Why our democracy lacks strong institutions ― PGF DG

Director-General of the Forum of governors on the platform of the All Progressives Congress, Salihu Lukman, has identified disdain towards bureaucracy as a hindrance towards the growth of democratic institutions in Nigeria.

Lukman was reacting to the recent role played by outgoing Vice President of the United States, Mike Pence, who as Chairman of the United States Senate and Congress rebuffed pressures from Donald Trump and gave the critical and needed endorsement to the victory of the Democratic Party candidate and elected President of the United States, Joe Biden.

The DG of the Progressive Governors’ Forum in a statement, “Bureaucracies and Political Parties as Pillars of Strong Institutions in Democracy,” argued that Nigerian politicians lack democratic tenets and ethos were a hindrance to the growth of its institutions.

Lukman maintained that the contempt for civil servants by elected Presidents, governors and lawmakers in Nigeria was a carryover of their lack of respect for those holding sensitive party positions in their respective political platforms.

He said: “As things are today, our politics is largely insulated from influences by bureaucratic structures. Instead, it is our politics that dictate and determine the conduct of bureaucracies. To a large extent, this is not limited to government and the corresponding political structures such as political parties.

“Across the board in the country, there is contempt for bureaucracy, to the extent that political leaders hardly regard organisational bureaucracies as sources of guidance for decision making and implementation. With the probable exception of big businesses, outside government, structured, rule-based, hierarchical and disciplined bureaucracies hardly exist in many of our non-governmental organisations.

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“In many of our civil society, trade unions, religious and traditional organisations, most of our bureaucracies are weakened, and appointees mainly recruited based on loyalty factors to leaders and therefore professionally unable or incompetent to consider any position other than the ones held by leaders of the organisations.

“The view that our institutions are weak in Nigeria reflects basically the state of reality of almost all Nigerian organisations. If we want to have strong institutions in Nigeria, why do we prefer to have weak bureaucracies in our organisations?

“If we orient our formal life to be intolerant of rational conducts, which require consideration of objective rule-based proposals by bureaucracies, how can we have “people of integrity who value their name and fear God” to preside over the implementation of democratic political decision making and implementation?

“As it is commonly said, Rome is not built in a day, the foundation for strong institutions managed by “people of integrity who value their name and fear God” is derived from our commitment to nurturing bureaucratic practices and our compliance with expected standards that recognise and respect proposals to guide and implement political decisions. It is pretentious to expect to have strong democratic institutions at the national level while at the same time undermining bureaucracies in our organisations. It is the same destructive disposition that individuals carry into politics, which re-enforces weak institutions.”

To stimulate capacity for strong, enduring institutions, the Director-General of Forum of APC Governors appealed to politicians, across party divides to court the bureaucracy in their respective political organisations and ultimately in the Civil Service structures.

“The point is, if we are to have strong institutions that are capable of guiding processes of political decision making and implementation, we must broaden it to cover the development of bureaucracies in our organisations and how leaders are oriented to recognise and respect proposals and recommendations from the officials in our bureaucracies. As much as it is important to continue to advocate for rational decisions by our political leaders at national levels, if our advocacy for strong institutions is genuine, we should cascade it down to all levels of organisations.

“For us to be able to develop the needed democratic consciousness among the hierarchy of our political leaders, we need to focus ourselves on issues that will support the development of strong bureaucracies in our parties. As things are, what exists as bureaucracies in our political parties are highly fragile and hardly guide processes of decision making and implementation.

“Part of the reason why there is always a lot of public debates preceding important decisions by our parties has to do with the combined reality of lack of competent utilisation of party rules in directing processes of internal party decision making, as well as the absence of competent personnel to guide processes of implementation of decisions. Almost every situation requiring political decisions is allowed to degenerate to the level of manifest ‘paradox of democratic dysfunction’ before decisions are taken, which often get interpreted based on subjective biases even when rational considerations may have guided the decisions of political leaders.”

NIGERIAN TRIBUNE

Why our democracy lacks strong institutions ― Lukman, DG, APC governors