Yesterday, I spoke with a septuagenarian who worked at the State House during the Shagari regime. He confirmed that cost of feeding at the Presidency could indeed have risen to N1bn p.a. as of today. According to him, during his time, the state house feeding included sumptuous lunches for all senior officers. The feeding time-table even included a bottle of wine on Wednesdays. It also extended to the Dodan Barracks as well.
At first, he asked for the rationale behind these lunches and the explanation he received was that it was because they were direct staff of the presidency and they had no defined closing period. (In reality, most of them clock out between 2pm-4pm and seldom spend a minute after the top of the hour). At that point he said he wrote to his superiors recommending that the lunch should also include their support staff as well (since they usually engage in "eye service" and don't close until the boss leaves), but his recommendation was disapproved because of the heavy cost implications it would have on the Presidency. Well understood.
At that moment he then proposed that the lunches be scrapped altogether being that they all received feeding allowances as part of their salaries but that suggestion was turned down as well.
Recall that at that time, Nigeria had 19 states, a population of less than 30 million people, lesser ministeries and parastatals and the naira was stronger.
A better solution to these lunches will probably be to make staff pay for their lunches of which you aren't obligated to eat at the Presidential canteen. The Presidency can now decide to (or not) subsidize the actual costs of the meal (I'm sure most of you will be squinting at the mention of the word "subsidy" all over again. But this is what obtains even in some private organisations).
Let staff pay perhaps N300 for a standard N500 meal and peg the amount of subsidy per meal per level of the officer. And it shouldn't be heavy lunches, more like tea breaks.
After all, most of them have breakfast before leaving for work and why. Must you give free lunches when you still pay feeding allowances?
The cost of running the Federal Government of Nigeria is too high by all indications. There are duplications, double entries and unnecessary "welfare" packages that have been institutionalised when we weren't this much a people. Systems and processes that shouldn't have been put in place in the first place due to their unsustainability; a clear indication of the lack of vision of our so-called leaders. Programmes, isms, ideas (which became ideals) that cannot be sustained and which the people have now become accustomed to. Situations and instances that are windows and pathways to corrupt and sharp practices. Allowances and salaries that are bogus and outrageous. These are the real evils.
Public office has been made too attractive and lucrative. Energy and time that could and should be spent trying to discover and invent new productive ways and solutions are being spent trying to find loopholes to exploit in the system.
I believe corruption can be reduced to its bearest minimum in Nigeria by empowering the legislature and the security agencies and decentralising the system by empowering the states. Let every state dictate its own minimum wage structure based on its internal revenue strength. Let the states be responsible for managing its own resources. Let them contribute percentages to the centre and not that the centre takes it all and gives them "allocations" on a monthly basis.
Amend the constitution to empower the people. No government official should be entitled to any kind of immunity - clause or phrase. Since the blood flowing through their veins has not been laced with a special super human serume making it different from that of the other man, why should they get special treatment if they are found culpable of sins committed by the other man?
Nigerians have once before displayed to the whole world that they can be disciplined and civilised even though it was under a military regime. People queued at stations, processes worked, crime was at its bearest minimum, security agents were not trigger happy, there were no insurrections and to the best of my knowledge, the economy was impressively stable. I'm not advocating for a return to military rule because the immediate junta that came after that one was overthrown was the greatest undoing of this nation (the naira was ill-advisedly devalued, crime esp advance-free fraud was institutionalised and several attrocities were committed). I think good governance is a function of the firmness and character of the leader. We had firmness in leadership.
Nigerians are one of the best and easily malleable people. When we travel overseas, it takes seconds to conform at the arrival lounge of the visiting nation. What we need is good leadership and, most especially at this time when the foundation is being shaken, a firm leader. People - especially public office holders - need to understand that it can not business as usual anymore. You can't keep telling me there's a cabal somewhere and no one has been prosecuted. You can't keep telling me petrol meant for consumption by Nigerians is being shipped to Mali, Niger, Benin, Togo and Chad and no custom's official has been fingered. I don't understand why anyone in the NNPC hasn't been charged over the illegalities in the oil sector with all the information, facts and figures available in the last 4 days. If all these are not addressed and we continue sweeping stuff under the rug, we are not ready for change.
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