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CMD @50

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2 years ago

In 1973, the Centre for Management Development (CMD) began functioning as the operational arm of the Nigerian Council for Management Development (NCMD), but the legal backing came by Act No 51 of 1976, meaning that the actual age of the Centre is debatable. Ordinarily, someone born in 1973 will be “golden” in 2023, but those who want to be strictly legal can argue that whatever needs law to exist, like an agency of the Federal Government that CMD is will be deemed to be legally existing from the day the law setting it up comes into effect, though nothing says exploratory activities can’t kick off, while the legal teeth are being sharpened. For constitutionalists then, the Centre would be deemed to still be three years away from its golden jubilee.

The disparity is akin to what is generally known as football age. Only that in this context, nobody is cheating and the gap can only be blamed on the nationalistic fervour of Murtala/Obasanjo’s regime known to be in a permanent hurry to eke some sparkle out of the national morass inherited from the Gowon junta, while it lasted. Just a decree in 1973 could have ensured a straightened history, but the current management of the Council led by the Director General, Bitrus Danharbi Chinoko, which has chosen to stay with the 1973 birth year, is celebrating nonetheless and the Danko/Wasagu, Kebbi-born administrator and his team, are deserving of the hurray and soirée. In fact, anyone familiar with the sorry story of the Centre, before Chinoko would want to encourage the current management to pop and pour champagne anyhow, whether the Centre is 50 years or 50 days.

The barracks-bred Chinoko simply brought the Centre back from the dead. The Centre, under the precious leadership, was so dead it couldn’t replace burnt bulbs from billions of naira allocations in its Lagos office, which remains its most known and literally the face of the Centre, despite losing the headquarters’ status to Abuja. The Rabiu Kwankwaso-led Senate Committee on National Planning was aghast that a leadership could be so degenerate, during a working visit to the Lagos office. Kabir Usman, Chinoko’s immediate predecessor, who took the Centre, to the bottomless pit, remains an untouchable who can’t be pulled in, for accountability questioning and still likely to grace the high table, when men and women, in the history of the Centre, are called for garlands to celebrate the golden age. In Nigeria, some quails (aparo in Yoruba) are taller than the others, mainly because they are permanently standing on the mounds of power, influence, godfatherism and connections in high and right places.

Another fellow that should be a felon, but on his way to canonisation is Hudu Yunusa-Ari, the purportedly suspended and wanted Resident Electoral Commissioner of Adamawa State, who went on self-imposed limbo after the coup he announced in the state, to topple democracy and Governor Ahmadu Fintiri botched. Ari may appear a fugitive today and public enemy number one , but a poorly-concealed choreographed whitewash is ongoing by the real coup plotters to remake him a public hero, considering that he is one already to his paymasters for demonstrating the courage to announce the checkmated d’etat.

Apart from hiding him away and keeping away security agents from arresting him, the puppet-masters are already taking calculated steps to rewrite the history of that giddy moment of Sunday April 16, 2023, when Ari, subjected democratic norms, to global odium. Apart from a so-long-a-letter written to security institutions exonerating self on the Binani coup, pleading his innocence and seeking scapegoats in other participating INEC officials and the Fintiri administration, Ari has also sued the AGF, IGP, INEC, DSS et al, seeking the enforcement of his fundamental right. Well, Ari’s right is his right and he can’t be denied. But Ari can also be wrong exercising his right, and what he did in Adamawa, wasn’t within his right, both human, constitutional and statutory. The world, rightly rose against him and posterity, will also likely condemn him. But the law can vindicate him, if the puppeteers who sent him on what Yoruba will call ise de toru toru (dangerous errand) are still minded to save his neck through the entire fiasco, especially if he is still deemed useful. At least, someone coordinated the security architecture that coalesced around him, announcing the coup. The security personnel were from different establishments, meaning someone capable of commandeering the leaderships of the security community, obviously facilitated the network that shielded Ari, during his infamous coup moment.

Another national embarrassment like CMD’s Usman is pension rogue: Abdulrasheed Maina. He, however, ended up in jail, alongside his son, because he didn’t know when to stop talking. Today is, however, not about national villains though CMD had produced a couple of them before something good began to come out of its Nazareth.

Chinoko isn’t even the first good news to ooze out of CMD. Many quality men had led the Centre primed to be the national hub of manpower development for both the public and private sectors, making it the bedrock of national development, per economic, structural and human capital growth. Trust Olusegun Obasanjo when it comes to quality headhunting, despite his regular comedic conducts. In fact, the pioneer DG of the Centre is Chief Christopher Oladipo Ogunbanjo, Ogun State-born high-flying corporate lawyer and philanthropist, who will be a Centenarian on 14 December, this year, if God preserves him, for the next eight months. From him, there was quality succession at the Centre, until Nigerian politics happened to it and its headship began a progressive decline with the coming of civil rule in 1999, when supervising ministers started using the office as job for the boys.

It was, however, Usman, a sidekick of ex-Minister of National Planning, Shamsudeen Usman, that spent his eight years of stewardship, taking the Centre to its lowest ever. Moving the headquarters to Abuja, couldn’t even hide his hideous stewardship.

In two years of acting leadership and exactly three years of substantive headship, Chinoko and his team, had resurrected the Centre and got more legal authority for it. Right in the middle of due process procedure the revised enabling law, has now put the Centre and the federal legislature’s desire to further arm it constitutionally is a testament to the commendable run, the current team is having.

But even in the midst of the golden celebration, I see a problem. The office of the DG is a political appointment of renewable-for-once four year term that is held by whoever at the absolute pleasure of the president. Now, the office of the president is totally political; forget the pretense to statesmanship. The office of the supervising minister is wholly political; forget the national assignment rhetoric. The president appoints at the recommendation of the minister. Chinoko has a year left of his first term, ending on April 28, 2024. What if politics happens to this all-important national asset again and another era of locusts is returned, in the name of job for the boys. That would make the celebration sacrament of today, tastes like a dirge menu, next year. God forbid bad thing.

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