair, table and a few ICT gadgets. Front desk officers trained, appropriately dressed and equipped with cognate skills for official and yet cordial communication with MEDAs’ clients via phone calls, e-mails and physical contacts should be engaged. 

V. Institutional websites - Each MEDA should have a functional and regularly updated website. Today, it costs less than N100,000 to host one. However, all MEDAs’ websites should be linked to a central Government web page.

VI. Institutional front desk e-mail addresses – This mustn’t be the personal handle of the Hon. Minister, Hon. Commissioner, Permanent Secretary, Director or the desk officer. It’s the MEDA’s official email address.

VII. Personalized Institutional e-mails for each civil servant on Grade level 8 and above – For example, a statistician at Federal Ministry of Agriculture can have aliyubabayaro@fedminofagriculture.gov.ng. Ditto for a Nurse employed by the State Hospitals’ Management Board (HMB) but posted to General Hospital, Abakaliki in Ebonyi State having emekamgbeahurike@hmb.eb.on.gov.ng

VIII. Institutional front desk phone numbers – It should be borne by a permanently registered SIM, table phone box or mobile phone that may be switched off at close of business and switched on at official opening hours daily. This mustn’t be the personal phone number of the Political heads or Accounting Officers.

IX. Development of electronic & physical directory of the institutional e-mails and phone numbers – The physical directory containing the institutional phone numbers and email addresses of all MEDAs (at Federal, State or LGA levels) should be placed beside each MEDA’s official phone gadgets while the electronic copy should be published on the government’s website.

X. Digital clock-in and clock-out devices in all MEDAs – For real-time monitoring of early resumption or lateness to work, absenteeism and indiscriminate exit before official closing hours.

XI. Electronic Human Resource Management platforms (linked to personalized institutional email addresses) – For leave application, training notification, promotion communication etc. by each civil servant. The world has moved beyond the archaic systems of human resource management using ‘paper’ circulars, memos and so forth.

XII. A new Performance Appraisal system – Like the Ondo Service Improvement Programme has consistently noted in recent times, the old and globally non-conforming Annual Performance Evaluation Report (APER) form has outlived its usefulness. A more digitally-driven Performance Appraisal system like that introduced by the Federal Government for Federal civil servants is needed across all States and LGAs.

XIII. Statutory annual Performance-Based Incentives for high-performing civil servants per sector – Set clear indicators (based on each sector’s expected yearly outputs) and make provisions for incentives to high-performing civil servants such as 2-week holiday/certification trips abroad, cars, houses etc. For instance, State governments can innovatively cluster their respective State’s public service into 5 sectors for this sectoral performance incentives.

XIV. Virtual meetings & supervisions instead of physical travels – With the exception of indispensable instances, the world has moved beyond compulsory physical supervisory visits & meetings.  From the comfort of an administrative office in Akure, it is possible to visualize a physical space in Ilaje Local government via two camera-supported electronic devices. Imagine the recurrent expenditure borne by the country’s fiscal space on Federal government officials’ (political office holders and civil servants) supervisory visits to 36 States, when many of these ‘sight-seeing’ ventures could be conducted via cameras. It appears we have just fixated our minds on traditional methods that ‘legitimately’ add little or more to our pockets. However, the COVID-19 pandemic reinforced this strategy with virtual meetings that save travel costs, time & risks.

XV. Incorporating community service activities into public service Day or May Day celebrations – All MDAs should statutorily set aside a day every month for environmental clean-up exercises. Furthermore, before going to gather at the Stadium (or similar venues) for Governors’ speeches and Labour leaders’ talks on 1^st of May and public service days, civil servants, led by the Head of Service, should go out to clear blocked drains, clean a market or motor park, cut overgrown trees on a major road etc. within the city or community. It will remind us, annually, that the public is our client base for whom the public service was established.

Finally, some multilateral organizations and corporate bodies have severally noted that they find it more comfortable and attractive to conduct government business with MEDAs that have institutional websites and email addresses for staff because it shows a strong corporate outlook. To stand as referee for many young Nigerians seeking to relocate and work abroad, most global organizations would only recognize your institutional e-mail. So, picture an angel investor in real estate sector surfing the internet and grabbing the institutional email address & phone number of a State’s equivalent of the Ministry of Housing & Urban Development to open an investment case in that State. If every primary & secondary school, Primary health facilities, General hospitals and MEDAs had permanent & functional institutional phone numbers and e-mails, will our public service sector remain the same? Isn’t it faster, cheaper and logical to use phone calls or e-mails to obtain daily & non-restricted information from MEDAs than to write memos & letters and wait for physical dispatch across the length and breadth of a State? That public service authorities, especially at State and LGA levels, still issue official instructions such as “copy your MEDA’s information on Compact Discs (CDs) and ask your officer to bring the CD” from one LGA or community, via a 2-hour road trip, to the State capital or LGA headquarters is an ominous sign of suspicious and deliberate refusal to innovate in the year 2024. This is a simple task that an email will resolve within seconds.

For the technology-enabled low hanging fruits already discussed, the primary role of those in authority (Federal, State & Local) is to provide broadband internet services within all government secretariats & offices. It is not a coincidence that this lecture holds within the precincts of State Information Technology Agency (SITA) that needs to be enabled to deliver this technology-driven reform for Ondo State public service, for example. While I again thank the man at the centre of attraction today, Rotarian Royal Bunmi Alade, for inviting me to lend my voice to public service reforms, I appreciate, also, the Rotary Club of Akure Royals for investing in strengthening public systems. Permit me to throw a challenge, in conclusion, to Rotary Club of Akure Royals, to work collaboratively & pragmatically with Ondo State Civil Service, through the Office of the Head of Service that is currently occupied by our highly cerebral and celebrated administrator extraordinaire, Mr Bayo Phillips, to implement these practical and low-hanging public service initiatives within a short space in Ondo State. I so recommend and submit. Thank you all for your interest and concentration.

This modified piece was written & delivered by Dr. Adetolu Ademujimi, a Medical Doctor, Author, Reformer, Coach, Public Policy expert and social entrepreneur and the original version was first published by Vanguard newspapers on 2^nd August, 2022 under the heading “Public Sector Reform Initiatives: Ignoring The Highfaluting; Igniting The Low-Hanging”