By Azuka Onwuka
When people who like me want to show that they see me flying high in future, they prophesy that I will one day be a federal minister, governor or senator or “holding a big position in government.” Even though I know that they mean well for me, I usually find it somewhat amusing.
There is a belief in Nigeria that the peak of ambition or career is holding a political position, whether elected or appointed. This belief is not nurtured by the mere hope that the person will transform the state or country. It is nurtured by the expectation that such a position will transform the financial and social standing of the person involved. And the moment someone gets appointed or elected into a government office, it is celebrated by those who are close to the person. The reason is that it is believed that political office means political power, wealth, prestige and patronage.
Consequently, no matter the height people attain in their career or in wealth accumulation, it is seen as incomplete until they have held a political position. Once a person is declared the winner of the gubernatorial election of a state or the presidential election of Nigeria, expectations are high over who will be appointed a commissioner or minister or a special adviser or a director general of an agency or a member of a board. Once the governor or president is done with the appointments, there are expectations of who the commissioners, ministers or DGs will appoint as special advisers and assistants.
The dream of every journalist or public relations professional, for example, is to be appointed the special adviser to the President on media or the chief press secretary of the state governor or the Senate President or Speaker or a minister. Those who get such opportunities are seen as the blessed few by their colleagues and friends. Others wait and pray for their own people to get elected or appointed so that they can get their own appointments as media advisers.
It is not surprising that once people get appointed as ministers or director generals of agencies and the like, their different constituencies pay them special visits. Town unions, church parishes and groups, social clubs, university alumni groups, professional associations and others which have some direct or indirect connection to the politician usually pay courtesy visits. The main reason for these visits is to wet the ground for projects, donations and employment opportunities which those groups will benefit from.
Close and distant relatives as well as friends and associates also make frequent trips to the offices and homes of the elected and appointed public officers. They come with a retinue of problems. They ask for financial help to pay for school fees, rents, medical bills, support their businesses, offset their debts; they ask for employment opportunities for themselves or their children; they ask for contracts that they will execute.
When these visitors are leaving, their host is expected to be generous in giving them “transport money.” Politicians who are lavish in giving such “transport money” are regarded highly as “grassroots-oriented” and “good people,” while those who don’t dole out money are tagged “stingy” and “detached from the grassroots.” Public officers who are known to welcome such individual and group visitors and accede to their numerous requests are also rated highly as the good and popular ones. They are the ones that will be voted for if they offer themselves for an election. Those who facilitated the election or appointment of such public servants also have their own list of demands.
The irony in all this is that nobody among the beneficiaries bothers to interrogate the seemingly bottomless bag this money is taken from by these generous politicians. Nobody also bothers to ask how people whose salary is not too high suddenly become the richest and most generous in their communities shortly after being elected or appointed into public office. To the beneficiaries, these politicians who are generous to them are good while those from other constituencies and zones who are generous to their own constituents are corrupt destroyers of the economy of the country who deserve to be jailed or even sentenced to death like Jerry Rawlings did in Ghana. But their own generous politicians should never be criticised or prosecuted. Anybody who does that is a hater.
This fixation with holding public office has led to some desperation to hold any political post by any means. There have been cases where people who were ministers were demoted to lower positions like special advisers and the like, but they still accepted such positions because of the need to remain in “the corridors of power.” Soothingly, there have been a handful of people who have also rejected such. In 1999, Dr Alex Ekwueme, having lost the presidential primaries of the People’s Democratic Party to Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, was asked to contest for the senate and be made the senate president, since the office was zoned to his South-East zone, but he rejected the offer. His argument was that he had become the vice president of Nigeria in 1979 when he was 46 years and would not accept to become the senate president when he was 66 years. Even though the senate president is the head of the legislature, dropping from number 2 to number 3 was retrogression in the eyes of Ekwueme.
Public service has been so much exalted in Nigeria that no other profession is comparable to it. For example, despite the heights achieved by academic icons like Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, J.P. Clark, Chike Obi, no university, airport or currency note is named after them. The only people who are easily named after those are political leaders.
In other climes, many professionals like journalists face their jobs with joy and content, showing no interest in public offices, because they are well paid and their profession is not seen as inferior to public office. Each person is seen as serving the country from his or her own angle of profession. The public servants are even seen as “servants” to the public in the real sense of the word. One of the ways they show it is that they regularly brief the media, and when they do so, they stand up all through the briefing while the journalists sit down. The journalists don’t stand up in deference to them even when it is the president or prime minister who steps in to do the briefing. The journalists ask them all manner of questions, and they do their best to answer the questions. If they are haughty, condescending, rude or evasive, the journalists report that to the nation and it affects their rating.
For a country to emancipate itself from mediocrity, poverty and regress, governance should not be seen as a lucrative business. It should be seen as a service. Good politicians should not be identified by the amount of money they share to the people but by the quality of service they offer to help in the transformation of the welfare and wellbeing of the people and the country.
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