Civil service or evil service?

By Oladele Osunbote

THE state bureaucracy is an indispensable institution in the governance of any nation. By its legal empowerment, it is an embodiment of great knowledge, operational power and can give the vital information, whether open or classified in the day-to-day discharge of the functions of the sate. In a given state of equilibrium, they could be very powerful. I wish to see the power of any institution in relation to humanistic perception of power. In other wise, any power which is antithetical to progress or humanism may not be so recognised. Recognising or respecting the feelings and needs of others is a great deal of power.

In the United States of America, the civil service was instituted and projected to defend and promote egalitarianism which is nationally recognised as the social philosophy of the nation. Before and after the Pendleton Act 1883, there were Government by the Gentlemen - 1789 to 1829; Government by the Common Man 1829 to 1883; Government by the Good - 1883 to 1906; Government by the Efficient 1906 to 1937; Government by the Administrators - 1937 to 1955; Government by the Professionals - 1955. Throughout all the enumerated periods, the United States bureacracy did not abandon egalitarianism.

The necessity for the US civil service to maintain political neutrality was dutifully recognised and respected. Yet, the society which it is out to serve has been expressing her wishes through the machinery of elections and political party system. In Britain, the report of Robbins Commission brought great and positive changes to the civil service in that country. The British administrative class are the highly devoted, trusted, and loyal civil servants who know the mind of the government and the need of the society which they serve. In 17th and 18th centuries, some countries in Europe were using cameralism particularly in monarchical states of that time. In Germany, Prusia and Austria, students for the civil service had to go to the university and learn cameralism. All over the world, the civil service is being regularly examined and properly tutored in order to position it for the service of the society which is constantly in motion.

In those days of Peter Odumosu and Simeon Adebo as heads of the civil service in Western Nigeria, the civil service was very efficient, loyal and dedicated. That civil service must take part of the praise for the then Western Nigeria civilisation. Many times I listened to Chief Simeon Adebo on television and he would say: “civil servant is to be seen but not to be heard.” At that time a civil servant would not speak to the press. They were working hard behind the scene or in camera. Majority of the people were then happy with the government and the civil service. That was a more efficient regionalism. Civil servants of that era were very honest and humble. For their contributions to the system, they were highly respected by the people whom they served.

During the Gowon era, particularly after the Nigerian civil war, some super permanent secretaries in the federal civil service started to talk to the press. They became so vocal that an observer then would know that it would be a question of time before the door of cameralism would be removed to pave the way for nihilism. I remember very well that Simeon Adebo warned this society that she must never allow the eyes of the civil servants to be opened to money. Unfortunately and along the line, the Nigerian civil servant became exposed to money to the utter detriment of the whole of the Nigerian people. In one recent debate, one speaker who was a retired director in the civil service insisted to the point of incorrigibility that today’s civil service is more deadly and of evil than the police constable who murdered a motorist.

In his words, he stated that the policeman would kill only one Nigerian but the civil service destroys countless Nigerians at the policy level. He would warn his listeners that the civil servant is dangerous and evil. He said that no civil servant is simple or junior because many times, ploys are to be executed with one voice with everyone playing his or her own roles up and down to the post of the messenger in the ministry. Today, the civil servant is the most corrupt and he is a leper. If not because by the law of the land, there are certain obligations which they must render to every Nigerian, I should be able to totally run away from them. They are not alright and I also know that they do not know that they are sick. The directors and permanent secretaries are demi-gods. For someone to leave his home in the bid to see any of them, would mean that such a person is ready to waste his precious time. They would not reply letters also.

Many of them have registered many companies to compete with private contractors an d consultants. Whenever they see good proposals from consultants, they would change few things in the proposal and use their company letter heads to present the proposals to themselves. Are they not fully in charge? Any payment by the ministry wherein there shall be no kickback, may not be paid in time or forever.

The civil servant fully plunged irretrievably into the abyss of corruption, wickedness and obscenity during the “settlement syndrome” of the then military president General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida. No nation in the world would operate a state bureacracy in this form and succeed. The attitude of the civil servant today is opposed to any on-coming change or civilisation. They are obstructors of any public good. General Murtala Mohammed saw them and knew them very well and that was why he descended on them and sent the malignant characters in the civil service home for good. Evidence at our disposal today indicates that the action, then, was not the solution. This is because, the civil servant has depreciated and depleted in value and in morality, more than ten times of the evils which they committed during the era of Murtala Mohammed.

In Britain, entrants into the civil service must be people who hold the university degree from either Oxford or Cambridge, not even Eton College. But here at home, some of the civil servants have Ph.D. in their studies but the nation has not identified some particular university for new entrants into the civil service. That may not be necessary in Nigeria because this is the issue of attitude and attitude is particularly dictated by interest. The attitude of the civil servant is not independent of interests because interests are to be jealously protected and promoted. Some years ago, when I was critical in one letter which I sent to a head of the civil service of the federation, he replied to inform me that he did not go to Ghana to recruit the members of the service. But to my mind, I was not impressed by that response because some institutional mechanism can be applied to make these people in the service to see the reality.

I do not seem to see much meaning in the seminars which the civil servants attend because that approach has not produced the change which the nation is urgently looking and praying for. There is a way by which an institution can be adequately moralised and if done properly, it shall be moralised. There must be great moral renaissance or armament whereby the society will move against all evils in the land. If any society shall survive, one of the above must be imperative. No force under the sun can stop either of these possibilities.

- Osunbote, a public affairs analyst, lives in Ibadan.