Labour unions protecting deadwoods in public service ― Olaopa

A professor of Public Administration, Professor Tunji Olaopa, has chided labour unions’ indifference to national productivity in protecting deadwoods in the public service as one that does the nation no good.

He noted that what the labour unions needed to push for was a public service that requires deep-seated reengineering and competitive wage policy.

According to Olaopa, the labour unions will be doing the service serious disservice if they do not move from adversarial-militancy-propelled activism to more technical-rational developmental approaches.

Olaopa stated this at a symposium in honour of the late former Secretary to the Oyo State Government and Head of Service, Chief Theophilus Akinyele, at state Secretariat, Ibadan.

He noted that public administration in the 21st century so badly required administrators that are on top of delivering development outcomes that will add up to ignite much desired national transformation.

He decried the loss of values of skills, talents, hard work, godliness and personal rectitude on the Nigerian civil service over time.

Olaopa also lamented that the deadly sins confounding the public administration and Nigeria, as a whole, as wealth without work, pleasure without conscience, knowledge without character, business without morality, science without humanity, religion without sacrifice, politics without principles.

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Making reference to Chief Akinyele whose skills were recognised such that he was invited to be Registrar at the then University of Ife, he questioned how many civil servants nowadays had any marketable skills.

He noted that public servants of the 70s were known to be administrative priests, serving with all sense of selflessness and dedication.

Speaking further, he stressed the need for today’s administrator to possess both hard and soft skills that enables multitasking.

He stressed that the 21st-century administrator needs to begin to deploy new skills for resolving complex management challenges in faster and less hierarchical ways.

According to Olaopa, today’s administrator must be a learner, thinker, entrepreneur, technology-conscious person, coach, strategic partner.

This, he noted, requires the switching from mere directive mentality to an instructive one that is open to a wide range of learning.

He, however, bemoaned that civil servants even fail to recognise their own vocational significance thereby allowing politicians to treat them as thrash.

Olaopa described Chief Akinyele as an unusual civil servant, an administrator whose professionalism and patriotism stood him out.

He also noted the imperative of improving the capacity of public servants to bring multiple perspectives to policy challenges and public service.

This, he said, includes building the skills of public administrators to design contracts and to conceive performance indicators that are able to track value for money, and investment instruments that are flexible enough to adjust when indicators suggest a need for change.

Various dignitaries extolled the virtues of the late Akinyele.

In attendance at the event were the wife of the deceased, Mrs Elizabeth Mojoyinola Akinyele; the children; Speaker, Oyo State House of Assembly, Adebo Ogundoyin; Secretary to the Oyo State Government, Mrs Olubamiwo Adeosun; Ekefa Olubadan of Ibadan land, Oloye Lekan Alabi; Chief Kola Daisi and others.

NIGERIAN TRIBUNE