The Seyi Makinde example

By Akinpelu Onigbinde

ONE  key human challenge faced by Nigeria and its component political units, the states and local government councils, essentially relate to ineffectual governance. Leadership at all levels of government is bedeviled by corruption arising from greed and lack of effective system of holding democratic leadership to account for public trusts. The citizens have also become cynical on any claim to patriotic service by any political office holder, public officers and  public servants. Because human beings have a tendency to take their cues from their leaders, this  state of affairs have often  percolated down the lines, making market women, traditional rulers, priests and imams, students and employees alike to follow suit: to accept greed, and inordinate desire for material acquisition which they observe in their leaders, as the new normal. One of the legal and constitutional instrumentalities aimed at creating a control on avarice, create institutional transparency on government processes and illegal accumulation of wealth by public office holders, and to afford the citizens an opportunity to appraise fidelity to public trust, is the Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act 1991. The law created the Code of Conduct Bureau. It states the aims and objectives of the Bureau as being “to establish and maintain a high standard of morality in the conduct of government business and to ensure that the actions and behaviour of public officers conform to the highest standards of public morality and accountability.”

The law that established the Bureau is also very explicit on the functions the Bureau is expected to perform. This includes “to receive asset declaration by public officers, ensure that declaration of assets comply with the law, and retain custody of the declarations, and receive complaints about such declarations in relation to issues of non compliance and referral of any such breaches to the Code of Conduct Tribunal, established under the Act. The expectation being that if the Bureau is seised of the declaration of a public officer on taking office, the claims in the declaration can be verified or refuted by any interested third party. The contents of declaration can similarly be compared with what the office holder has acquired after leaving office arising from or public knowledge of his material possessions while in office which can be benchmarked against his earlier declaration. This requirement covers   persons  in government engagements. This way, members of the public and appropriate statutory agencies with the mandates to monitor such matters can have objective basis to make the appropriate judgement-calls, if there is evidence of graft, corruption or abuse of public office and trust.

The Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999; (as amended ) in sundry sections makes it mandatory for public office holders, judicial and political office holders to declare their assets. Similarly, public office holders, political office holders and judicial officers are often made to  swear to uphold the provisions of the Constitution, (including the provisions relating to assets declaration). This is what Governor ‘Seyi   Makinde of Oyo State must be understood to have done. Beyond the promise made on the campaign trail, his action must be understood as a demonstration of the consciousness of his abiding duty to observe provisions of the law and the constitution, whose provisions he swore to observe and uphold. All those that will work with him must take the cue, and take steps to comply as well. Actions speak louder  than voice. No servant can be greater than his master.

The governor had similarly, earlier in this regime, undertaken to establish an anti-graft agency, like the Federal Government’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, to tackle graft, corruption and financial crimes in the state: obviously conscious of the fact that Federal EFCC, is overburdened with its own mandates, and often unable to cover the field, in all states of the federation on matters requiring similar interventions. These are windows into the thinking, the “software” with which the present governor seems to be operating.  It may also possibly give insights into the policy directions the governor might be headed. These may be indicative of what kind of government Oyo State may expect in the next four years. These are actions which the governor is taking voluntarily without any external prodding, or compulsion. The kind of society we all end up with, is dependent on the qualities of the leadership we have. Most important  of these qualities must include real nobility, respect for sublime, and selfless thinking and concomitant actions. The resultant public space will also be dependent on the preferences we as citizens welcome and encourage. Citizens must recognize and encourage such outstanding darings that the Makinde governorship appear to be playing out. When citizens demonstrate that this is the kind of template of leadership they desire, then we may be on our way to making progress in the direction of real development.

If as a state in this Republic we wish to restructure our governance template, to be different from the pack, to insist on openness and graft-free governance environment: we seem to have a champion in the house. The challenges of the present  has to do less with our past problems and dysfunctional governmental system. It has to do with getting the kind of leadership that can enable us to face the future challenges and demands without guile, and with resolve to create a new day. The past, it is good to know, but we must not be bogged down eternally by it. How more dysfunctional, bruised and broken could a country and a people be, but the emergence of Paul Kigame in Rwanda remade history, and launched the country on a pathway to rectitude and development. The citizens, the Tutsis and the Hutus chose to leave the past behind,  agreed with the vision of their leader to create a new day for themselves. How more weary, bruised and broken could a people be, but South Africans, white and black, agreed to be led by the values of Madiba Nelson Mandela, and a new South Africa was born. Just a single excellent example of even-handedness, and restraint from revenge by Mandela, and the bitterness of apartheid could not stop the progress of the new state.

It does NOT have to do with political party affiliations either, but with the vision and the honest commitments of the leader.

Nelson Mandela and Jacob Zuma both belong to the African National Congress (ANC): the one leader created a legacy of good and clean governance that became acclaimed beyond South Africa, and became a global brand. The other leader is on trial currently on allegations of corruption in South African Courts.

Olikoye Ransome-Kuti (of blessed memory), served under a military dictatorship, yet, served and left office, not only in a blaze of glory, but with a collateral recognition and appointment in the

WHO after leaving office as Nigeria’s Minister of Health. The performance of Dr. Akinwumi Adesina as Minister  of Agriculture in the last Administration of Dr. Goodluck  Jonathan has nothing to do with membership of any political party, but the quality of his mind, discipline of conduct and vision for agricultural development. We need, and must look for, and recognize leaders that demonstrate sublime and noble values when they show up.

We must be interested beyond campaign posters and political rhetorics put forward by those who we elected into offices of trust across every level of our society. The old saying is still true: your actions speak so loud, I cannot hear what you are saying. We must begin early to see those things which political office holders hold as priorities and core values by their actions alone.

The Makinde Example in Oyo State has nothing to do with his political party affiliation or leaning. As governor, he is the leader of the state, and he bears rule on all, whatever political, religious or other orientations the citizens may profess as individuals . What is he doing to govern himself, and to govern Oyo state effectively are the relevant question now.

A governor that chooses to play by the law, and by Constitutional rules surely demonstrates that he is aware that there will be a day after his office. He seems to be preparing for that day. He probably is also thinking of living a life of continuing honour after leaving office. He probably is also thinking of leaving a good name after leaving office for his children, who are probably still very young now. He probably is also thinking of avoiding going to jail after leaving office; and possibly making governorship a ladder, and not a grave.

Civil servants in the State, I learnt, say that their salaries are paid before the end of the month by the new government. A governor that is taking steps to return the dignity and humanity of pensioners to them, not only by implementing a transparent and orderly payment of pensions and gratuities, and taking an open, clear stand against their exploitation by some civil servants certainly has a standard and a new example to observe.

Local governments cannot fail to pay salaries on time again in Oyo State, the governor is paying, and citizens know that federal allocations to local governments are now made to their accounts, they must follow a good example.

• Dr. Onigbinde (SAN), a former speaker, Oyo State House of Assembly, writes in from Ibadan