Awaiting Osun’s cabinet

AS a concerned Nigerian and bonafide citizen of Osun State, I have been bothered about the indescribably amorphous structure of the state cabinet for some time now. This manifests, particularly, in the fact that Osun has made a stagecraft of running a zero cabinet template for the better part of the last five years or so, a development which patently runs afoul of Section 193, Sub-sections 1 and 2(a), (b) & (c) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999. Beyond the imperative of the constitutional sanctity of having a cabinet in place as cited above, one’s concern is even more heightened by the fact that the state is robbed the beneficial values of such an accompaniment, chief among which is the robustness of engagement and depth of debates that inform governmental policies in the state. This, obviously, was what President Muhammadu Buhari was referring to recently when, while commenting about why he kept his cabinet intact between 2015 and 2019, he said: “We all had a common vision, we frequently had heated debates in this room on the best way to achieve our goals. These differing views are what made the decisions we took all the more rational.” (tribuneonlineng.com, May 22, 2019.) This is open admission, at a much higher level, of the beneficial values of structured, cabinet-driven governance in a democracy, as opposed to rulership by a few.

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Additionally, I think having a cabinet in place in a democracy is a potent venture towards diffusion of power and shared prosperity. This is underscored by the fact that the appointed cabinet members would also be influence-wielders of some sort in their own constituencies, thus helping to deepen our democracy and cascade its accruing dividends to more stakeholders. One can go on and on in reeling off the opportunity costs of not properly constituting a cabinet in a political space.What has been happening in Osun belies the scenario painted above. The All Progressives Congress (APC)-led government in its close to nine years’ administration in the state has been with and without a cabinet for about the same length of time. The zero cabinet dispensation came into being at the outset of the second term of the Rauf Aregbesola administration, ostensibly in the wake of the appalling condition of the state’s finances occasioned by the global nosedive of the prices of petroleum products which hit Nigeria and almost grounded its mono-cultural economy. In the wake of this, Osun was in the news for all imaginable unsavoury reasons, topped by staggering salary and pension deficits. The telltale signs of a failed state were written all over the State of the Living Spring!

It was, obviously, as part of the immediate plans to redeem the state and change the narrative that the Aregbesola government adopted the zero cabinet policy, ostensibly to unburden the state of salaries and other emoluments for commissioners and other such high-powered political appointees.  A critical situation, they say, calls for a critical panacea. One might, therefore, excuse the former governor and even commend him for ingeniously reining in on the situation. However, true to the words of Prof. Chinua Achebe that “When a handshake goes beyond the elbow, we know it has turned to another thing,” one would not expect it to become a permanent feature of the APC government in the state. But unfortunately, this seems to be the reality. The Gboyega Oyetola administration in Osun State has been in place since November, 2018. Clearly over six months into its tenure, no commissioners have been appointed. And if that is not jolting enough, the commissioners whom his predecessor (Aregbesola) appointed in the twilight of his second term in office and who, naturally, stood disbanded upon the lapse of their principal’s tenure have been chief hangers-on around the Oyetola administration, and are being ‘officially’ paraded (or is it unofficially?) as ‘supervisors’ for their erstwhile ministries!  This is wanton aberration and flagrant desecration of an otherwise noble and constitutionally governed function aptly tagged “commissioners”.

While pondering this issue further, I began to wonder if Osun is the worst state in Nigeria in terms of finances, revenue base and other such fiduciary imperatives. How and why is it that other states, who even on the face value of it do not have half the potentials of Osun State, are enjoying the full compliments of a robust democracy? What is the way out of this conundrum which the state seems to have found itself? This would lead me to broach what led Osun State into the situation in the first place – paucity of funds or financial incapacitation vis-à-vis its huge obligations in terms of wages/pensions bills, infrastructural deficit, etc. What can the governor of a state burdened with about 35,000 (or is it 45,000?) civil/public servants to cater for amidst other commitments and confronted by fast dwindling public allocations from the Federal purse do? I think an engagement programme borne out of a good heart may be much useful. This can be executed as follows.

The government should plan a structured assembly with the entire workforce and other key stakeholders such as frontline traditional rulers, religious leaders, etc. If holding a session with such a mammoth crowd would tend to be unwieldy, credible representation can be drawn along Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) lines. At the session, it should make a concise presentation on the state of the state, part of which would be the historical trajectory of the revenue base, say, for the past 10 years, to project how the state has been having to confront more with less, and the challenges ahead. Sequel to this, it should ask the participants to volunteer ideas on where lies the money of the state. In other words, where lies its potentials. What does it have that can be harnessed as revenue earners? I am certain that torrents of ideas would be on the table. These can be streamlined into realizable projects based on short-term, medium-term and long-term schedules. If, for instance, lumbering is identified as a lucrative potential, a deep-dive into it will be required. Consideration for cultivation for environmental protection and for commercial harvesting, through which Osun can become a major supplier of planks to the West African sub-region, can be made.

fter all, it was reported in the Bible that a certain King Hiram of Tyre made good earnings off the nation of Israel through supply of treated planks in the days of the legendary King Solomon! Osun State is blessed with a vast array of fertile land to cultivate trees and make a livelihood off lumbering. The crux of the matter would now be in rechanneling the resources of the state civil servants to driving these newfound revenue earners, as opposed to the erstwhile tradition of ‘pushing files’ and counting down to 35 years! It is only those who are not willing to or capable of fitting into the new paradigm that would be excused from the civil service. I strongly believe that this model can be extrapolated for fisheries, poultries and many other cottage industries.

The import of my foregoing submission is that it is a futile and counter-productive endeavour to continue to depend on the ever shrinking federal allocations and limited internally generated revenue (IGR) to reflate the economy of a potentially viable state like Osun. True to the words of Marianne Williamson which say, “Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you,” it is in our overall best interest to bake more so that we can have much more to go round thegood, peace-loving and hardworking people of our dear state.

• Adefioye, a Communication practitioner, writes in via [email protected]