KWENU: Our Culture, Our Future

THE IMPARTIAL OBSERVER

Leadership as ‘the thing around your neck’

HANK ESO

hankeso@aol.com

                                                                                                                                                    Sunday 13 November 2011

Nigerian leaders have been greedy and unprincipled particularly [those in] the Southwest and the North who have been controlling power since the 1966 coup after which the Southeast was marginalised.

                                                                             ~~ Balarabe Musa

For Nigerians, trusting their leaders is the proverbial road less travelled. As desirable as the need to secure the public’s trust is, the reality is that such trust stands mortgaged.  The limited trust is being further eroded by the prevailing political climate, in which the path to public policymaking is crater-filled and replete with invisible fault lines and suspicions wrought by personal and group interests. Hence, navigating the realm of policymaking has become immensely complex.

Several unfolding events in Nigeria relating to governance and national policies, point to the enormity of the deep-seated distrust between the rulers and the ruled.  The challenges and the burdens imposed on leadership, has metaphorically become ‘the thing around your neck’ (with apologies to Chimamanda Adiche). Figuratively, could be anything but a necklace, collar or tie; it could also be a screaming albatross.  In pre-colonial Nigeria, the thing around your neck could be a chicken, denoting that the wearer, being paraded around the village or town square, had engaged in thievery of livestock and was caught.  In the darkest days of apartheid, when despair turned to visceral anger, snitches and collaborators of the obnoxious regime were lynched; so, the thing around your neck could be a burning tire doused in gasoline.

In the realm of leadership, the thing around your neck is ever so glaring that everyone sees it and knows that you are the one carrying that lone, dubious, awesome and inevitably unwholesome burden.  The thing around your neck also denotes unshakable responsibility and profound consequences.  The thing around your neck could equally be the manacle that has hamstrung many in leadership positions, albeit mostly self-inflicted. Some of such limitations arise mainly from ill-advised policies and from greed and unprincipled positions. Leadership limitations arise at times, because many leaders who start off well falter over time. As Freeman Dyson suggests, “There are no best rulers, because power corrupts and circumstances change. Rulers often begin well and then make stupid mistakes.”  The consequences of such faltering or mistakes are inevitably dire for nations.

Moreover, when the thing around your neck relates to leadership, it can earn for a leader the opprobrium of a nation.  It might lead to revolutions, be they soft or hard core.  And it does lead to trenchant criticisms. Such was the case recently, when Balarabe Musa, the former PRP governor of Kaduna States remarked, “[All] Nigerian leaders have been greedy and unprincipled, particularly [those in] the Southwest and the North who have been controlling power since the 1966 coup after which the Southeast was marginalised.”  This is s stinging indictment. Still the same can be said of south-south and south-east leaders, even at the risk of broad brushing a few good ones.

Leadership matters; but leadership isn’t easy. It has never been. Those seeking proof should look across the width and breadth of Nigeria. The thing around the neck of Nigerian leaders is so huge and debilitating; it has held them from doing the right things for the nation. Hence, the nation struggles infinitely.

There is an emerging question that has been asked repeatedly and which despite the nuances, point to a core issue.  Some have put it more bluntly: “Is President Goodluck Jonathan up to the job of ruling Nigeria?” Such inquiry is not demagogic or partisan. Neither is it the attention-grabbing slant employed by some trenchant critics. It is a legitimate and hardheaded question in view of the state of the nation.  

The question, incidentally, is applicable to all branches and tiers of the Nigerian government considering the recent observations by Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah, to the effect that  Nigeria’s leadership problems are traceable to “the conscription of people who were not ready for governance” into such positions. The premise here is that one should be sufficiently prepared and qualified to be a good leader not that becoming a leader will make you good and qualified to govern. Apropos Nigeria’s challenges, another question is pertinent.  Are those in leadership positions at the federal, state, and local governments and their advisers doing the necessary heavy-lifting required of them?

In real terms, purposeful leadership and good governance are fungible. Where the three two meld, proactive governance and quality government is bound to result.  This is by no means the same as a situation, where leadership concentrates on precepts and varying acts of symbolism aimed at conveying a sense or semblance of continuous good governance activities. It is context that the state of policymaking in Nigeria must be analyzed.  

First, Nigerians were not thrilled or sold on President Goodluck Jonathan’s proposal soon after his election, to change Nigeria’s presidential and governorship tenures to a single six-year term.  Many still snort with bemused derision at that policy, which many view as most unserious. Besides the awful timing, this could hardly be a priority to any serious minded administration in a nation like Nigeria.  One must ask, therefore, who is the author of the policy?  Still, the buck stops with the president and as such, he must take full ownership of that policy.

Meanwhile, three issues – the Sovereign Wealth Fund, the National Minimum Wage, the removal of the Fuel Subsidy - all currently pit the state governments against the federal government and both tiers of government against the people and the labor unions. Where there should be collaboration, there is clear dissension and division.  Combined, all three policies relate to revenue sharing and the deep-seated distrust at all levels of governance.   However, the minimum wage issue has especially been a magnet for the expression of broad national discontent. A fourth issue; how to tackle the rising incidence of terrorist bombing by the Boko Haram sect, has the nation in jitters. But there are some other stark realities about our leadership challenges. Unquestionably, there is absence of “quality government”, except in one or two states, the most obvious being Lagos State.

For many of the 36 states, flawed policies, non-solid structures and poor funding has resulted in a vicious circle of self–administering states that hardly impact positively on the lives of their citizens. Some states, notably Adamawa and Abia now resort to the xenophobic policy of chasing the elusive ghost of non-indigenes, which makes Nigerians aliens in their own country. Now most states devote between 60-70 % on recurrent expenditure and only 30-40 % on capital expenditure. Yet we wonder why we have no new infrastructure, and cannot maintain the ones that are in place. 

Besides, the current governors carry the burden of their predecessors; empty treasuries, deficits, weak structures, weak economic base and all. Their case is hardly helped by the public knowledge that each governor collects an estimated N300 million monthly as security vote, yet there is hardly any security.  The recent indictment of former governors Danjuma Goje of Gombe, Gbenga Daniel of Ogun State, Adebayo Alao-Akala of Oyo, and Aliyu Akwe Doma of Nasarawa and the mind-boggling amounts running in the billions, which they are  respectively charged with looting is hardly confidence-building or trust-enhancing attributes of good governance or quality government. So where is the quality leadership, the morality and public sense of honor?

At the state level, one witnesses a convenient but crass invention that is fast becoming the norm, even though it is a historical anomaly.  We witness how some leaders have become very adept gaming the governance process, by not letting their accomplishment speak for itself. Rather, they resort to promoting what they have supposedly accomplished while in office through large bill boards and newspaper advertorials. In all, it seems that they are constantly running for re-election. Then again, in actuality, these billboards and adverts are means of doling out largesse to political cronies, just as they hoodwink.

The truth however, is that quality government would routinely translate to tangible accomplishments that stand out like the thing around your neck. Such accomplishments are visible; it gleams; it sells and markets itself.   It comes in the form of well-paved roads devoid of potholes; gleaming new buildings and bridges, paved multi-lane highways, new and active construction sites, well lit streets, and functional mass transit systems. Added to these are of course, good schools and hospitals and low crime and low unemployment, especially for youths.

All these go beyond symbolism and are present when quality government is present, and the leadership is focused, purposeful and not engaged in politicking.  It goes to confirm that leadership and governance accomplishments are not products of shambolic policies; neither do they represent in any sense the inchoate quality of policy. Where there is good leadership and governance the resonance is profound. Even those ideologically removed and the political opposition find grudging ways to acknowledge such accomplishments.  This is not to suggest that the naysayers and detractors won’t try.

There is no question that most Nigerian politicians and leaders sleep and live on government-backed “monetized” featherbeds.  Inevitably, this predatory disposition means that quality of government is diminished at all levels. This disposition is worsened when incongruity in governance results from focus on political reform but not on economic reform; when indeed both should be pursued in tandem. Growing corporate influence on government has not helped, since it undermines government’s regulatory role rather than promote private and public sector partnership. This is a known but hardly acknowledged fact. Even the so-called private sector community-reinvestment initiatives (CRI) are now used to sponge off funds from public coffers.  At issue is who really is looking out for the disenfranchised silent majority.

If as is often the case, these circumstances breed or create room for corruption or other forms of official malfeasance, it goes without saying that such environment will result in a broad frustrations, “diminished social trust”  and indeed, “more inequality”.  This is a point well made by Nobel Laureate Elimor Ostrom in evaluating Bo Rothsteins’ recent book titled, “The Quality of Government”.

Here is a case in point. Recently, an audit report by the Office of the Auditor-General of the Federation submitted to the oversight committee, the Public Accounts Committee of the House of Representatives, pointed to the disregard and non-compliance by various federal ministries, parastatals, statutory corporations and other bodies. The report also implicated the National Assembly, which it imputed, had by omission, and “negligence” failed to censure such bodies and indeed, had encouraged them to be blasé about the auditor’s report, and their obligations to upholding financial regulations. This failure of leadership by the National Assembly has clearly resulted in waste of public funds and rise in official profligacy and malfeasance. Consequently, the Nigerian people and their governments do not get a naira value for a naira spent in public expenditure. 

It could be hardly incidental that over the past twelve years many states if not almost all, have gone without local government elections.  In many states the last local government elections were held in 1998. Most have resorted to the use of caretaker committees and appointees. What this translates to is that State Governors control the LGA machinery and resources through their appointed cronies.  Inevitably, decisions determining local development, which might not be based on local needs, are shifted to the state levels, rather than being made at the grassroots where they rightly belong. This attitude is tantamount to glaring lack of respect for the constitution and the ordered autonomy of the local governments. The consequences are as visible as the heaps of uncollected garbage that fester most Nigeria urban areas.

It is inevitable that every government must account for its actions. After all only those who possess the congenial insider’s view of the workings of any administration can justifiably defend its intent and its output.  The fact that several key government policies have run into serious trouble within the so-called presidential “honeymoon period” is indicative of our governance challenge, just as it speaks to the growing vibrancy of our nascent democracy.

Our domestic problems have also manifested itself in our foreign policy. Our dismal presence of the global stage is no longer in dispute, despite the emerging trend of President Jonathan junketing, when he should rightly stay home.  Moreover, the prevailing organizational and policy deficit means that as a nation, we stopped being transactional in pursuing our domestic and international goals and meeting our collective needs.  A case in point, reliable sources indicate that the Nigerian Foreign Ministry went ahead to announce Nigeria’s recognition of Libya’s Transitional National Council, (TNC), without first clearing that policy with the Presidency.   If true, nothing could speak louder to the state of Nigeria’s dysfunctional foreign policy than this. Nigeria continues to be dogged by its incoherent policy positions. Still, if the leaders were truly in search of a quality government, they ought to understand that the best, most productive and sustainable policies are those forged through bipartisan consensus, as such broad ownership translate to broad support and acceptability.

Some Nigerian partisans argue that the current leadership under the present circumstances is doing its utmost, if not the right things. In making such an assertion, they merely wish to hold out the best of hope. When and how soon can Nigeria become a society consciously self-driven to self-reform?  So what to do? These governance questions are beyond the elemental. But one needs to also approach this matter from another dimension.

National subsidization of the cost of living is not peculiar to Nigeria. Other countries big and small subsidize medical care, housing, education, etc.  Nigeria does not do any of this, but subsidizes the cost of fuel in lieu of providing cheap mass transit.  This is now a problem. Nigeria currently expends some N500 billion annually on fuel subsidy.  This means that Nigerians enjoy the benefit of paying N65 per liter, which is an equivalent to $0.38 per gallon, compared to $3.80 per gallon paid in the US. Still, Nigerians pay far more for gasoline than some other oil producing countries such as Angola, Libya, Ecuador, Iraq, and Venezuela. This should not be!

Regarding the removal of the fuel subsidy, the politics and intent seems rather faulty, not because the policy itself is misshapen, but because of the diametrically opposite rationale proffered by the proponents, who form two sides within the government.  The nexus between the removal of the fuel subsidy and sourcing funds to enable the states pay their share of the minimum wage is clearly evident.  However, the state governors, who pushed for the removal, without a clear consideration of its possible deleterious impact on the domestic economy and transportation, only did so in hope of deploying the subsidy resources towards implementing the Minimum Wage Act. Indeed, the Nigerian Governors’ Forum had in a recent communiqué, insisted on “immediate removal of petroleum subsidy.” The unspoken truth, which has now come to light, is that un-elected bureaucrats in various government agencies, who deduct huge extra-budgetary amounts from accruing revenue all in the name of servicing the fuel subsidy, hardly account for such funds in a transparent manner.  Therefore, the governors as elected officials feel that they should be the ones in control of such funds. 

Conversely, those who advocate the removal of the subsidy on grounds of strategic economics, insist that only such deregulation would guarantee the creation of an enabling environment, wherein private investors could to build more refineries and thus generate wealth and employment opportunities, while allowing competitive market forces to depress the price of fuel below the present price of N65 per liter.  The dichotomy between the two camps – federal and state --is clear.  The former, sees the strategic economic gains and therefore see the removal a broad economic game changer. The latter, seeks to use the resources saved from the subsidy to service the immediate unmet needs that the minimum wage pay rise would address.  Faced with this dichotomy, it is hardly surprising that the proposal to remove the fuels subsidy is drawing great angst from the population and national labor unions, despite what seems like concrete justification. Irrespective of which side one takes, the fuel subsidy presents a Catch-22 situation and has become an albatross for our leaders. It is clear that it is greed that drives the attending public policies.

Boko Haram struck again this weekend in Maiduguri and in Damaturu, the capital of Yobe state, increasingly proving their brazen attitude in the face of the federal government’s laxity and inexplicable indifference by the leadership elite in the northern states.  As much a government claims that it assiduously tackling domestic terrorism, there seems to be an ambiguous policy on the matter. The welter of armed robberies, kidnappings and suicide bombings, makes insecurity in Nigeria palpable and intractable.

It is highly improbable that any democratic government would have four key legislative issues in deep trouble and not recognize the political morass in which it was mired. The recent launch of the State Peer Review Mechanism by the Nigerian Governors Forum (NGF) is tacit acknowledgement that across the board, all is not well in the governance circle.  It is surprising that the federal government has not gone into a policy crisis mode aimed at finding ways to forge a consensus on these vital national issues. The present rut seems to matter little to those in charge. Such failing is surely the thing around the neck of the present leadership. The government has clearly gone beyond the” three strikes” principles that are applicable to repeat offenders.  Were these principles applicable to governance, the present administration and most of the state governments would be at risk of being booted out for good.

With neither anger nor partiality, until next time, keep the law, stay impartial, and observe closely.

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Hank Eso is a columnist for Kwenu.com.  His observations on Nigerian, African and global politics and related issues, has appeared in various print media, journals and internet-based sites. © Hank Eso, 15 November 2011. Email: hankeso@aol.com