Good governance: Whose responsibility?

 

According to the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, governance is “the process of decision-making and the process by which decisions are implemented (or not implemented). Governance can be used in several contexts such as corporate governance, international governance, national governance and local governance.” In the opinion of UNESCAP, “Good governance has eight major characteristics. It is participatory, consensus-oriented, accountable, transparent, responsive, effective and efficient, equitable and inclusive and follows the rule of law. It assures that corruption is minimised, the views of minorities are taken into account and that the voices of the most vulnerable in society are heard in decision-making. It is also responsive to the present and future needs of society.”

In Nigeria, the governance structure is such that there are 11,082 elective political offices comprised of the seat of the president, 36 state governors, 109 senators, 360 members of the House of Representatives, 993 state Houses of Assembly members, 768 local government chairpersons, six area council chairmen and 8,809 councillors representing each of the political wards in the country. This calculation deliberately left out the positions of vice president, deputy governors and vice chairmen of local government and area councils because they are not stand-alone positions. As a notable Nigerian politician jokingly said, they are ‘spare tyres.’

Note also that there are three tiers and three arms of government in Nigeria. The three tiers are the federal, state and local government; while the three arms are the executive, the legislature and the judiciary. These tiers and arms draw their funding largely from the federal purse as laid down by law. While the arms of government receive their funding annually through the federal budget, the states and local governments draw their funding monthly through the Federation Account Allocation Committee. The three arms of government are governed by the principles of separation of powers as well as checks and balances. It is very simplistic and naïve to blame the President for bad governance and incompetence without taking into cognisance that he is not the sole administrator of the country.

It is true that Nigeria has an executive president deemed to be among the most powerful individuals in the world, however, he is merely a superintendent. To succeed, he needs the collaboration and support of his lieutenants. His aides whether they are ministers or heads of Ministries, Departments and Agencies must cooperate with him in order to succeed in delivering the dividends of democracy. The public servants must play their roles nobly as the engine room of the government’s bureaucracy. While it is true that the president can hire and fire, he must use his presidential powers with utmost discretion in order to avoid sabotage. A president must have eyes for details, be alive to his responsibilities and have an independent way of getting information about the public mood without excessively relying on his advisers many of whom will only tell him what he wants to hear and not what he needs to hear.

For there to be good governance, the local government chairpersons and the governors must be conscientious and selfless in the performance of their duties. Personal aggrandisement should not be the sole purpose of being in government. Nigeria suffers from underdevelopment today because our political leaders across the board see their offices as avenues for corrupt enrichment and opportunities to feather their own nests. This is not in sync with the principle of good governance.

If we use the eight characteristics of good governance as espoused by UNESCAP, namely – participatory, consensus-oriented, accountable, transparent, responsive, effective and efficient, equitable and inclusive, how are Nigerian political leaders going to fare? Do our leaders believe in the rule of law or the rule of thumb? How much allegiance do our leaders hold to the constitution of the country? There is a provision for the federal character principle in sections 14 (3) and (4) of the 1999 Constitution. Unfortunately, this principle meant to cement national cohesion and national loyalty is observed in the breach. Appointments into civil service and even leadership of MDAs often do not follow the federal character principle. How transparent and accountable are our political leaders? The budgeting process in many states is shrouded in secrecy. Unlike the federal budget that is online, only members of the state Houses of Assembly get to see the budget of many states. In Rivers State, the N800bn budget of the government for this year was presented to a four-member Assembly who returned it to Governor Siminalayi Fubara the following day for his signature. What a mockery of due process!

Most local governments do not even have annual budgets; the local council, which is supposed to be the legislative arm, hardly meets. In fact, not a few people believe that local government is virtually non-existent in Nigeria as their roles have been taken over by the state government. Do we have participatory and inclusive governance in Nigeria? If we do, why are the vulnerable groups viz. – women, youths and persons with disability, underrepresented in the governance system of the country? The National Gender Policy of Nigeria stated 35 per cent slot for women in appointive positions but none of the tiers of government have paid due attention to that. Not even President Bola Tinubu has up to 20 per cent of women in his 48-member cabinet. There are only nine women in his cabinet with one of them, Dr. Beta Edu, suspended since the beginning of the year.

There are about 11 under-50-year-olds in Tinubu’s cabinet of 48 members. As for PWDs, they don’t even have any seat at the table of the president. He only appointed a Senior Special Assistant. Not a single member of his cabinet is a PWD. This same nonchalance to the marginalised groups is replicated across the three tiers and three arms of government. How then can you claim you’re running a participatory and inclusive government?

Ensuring good governance is not the responsibility of only the people holding political offices. Citizens too have a role to play. We should stop placing a heavy financial burden on political office holders. You cannot have your cake and eat it. You can’t be going to politicians for ‘chop’ money and asking them for stomach infrastructure and expect them not to steal to meet your insatiable demands. The reason many lawmakers don’t like to go to their constituency offices is due to heavy financial demands on them by their constituents who want them to send them on holy pilgrimage, help them pay school fees, bankroll the funeral of their dead parents and pay their hospital bills, among others. We’re not talking of a few individuals here but hundreds of people. Failure to meet this need gets the legislature into the black book of the constituents who will promise to punish him or her at the next election.  Citizens should also pay their taxes and levies, stop vandalising government or public utilities and generally be law-abiding. It is all these collaborative efforts that will lead to good governance which has become a buzzword.