Two substantive appointments made by President Muhamadu Buhari namely Dr Emmanuel Ibe Kackikwu as Group Managing Director of NNPC ( GMD) and prof. Umaru Danbatta as the new Executive vice Chairman and chief Executive of the Nigerian communications commission( NCC) are indications of the direction of the character of regime as abhorring incompetence and inexperience. The resumes of the two chief Executives show clearly that the presidency took time to go for the best in terms of competence, transparency and experience. The new chief Executive of NNPC not only distinguished himself academically, but worked for close to 3 decades in the oil industry and rose to highest post ever held by an African in a well known international foreign oil company, Exxon Mobil where he was the Executive Vice Chairman of Mobil( Africa). On the other hand Professor, Dambatta. has relevant qualification to man the communication outfit having excelled academically in electronic engineering and telecommunications, rising to become a Professor in the said discipline at Bayero University, Kano. He has also garnered relevant telecommunications experience in the course of service to his fatherland.
It’s not only about the intimidating credentials that these gentlemen bring on the table, but the assignment they are expected to undertake. The group managing Director of NNPC was charged with the following responsibilities: 1 Rid the the corporation of corruption 2 in conjunction with EFCC, recover all stolen monies from the crude oil sales and other related transactions in the oil industry such oil subsidy. 3 block all leakages and wastage in the oil industry. 4 ensure that our refineries are resuscitated and operating at optimum capacity. 5 restructure NNPC to compete globally . 6 Ensure that all financial transactions are done diligently and all due processes are adhered to. 7 give targets to all subsidiaries of the corporation and putting in place performance benchmarks. Finally the President promised that there won’t be interference in the management of the oil industry.
Pardon me for being too simplistic in concluding in just few appointments that this government will be allergic to incompetence and corruption. But what endears me to clinging to this positive change mantra in governance is that just two days after his appointment, the GMB came smoking, cutting the cost of managing the corporation by restructuring it, reducing the directorates from 8 to 4. Similarly, the none interference of the president showed clearly when the news came from the corporation that the GMD had restructured the corporation and appointed 4 managing Directors/ Executive Directors . Hitherto, it used to be the president had approved the appointments and not the GMD. I totally believe this non interference Mantra of Mr president because I vividly recollect what Prof Tam David West said about General Buhari when he was his minister of Petroleum resources in his 20 month rule as military Head of state. Prof Tam David West said that during his tenure as minister of oil, Gen Buhari at no time he phoned or send a note to assist anybody. He truthfully said that the man gave him free hand to run the ministry.
Honestly this character of non interference and going for the best and with requisite and relevant qualifications will go a long way in bringing about a quantum leap in the development of this country which we have been yearning for.
This also brings to fore the importance of leadership in any progress made in the development of a nation. Take for instance if PMB had gone for nitwits, any hope that there will any progress in running of the affairs? If today PMB interferes in the running of MDAS asking for instance the GMD of NNPC to issue contract to favoured people and also directing him to release money to cronies and persons of all shades of character, these could definitely spell disaster as it happened in the last 5 years. This is why the Chinese said once the head of fish is rotten, the entire fish will be affected. Perhaps the importance of leadership in the achievement of positive results is amply demonstrated by this comparison. Gen Olusegun Obasanjo said the Ngozi Okonja Iweala that served under him is not the same Iweala that served under GEJ. These facts will clearly bring the statement OBJ to reality. Under OBj, Iweala used her world bank experience and negotiated our exit from huge debts incurred from western countries that reached $31b and we paid only $18b. That ended the story. Under GEJ, the same woman took us back to the dark days of indebtness by raising our debt profile to $10.5bn.Under OBJ, this woman saved $22bnin our excess crude account. Under GEJ not a kobo was added, instead the $22b was frittered away, leaving a paltry sum of $2.1bn! Under OBJ, the same woman raised our foreign reserve to$47bn, it rose to $67bn under late Yar Addua. The woman inherited the $67b, by the time she left on the 29th may 2015, our foreign reserve went down $29bn!
Though the meticulous and slow approach of PMB in assembling his crack team will give us a positive direction in governance which is highly appreciated and commendable, nevertheless, I still plead that our leader should add a little bit of urgency in moving forward.
In my request for more speed, I wish to refer PMB to the speed of his mentor Late Gen Murtala Ramat Muhammed who in 6 months totally changed the political, economic and social landscape of this country and his achievements remain indelible in the annals of time. I know some people will argue that Gen Murtala Mohammed Government was a military regime, I don’t think that can jell. Gen Murala inherited back log of problems from Gen Gowon’ s regime. It took Gen Mohammed 1 day after being sworn in to dismantle the 12 military Governors who became very powerful, corrupt and untouchables, notwithstanding the fact Gowon was a military Head of state. He did not only remove them, but investigated them and found 10 of them guilty, confiscated their stolen assets and dismissed them with ignominy. Within 1 day he was able to fish out competent military officers to replace them, one of them being the incorruptible PMB who became the governor of North East at the age of 32 years. There was clamour for more states from all the nooks and crannies of the country which the Gowon regime despite being a military regime couldn’t address and took Gen Murtala 5 months to restructure the country from 12 states to 19. While Gen Gowon prevaricated on the issue of the relocation of federal capital from Lagos for several years, it took Gen Murtala only 5 months to find a new federal capital Abuja. Within 5 months in office, precisely, on the 11th of January 1976, Gen Mohammed mobilized OAU to support MPLA which culminated to independence of Angola. With supersonic speed in 6 months of governance, Gen Mohammed left enduring legacies summarized above and one of the legacies is PMB himself which the nation is still benefitting from.
I have taken this time to, with relish, enumerate the high points of The dynamic Murtala Mohammed regime and demonstrated that speed doesn’t necessary kill, sometimes it is required, especially when things are bad as they are now. While we appreciate PMB’s slow pace in trying to fix the monumental problems inherited from successive regimes, it will not be out place to make a clarion call for increase in tempo of governance. There is no doubt that the five point agenda of PMB namely corruption, job creation, insecurity, accelerated agricultural growth and exploration and exploitation of solid the mineral sector are achievable . My primary concern is while other actions can wait, putting in place an economic team that will address the crisis of the dwindling value of our Local currency, resolving the fuel subsidy crisis that has been defrauding the nation of trillions of Naira which could have been used in fixing some vital infrastructure and social amenities should not be unnecessarily delayed. The economic team would have by now fashioned out a blue print for the economic development of the nation. I’m also concerned that the sensitive office of the secretary to the Government of the federation (SGF) which is to coordinate all government activities is yet to have an occupant, just as the chief law officer of the federation the Attorney General, one of the 4 Executive offices recognized by the constitution namely the president, the Vice President, the Attorney general and the Auditor General.
Another sore point that deserves immediate attention is reconstituting the Independent National Electoral commission( INEC). At present the national Electoral commissioners cannot conduct a lawful meeting because there won’t be a quorum. Only 2 commissioners out 12 are still serving their 5 year tenure, the other 10 have exhausted their tenure. Out of 36 Resident Electoral commissioner, 35 will have their tenure expiring in the next few weeks. Already the commission has 2 governorship elections to conduct this year in Kogi and Bayelsa. Fast tracking the appointment of the substantive chairman of the commission and other positions in the commission will go a long way in restoring confidence in the Electoral body.
There is therefore no doubt that with the few substantive appointments made by PMB, it is clear that governance will be all about competence, transparency,experience and service delivery. It will however not be out of place to request for a little bit of acceleration by putting in place the various structures of government to turn around the fortunes of the nation in no distant future.
Fenny J Fwa
Ministry of information
Yola