My reflections and root cause analysis have also identified the following as critical of accelerated attention:
- The absence of a robust national ethos and value system which has weakened whatever could have existed at various ethnic or sub national groupings. This is the core driver of the malaise in various sectors of the polity with undesirable impacts on critical levers of development such as
a) education/ignorance- the lack of passion and interest in acquiring and sharing knowledge arising from a lack of the spirit of scientific analysis and enquiry, mismanagement of issues, misplacement of priorities, the unwholesome crass gullibility and the pursuit of fantasia – social, cultural, entertainment and spiritual.
b) weak institutions – inability to create and maintain self sustaining and propagating structures to deliver critical services – education, health, infrastructure, power, politics etc. The absence of a quality and service delivery culture and orientation breeding a system of nepotism and patronage leading to conflicting personality cults
c) integrity systems – inadequate accountability and performance management systems, inefficient internal controls and assurance mechanisms and ineffective protective and detective arrangements, low utilization of modern tools to deal with volume and size and largely affected by a) and b) above
d) leadership – undeveloped process of selecting and grooming people with leadership potentials leading to the emergence of a crop of leadership that could not effectively deal with our development challenges. The absence of a functioning network of experienced leaders who could bring to bear insights and reflections on governance is also a factor. This arose from the imposition of an alien democratic culture on our populace by the military and the colonialists despite the fact that we have functioning and respected leadership and administrative structures in our traditional systems
e) vulnerable economic models – our economic myopia led to our comfort zone acceptance of a monocultural economy oblivious of emerging trends among and proactive responses among our fellow competing producers and customer nations
e) mindless prebendalism – our wealth without work paradigm and absence of shared or collective responsibilities have led to the paralyzing mindset that leaders and government functionaries are nodes of their constituencies to the sharing of a cake we have not jointly baked
Other issues that most Nigerians are usually excited about describing but give fainthearted solutions such as power failure, falling standards of education, infrastructure decay, corruption, elections manipulations etc are symptoms of these systemic lapses
If we agreed that the root causes have been clearly identified. There is hope that solutions may be close to being proffered and realised by a critical mass of committed people. Through sustained initiatives, networks, collaborations and teams that can appreciate the problem and can see what has to be done to address them. I will say that this assumed responsibility is not usually given or appreciated by a lot of people until it is actually done, the kind of revolution is a silent transformation, as one may be unsure of the results. My main motivation in joining government was to work with others in dealing with these issues from within through a process we call participant observation in organization development.
My experience has proven to be quite illuminating and worthwhile, despite some successes in some areas, there are of course challenges ‘ a ti gbomo lowo ekuro, ki I se oju boro. It has brought into sharper focus the depth and dimension of the problems and the issues. It has also challenged severely the extent of the honesty of purpose of people who come to say that they want to deal with the problem. The usual risk of our kind of situation is like a viral infection, leading to the grave infection of a non resilient curer. Most, rather than using placebos or doing chemistry or pharmacological methods, require radical surgeries or genetic transmutations.
Whilst waiting for them to take their root, others are also being developed, of recent I have taken some keen interest in Character Education and Reorientation, Skills Development for Teachers, Economic Development Councils, Entrepreneurial Training for Youths, Accelerated Mathematics and Science Awareness Training, Accountability in Government, Integrity Systems Development and Internal Controls, Youth Responsibilities and Leadership Awareness, Civil Service, Business and Political Leadership Development, Service Learning and Community Responsibility Initiatives. For it is said, that the significant problems, we faced cannot be solved at the same level of consciousness we had when we created them.
I just think we should not leave the job to the government alone, I have experienced the dysfunctional incapacities of expecting political based governments to carry out major transformation type initiatives. There are so many distractions! There is a also a lot of Ego, Selfishness and Civic Irresponsibility. These have led to intractable and somehow mindless conflicts between the Leaders that have emerged They are indeed oblivious of the sacred duty of leaders to be good models for the future generation. They somewhat wasted their generation, we should not allow our generation and the ones coming to be channelled to such delirious route. The time for rescue is now!
I do not agree that going our different ways could be a solution, we would just evolve banana kingdoms that would create problems for their neighbors and even humanity. The world is replete with countries that are able to harness the strengths of their diversity for the common good, it takes enlightened and discerning leadership and citizenry. We should all be our brothers keepers.
Some work is being done on corruption already, the institutions have a restraining influence on people, although some connected people can still be brazen. I have found out that the absence of preventive controls, good accountability principles and knowledge being put to practice and well networked integrity systems have been facilitating such tendencies and the society also supports by their unreasonable expectations. I am hopeful that with the appropriate introduction of the necessary technology based components. Hope may be on the horizon.
All these are not easy stuff both in conceptualization and execution, we should just continue to explore the dimensions and commit to doing something. Little by little, we will be progressing.
I just feel that we should begin to exercise some person ability for some things and stop pointing fingers. For, if it is to be, it may be up to us!
