Public office was not a public trust, but rather a platform for personal aggrandizement and patronage. In the same vein, development priorities were misplaced, leading to colossal waste, a plethora of abandoned projects and a pauperized majority of the citizenry. A 2005 Report by the United Nations International Development Organisation (UNIDO) indicated that some US$107 billion of Nigeria's funds are stashed in private accounts in Europe and the Americas.
Since the Public Sector in Nigeria is the main engine of growth and source of patronage, it offers tremendous opportunities and conveys awesome socio-economic and political. The public sector makes and enforces policies that cover virtually everything that government does.
Until the 1988 reforms, the civil service was organized strictly according to the British tradition. It was apolitical, civil servants were expected to serve every government in a non-partisan way, and the norms of impersonality and hierarchical authority were well entrenched. As the needs of the society became more complex and the public sector bloated rapidly, there was a corresponding need to reform the civil service. The Adebo Commission (1970) and the Udoji Commission (1972) reviewed the structure and recommended ways of rationalizing the civil service. The greatest problems of the service remained inefficiency and red tape. Again in 1985, a study group headed by Dotun Phillips looked into the problems.
At his inauguration as the President in May 1999, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo expressed the commitment of his administration to the enthronement of transparency and accountability in the conduct of public affairs in the society, which has become notorious for an unenviable pedigree of mismanagement, inefficiency and endemic corruption. These sorrowful developments greatly inhibited the attainment of the objectives for which it was established, thereby impacting negatively on the growth and development of the economy.
Worried by these developments and determined to make things work better in publicly owned organisations for the benefits of the nation the present administration identified the need for institutional, structural and systematic reforms.
Unfortunately, public service Reform (PSR) has been greatly misinterpreted to be synonymous with downsizing or retrenchment in Nigeria. The concept of the PSR is about strengthening the way and manner that the public sector is administered.
Bloated bureaucracies, highly irrational decision making processes over-staffed public enterprises, non-accountability, poorly designed and implemented programmes and poor service delivery are some common factors that usually give rise to public service reforms.
The motivation for downsizing is predicated on the need for fiscal discipline, government is trying to reduce the cost of public administration. According to Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, a member of the reform team, there "are people who in the first place should not have found their way into the service." This of course is coupled with the desire to move toward a more market oriented economy.
A typical package of interventions involves,
- Workforce size reductions, implemented through mechanisms such as voluntary early retirement, natural attrition and strict enforcement of the retirement age.
- Compensation schemes, including lump-sum severance payments to encourage the redundant workers to quit, thus overcoming their resistance to downsizing, restructuring and job re-training, aimed at easing the transition of laid-off workers into the private sector.
- Wage Policy reforms, such as monetization of non-cash allowances and benefits, all aimed at containing wage expenditures.
Government on its part should take a more sophisticated approach to the issue of public sector reform and not lose sight of the fact that designing and managing a PSR programme requires a high level of administrative capacity.
The stark reality about PSR is that it takes only a strong, relentless and well-placed leadership to overcome the political and bureaucratic obstacles that are likely to confront a reform programme.
Failed accountability is at the root of public sector dysfunction. public sector performance is usually determined to an important extent by the interplay between the public sector and the country's key institutions of accountability.
Information is a critical tool in any society, wide dissemination of information that allows citizens to monitor public service delivery and public expenditure can have a powerful positive impact on the attitude and behaviour of public officials. Experience has shown that information flows can set in motion an uncontrollable dynamic promoting a more accountable and better performing public sector.
Government should bear in mind that public sector organizations with a culture that is outcomes-oriented and mission-driven have higher levels of performance than organization lacking these features. This underscores the importance to successful PSR of public - sector leadership styles and internal performance management practices that focus on results and service to the public.
Government should ensure that it provides timely and well-argued policy advice to public decision - makers as this is generally regarded as a core responsibility of public service.
Above all the Federal Government should put in place long-term machinery that would sustain the PSR because fundamental change demands sustained effort, commitment and leadership over many generations.
Autor(en)/Author(s): Ovuakporie Efe
Quelle/Source: All Africa, 16.087.2006
