Re-Inventing The Public Service

By Rasak Musbau

Poor leadership and mismanagement have been the bane of Nigeria since independence. With security concerns surging to the foreground, our nation is faced with huge challenge which requires fresh thinking and deft action from different sectors of the economy, particularly the public service sector. Truly, it is hard to deny that many aspects of public service are strained, bent, or even broken, the reality is that hope for positive change and genuine transformation rest on the public service.

Public service is the institution that drives the activities of government all over the world. It consists of the civil service which includes Ministries, Extra-ministerial Departments/Agencies, the local government service and parastatals. It operates with professionals and non- professionals from whom it demands a special aptitude, training, language, discipline and culture. It is the major instrument used by government to implement its policies, programmes and plans. No wonder many refer to it as the engine room of governance!  It can be rightly said that the health of the nation rests on good politicians and competent and resourceful public servants. Hence, for any government to do well, it must be backed by a virile and visionary public service

Unfortunately, it is obvious that the public service has many shortcomings which make it difficult for public servants to function efficiently. The Nigerian public service was started by the British colonialists as a colonial service. It was, therefore, not designed to work for the interest of Nigeria and its people, but to serve British colonial interest. Essentially, the colonial service made Nigerians to obey the colonialists and worked to help British colonialists take away our crops, minerals and other produce. As a result, it was difficult, even after independence, for the service to evolve good plans for the development of the country. It is not the role of civil servants till date to question the policies of government. They may advise but whether or not their advice is taken, they must carry out the policies to the best of their ability.

The Europeans who served in colonial Nigeria lived far apart from Nigerians. They lived in comfortable houses in special areas known as “European Quarters.” They had servants, gardeners, and night watchmen who attended to them and their needs. They also enjoyed high salaries and all kinds of allowances as well as other special privileges. Generally, they looked down on Nigerians with contempt. Our people reacted by being disloyal to them for they did not see government as serving their interests. Government property was not considered by Nigerians as national property. In fact, some people actually destroyed such property whenever they could do so.

Today, many years after independence, this negative attitude still persist. This is because some Nigerian public servants still behave like the British did. They enjoy special privileges  and look down on other Nigerians. In some government offices, officials do not attend to people on time. This attitude usually puts the people off. This attitude is wrong because public servants are actually the servants of the people and not the other way round.

The oil boom era also had a negative impact on the country’s public service as it led to better paid jobs in the private sector of our economy. This made many qualified public servants to quit their jobs. Some of those who left became Chief Consultants or Chairmen and Directors of foreign companies in Nigeria and used their past government and civil service connections to exploit the country. Some of those who remained behind also used their positions to make money as middlemen and commission agents and engaged in corrupt activities.

However, not all problems of the public service can be blamed on public servants. For instance, political instability has seriously affected the country’s public service more than any other sector.

The question, to a discernible mind, is: what should be done to save the public service? In Lagos State, much has been done in the last twelve years, in terms of reforms that have impacted positively on its public service. To inject fresh blood into the system, the state government has recruited over 10,000 graduates into the state’s public service from 1999 to date. Training and re-training of staff has equally become a feature of the state’s public service since 1999. Upgrading of qualified principals to Tutor General/Permanent Secretary status is another reform that has taken public service in the state to a new level.

On-going reforms in the state public service are being undertaken in partnership with the UK Department for International Development (DFID) through its States Partnership for Accountability, Responsiveness and Capability (SPARC) programme. The newly created Office of Transformation recently introduced service charter to restore public confidence in government services and as a mechanism for making public officers alive to their responsibilities. The service charter is to provide among other things, the experience a customer can expect and the available information about any of the MDAs they approach, as well as the relationship the customer will have with any particular agency of government. This has helped in correcting the age-long practice of unfulfilled promises characterizing government establishments over the years.

It is also the state’s commitment to truly connect to the people that prompted commencement of Saturday service delivery in selected Ministries such as Ministry of Health, Transportation, Lands Bureau, LAWMA, magistrates’ courts, MVAA among others.

Public servants have also taken it upon themselves to regularly attend training programmes. Some have been in-house; others are conducted by Management Consultants, while others are being undertaken by professional bodies and associations. Yet, others have been held outside the country. Hundreds of civil servants, mostly professionals, have been to Singapore to share the experiences of how the country achieved successes recorded in its tremendous developmental efforts. Those who have benefitted from this included Town Planners, Architects, Engineers. Likewise, French teachers in the State public service were at the Republic of Benin to sharpen their teaching skills.

Even with all the aforementioned reforms, no one can say everything is perfect yet about Lagos State Public Service. The message is that public service can and should serve as catalyst for transforming the country for the good of all be it at the federal, state and local government level. What can be learnt from Lagos example is that with adequate motivation there are grounds for optimism that public service can be reformed and reshaped to fit today’s shifting challenges. Though the difficulty of improving public service delivery is one of the biggest challenges confronting not just Nigeria but other countries, the stakes here have seldom been higher for public service. To get to desirable level citizens must also be active, ready to always stand up for their rights and demand accountability from public servants. All officials including politicians in the public service are servants of the masses and not their masters and as such must dutifully and diligently provide public service for the public who are the real masters.

•Musbau wrote from Alausa, Ikeja.