"THE CIVIL SERVICE: A VEHICLE FOR BETTER SERVICE FOR ALL", A GUEST LECTURE DELIVERED ON THE OCCASION OF 2002 CELEBRATION OF THE CIVIL SERVICE WEEK ON WEDNESDAY, JUNE 19, 2002 BY PROFESSOR (MRS) OTETE CECILIA OKOBIAH, PROVOST, DELTA STATE UNIVERSITY, OLEH CAMPUS.

INTRODUCTION

I am greatly honoured for the invitation to give a guest lecture at this occasion of the 2002 year celebration of the Nigerian Civil Service week. I was deliberately selected and I deliberately accepted without the consciousness of the brevity of time - just one week to write a paper to be delivered to such dignitaries of the Delta State Government and citizens. As at the time I realized the brevity of time, it was too late, to deliberately reject the offer. The organizers of the programme did not give me the academic prerogative of the choice of topic for the lecture. I have been asked to talk on: THE CIVIL SERVICE: A VEHICLE FOR BETTER SERVICE FOR ALL... I will start by defining the word Civil Service.

THE CONCEPT OF CIVIL SERVICE

The Oxford dictionary defines civil service as "the paid services of the state in so far as it is not military or naval." The Encyclopedia Britainica defines it more explicitly as "The body of government officials who are employed in civil occupation that are neither political nor judicial." In the same conceptualization, the Encyclopedia Americana makes a clearer definition and distinction. It describes the civil service as "the organized body of paid civilian government employees appointed to office rather than elected.

These definitions clearly imply that civil servants are appointed, employed and paid workers by the Government. They are, therefore, not political appointees. The implication of employees of Government not being political appointees brings to mind the method of recruitment. The selection of employees (method of recruitment), which is based on merit, is a distinguishing characteristic of the civil service and it must be emphasized. It must also be stated that promotion is based on merit and seniority. According to the Encyclopaedia Americana, the civil service is "synonymous with merit system under which employees are recruited" on the basis of their qualifications, as determined by their achievement in competitive examination and not because of their political affiliations. We want to quickly point out that seniority is the only criteria for promotion in the civil service in Nigeria and Delta State. Civil servant is an individual employee in a government department or ministry and paid wholly from government funds (Emiola, I985:3). Olugbemni, (I979:96) defines civil service as "an instrument both for policy advice and for the implementation of the will of the state as determined by legitimate political institutions to which the service must be subordinate and subservient"

The need for the subjection of the civil service to political control was stated as "necessary to prevent the civil service as an institution from becoming a master rather than the servant of society as well as for ensuring the eflective discharge of its functions (Olugbemi I979: 97). One can rightly say that without this subjection, there will be no civil service today as there would have been no "servant". Subsequently, this gathering would have not been in place today. Perhaps, it will be pertinent to ask some rhetoric questions. How many of our civil servants have passed the Administrative Staff College of Nigeria Examination. What are the criteria for the appointments of civil servants?

What are the professional areas of the civil servants? It is against this background that one would want to raise some vital questions to guide us in the discourse. What are the functions of the civil servants? How do the civil servants perceive and understand their functions as a vehicle for better service for all Deltans, and Nigerians at large? What are the perceptions of non-civil servants about the functional and efficiency of the civil servants? What factors affect their job satisfactions? What facilities do Government put in place to enhance the efficiency of the civil servants to serve as the desired vehicle for better service for all Deltans and Nigerians in general? What achievements are the civil servants celebrating.? What is the way forward?

My dear and honourable civil servants, and other guests, you will agree with me that neither this paper nor one week of seminar can address meaningfully all issues raised concerning the civil service as a vehicle for better service for all Deltans. What then, can we learn from a discussion of less than an hour? I am very confident that these questions that have been raised on burning issues concerning the civil service and civil servants in this paper may certainly be Food for thought lor the organizers of this occasion which may regenerate and strengthen the WILL to make the civil service a vehicle for better service for all Dellans. For where tills WILL is absent, in the civil service there will be depressed morale and lack of productivity, lack of development and failure of the civil service to achieve its goals - better service for all. This WILL must be kept alive for the civil servants to be efficient and productive. For the Adebo Salary Review succinctly pointed out "the effectiveness of the government (Delta State Government) in this case is to a large extent determined by the efficiency and competence of the civil service" (Ayida, I976:6). It, therefore, stands to reason that if the Delta State Government must provide better service for all, the civil service must demonstrate efficiency and competence in all facets. A seminar such as this that will draw attention to critical self- examination by the Civil Service and Civil Servants is, therefore, a right step in the right direction. No one can attempt to answer all these questions within the limited available time. I have, therefore, deliberately selected some of the areas to discuss.

PERCEPTION OF THE CIVIL SERVANTS BY THE NON- CIVIL SERVANTS

If we ask the non-civil servants in our midst this question "what are your perceptions of the civil servants and their functions? If we have time to analyse their responses, the Head of Service, I guess will be embarrassed. But for the civil service to sincerely serve the society better, I suggest that she carries out a survey study on some of the issues raised in this paper. The Findings of such studies will certainly help to have a better focus of assisting the civil service to provide better service for all.

Generally, the civil service is perceived as bureaucratic, nepotic, wasteful, inefficient, corrupt, and bogged with rules and regulations which slow down the activities of the system. The system may or may not be so bad. if some of the staff through whom, the public contacts the senior staff are not rude, if they are efficient, know their functions and perform them well. But the case is contrary. Some of them are so rude, inefficient, corrupt, and are never prepared to service the public. What is more, some of our senior civil servants for reasons best known to them, have indirectly empowered the female junior staff to the extent that her immediate boss becomes her subordinate. Our warped societal values have also not helped matters. A junior staff wants to own a house, vehicles, dress ostentatiously with the meager salary he earns. He/she has false self image which he/she yearns to satisfy. He opts for an unrealistic life and strives to satisfy this. He compares himself with other members of staff and strives to satisfy unrealistic hopes and aspirations. Thanks to His Excellency, Chief Onanefe Ibori for minimum wage. In spite of this, I still believe that with the warped societal values, we have refused to come to terms with the reality of our time. So the greed, avarice, false sense of values acquired by some of the staff in the civil service make them to forget their functions and tht;y search for money with "legs, hands, stomach." Thereby engaging in all sorts of sharp practices (extortion, corruption, immorality etc). We are all aware of the ugly and negative effect of this attitude towards our jobs - jobs sought for with all energies in us. Most of the civil servants feel that their jobs are Government jobs and so must not be done. With the dedication and commitments they deserve. The lackadaisical attitude of civil servants, lack of productivity, laziness, corruption, excessive high costs of contracts, over-invoicing of goods etc. have contributed to the 'ever negative perception of the civil service" by no-civil servants. There is also the perception that the civil service is a clog in the wheel of the social and economic development of the nation/state. Some civil servants do not perform their duties, until one form of gratification or the other is received. So, the general feeling is that the civil service is corrupt and the civil servants waste government's funds.

FACTORS FOR NON-PERFORMANCE OF THE CIVIL SERVANTS

There are so many factors for the non-performance of the civil servants and civil service. Some of these factors will be discussed. Again, the system is encouraged to carry out an action research to determine the extent of this problem in all areas of operations for meaningful and relevant solutions to be provided.

Some of these factors include low morale, inadequate executive capacity, lack of knowledge and skills, incessant conflict between the generalists an the professionals, lack of preparation for the job. Others include: poor co-ordination and control, poor or non existence of monitory unit, lack of techniques of management of lean resources, warped societal values, lack of defined criteria for promotion, lack of defined objectives and responsibilities of the system, lack of defined functions to be performed by civil servants.

Some of the civil servants for various reasons have no job satisfaction. This lack of job satisfaction leads to all sorts of vices and low morale. It is indeed true that some of the conditions of service are poor but job satisfaction is a psychological problem. Generally, when a worker has an inappropriate goal - unrealistic goal, he finds it difficult to meet his needs. Such a situation can lead to job dissatisfaction. Some drivers, 'yellow fevers', clerks, tailors who are contented with their jobs are very happy. They do not own all the 'facilities' needed to make them comfortable, yet, they are devoted and committed to their jobs and they have job satisfaction. They are able to met their daily needs. Some of them have adequate planning skills and so they are able to acquire some basic facilities for their comfort. Some of the civil servants , especially the products uf our educational institutions these days do not possess adequate knowledge and skills for efficiency in carrying out their functions in their offices. It is very common to find graduates who cannot draft a memo, cannot carry out simple drafting of architectural drawings and cannot take briefs from clients etc. Some of the newly employed staff are not prepared for their jobs and not willing to learn on the job. They may also not have the needed skills to perform on the job. In other to be relevant in the system they engage in some undesirable behaviour such as taking bribe, other corrupt practices, ostentatious living, etc all such acts certainly contribute to the civil service inability to provide better service for all.

The Report of the Political Bureau produced by the Directorate for Social Mobilization in I987 explicitly states three other major problem areas of the civil service as:

I. the development and sustained conflict between generalists and professionals.

2. lack of understanding of the nature of symbiosis between the administration and management, and

3. the elitist attitude of the civil service which looks down on the masses more or less in contempt in the administration of services to them (p. III).

As you all know, this problem has been with the civil service for a long time. In addition to improving the general conditions of service for civil servants, the Udoji, Adebo and Udoji Public Review Commission "tried to resolve this (incessant) conflict by evolving only one hierarchical structure the 'Unified Grade System' into which every cadre should fit". Prior to this, the arrangement was that only the generalist administrator can be the Permanent Secretary - the principal adviser to the Commissioner and head of the ministry. The obvious implication is that the professionals are under the Permanent Secretaries. This relationship has been known to generate conflicts, acrimonies, unhealthy working environments etc. in the Civil Service as the professionals resent their subordination to the Permanent Secretaries. There, is, also distrust and conflict between the Commissioners and their Permanent Secretaries, especially when both of them are not from one ethnic group or Senatorial District (Asiodu, I98I). There is also the resentment of the Commissioners by the Permanent Secretaries in a political era. The Commissioners themselves may have the tendencies of ignoring their Permanent Secretaries because 'when they were in the battle Field struggling to come to power, the Permanent Secretaries were enjoying." According to the Report of the Political Bureau, the conflict situations in some of the ministries are compounded "by infra-group conflicts even among the Professionals themselves such as in the ministry of health, where specialists in Public health, pharmacology, micro-biology etc often engage in verbal warfare over matters of importance to the health of the people" (P. II2). Such conflict(s) hinder productivity, create acrimony, hinder economic and social developments, democratic survival and impede the growth of workers on the job. Will the civil service allows this situation to continue? If it decides to recommend a structure that is likely to assist it in achieving its objectives serving the people better, will the government or those who may not benefit allow the change? Where do we go from here in the face of all sorts of acrimonies, grudges and conflicts, and inability of graduates to perform on the job?

There are rules and regulations guiding all the ministries operations. What are the monitoring machineries put in place to ensure that the stated objectives are achieved? How does the Ministry of Health ensure that private and Government hospitals meet the requirements it has set providing health services lor the people? How does the Ministry of Lands and Survey monitor the structures individuals erect to ensure that they meet the specifications? Is there any link between the Ministry of Agriculture and the subsistence farmers? How does this Ministry ensure that there is enough food for all in Delta State? How does the Ministry of Works ensure that roads are built and maintained for the people especially for the rural dwellers? What are the educational facilities and activities put in place to ensure that the best brains are adequately developed for technological development?

In all these areas of the civil service, there may be good policies as it is with the 'Nigerian case. The greatest bane of our development is implementation of well-articulated policies. So how does the civil service implement its policies to ensure better service for all? Being an educationist, I will use the Ministry of Education to illustrate how effective monitoring of the system can enhance better service to all.

One of the effective machineries for better service of the civil service for all, is the performance-monitoring unit in all the ministries. Presently, I know that there is the monitoring unit in the Ministry of Education. Is this unit effective? What are its objectives? What are the strategies planned to effect effective performance monitoring? What are the functions of the Inspectorate Division? What facilities are provided for the inspectors to achieve the stated goals? What are the roles of the Local Government Areas in -the Civil Service in ensuring the provision of facilities and enabling environment for the attainment of the stated objectives? These and many more questions are still food for thought for each civil servant and the civil service.

The Ministry of Education should ensure that the Inspectorate Division is adequately staffed with experienced and effective principals who will carry out effective monitoring of the teachers performance. Government should be able to provide enough supervisors for each subject area, and enough to cover all schools m each of the Local Government Area. Other facilities should be provided to avoid the temptation of asking for some gratifications from the heads of the schools during monitoring exercises. In the Local Government Area, there should be experienced Chief Inspector of Education who will carry out effective performance monitoring exercise.

The Inspectors should be provided with facilities like motor-cycles, bicycles and vehicle as the case may be, to make the supervisory role easier. In our educational setting where we cry "falling standard" the zonal inspectorate officers who could help ensure good supervision of the system are handicapped. Some of them are not abreast with new technological developments in their areas of specialization. For instance, the curriculum. the lesson plans and lesson schemes change with time. Another problem with the supervision exercise is that the inspectors are young and inexperienced and therefore, do not command respect from the older and more experienced heads of schools and teachers. Some inspectors do not even have any knowledge to impart to the heads of schools and the classroom teachers.

Some of the heads of the institutions are ineffective, incompetent and not knowledgeable. This is principally due to the method of appointing heads of schools where seniority on the job is the yardstick. The teaching Service Commission has no set criteria to guide it in appointing heads of schools other than seniority. Hence, some of the heads of schools who should not even be in the system are appointed heads. Promotion or appointment should be based on some assessments. This method of appointing heads of schools totally ignores efficiency, effectiveness, dignity of labour, morality etc. Indeed, this method of appointment contributes to idleness, corruption, lack of development, growth, as well as lack of improvement of the tone of the school as the others simply wait for their turn to be made principals whether they are competent or not. The result is that some of the heads of the institutions cannot manage the human and material resources of the school. This may be attributed to the fact that some of the heads of the institutions themselves engage in these corrupt practices. Some failed students are promoted, some students who are not in SS3 from other schools are registered for SSCE in their schools, some students who commit one offence or the other are asked to bring either bags of cement, or blocks or roofing sheets as the case may be. What is the relationship of the offences of students to the collection of these items as means of correcting students' misconduct? Some of the heads of the institutions collect illegal fees such as library (and there is no library corners nor books) sports (no sports equipment) etc.

The Post-Primary Education Board should ensure that teachers are posted equitably to schools in rural and urban area to avoid redundancy, which abound in most urban schools. This is an avenue of waste to the Government and lack of utilization of human resources.

THE WAY FORWARD

As pointed out earlier, the organization of this seminar is one of the steps in the right direction if the civil service is willing to provide better service to its citizens. The civil service should, therefore, organize more orientations for the staff at various levels to re-examine;

(I) modalities and criteria for promotion of staff

(2) the objectives office civil service

(3) plans and strategies for achieving stated objectives

There is the need for every civil servant to ask, meditate and answer the following questions;

I. what are my occupational goals?

2. what are my functions?

3. am I performing my functions diligently and honestly?

4. am I qualified lor this jobs?

5. am I willing tor the civil service to service the public?

6. what are my values and philosophy of life?

7. am I satisfied with my job?

8. what can i do to improve myself?

9. what can I do to put a smile on the faces of the people that come to my office today?

The civil service should organize orientation for the civil servants such that they will know themselves their values, occupational goals etc. so that the civil service can provide better service for all citizens. Each sector/area of the civil service should fmd out the areas of the society they can actually assist to provide better service for all. For example, the Ministry of Agriculture should look for effective ways of assisting the peasant farmers to solve the agricultural problems. The report of the Political Bureau (I987-.63) states "development in agriculture should take into account the need for handy simple farm implements that are required by the peasant farmer so as to enhance his productivity." If the farmed s productivity is enhanced, there will be plenty of food for all. The availability of food will certainly lead to affordability, one of the ways better service can be provided for all. The ministry of works should ensure that there are feeder roads for the farmers' products to be easily transported to the cities for the reach of the common man. The agricultural projects should provide infrastructure and facilities for the farmers and not contractors who will in turn deal with the farmers thereby increasing the costs of agricultural products. The government should ensure that there is efficient transport system which is also Integrated without other network of roads.

The railway system which is the cheapest means of transportation should be completed and when in use security should be provided. Government should ensure that there is regular supply of electricity. This will make most of the ' road side' workers, small scale industrialists be gainfully employed while they contribute their own quota to the development of the state. The Ministry of Finance can make soft loans available so that our young men and women can establish small scale businesses like poultry, saloons, fishery photocopying, computer services etc. the Ministry of Finance should also ensure that citizens pay their taxes as and when due.

The civil service should always recruit workers on the basis of merit with minor adjustment for state characterization as in the United States where they have 95% recruitment on merit and 5% for public relations. I imagine our public relations are mere embracing so we might modify this ratio to meet our cultural needs.

Enough of what Government should do. Let us turn to ourselves, as instruments for better service for all citizens. If the Government provides all facilities, and the Civil Service and Civil Servants do not have all it takes to effectively maximize their utilization for the service of the citizens, there can be no better service for all

The individual civil servant should have a new orientation of life - new values philosophy of life, cutting their own cloth according to their cloth and not size. Civil servants should learn to appreciate what they have, have pride in their jobs, instead of comparing themselves with other employees in the industrial settings. The Christian civil servants should from time to time advise others to exhibit positive work attitudes for efficiency and productivity. Civil servants should always remember that '' we came to the world with empty hands and we are leaving the world with empty hands."

Each time I have had the opportunity to reflect on some topical issues affecting productivity, efficiency and provision of social amenities in our country/nation, I have always felt that the individual citizen has a great role to play. This personal conviction is without prejudice to the role the Government should play. I feel that there should be a total reorientation of our societal values with the individual citizen at the center. There should be a new philosophy of 'I' and not they": The individual must be able to identify himself, his talents, interests, capabilities, traits, what he is able to achieve within his own lean resources and what he cannot achieve. He should be able to establish a realistic achievable goal considering his own available resources. The individual must enjoy work ~ have the dignity of labour - earning his wages. The individual citizen and indeed the civil servant must resolve to preserve and protect public property as if he was the sole custodian of the property. This resolve has implication for all civil servants and the civil service - the fight against all forms of corruption, misappropriation and squandering of public funds, time. materials etc. very civil servant must recognize among other things the fact that where his own freedom ends, another person's own begins. He must be law abiding. Every civil servant. I am sure, is very happy with the Government of the Delta State - MINIMUM WAGE. The evidences of this happiness and improved standard of living abound - w''e do not need to list them. Civil Servants, do you not believe that there is need to reciprocate the Government by putting in our best to e:-.iure that all citizens benefit from our productivity? For we all know that to whom much is given much is expected. When each civil servant does his own little bit very will, the civil service can be a vehicle for a better service to all.

Thanks for listening and God bless.