How would you advise the new Ministers?

I guess it would seem presumptuous for someone who has never held a ministerial post to wish to advise the set of 43 recently unveiled by President Muhammadu Buhari. But we all have a stake in their success and should never hesitate to chip in our bits to guide them. Even without the experience we can always fall back on what some other many honourable persons have been through in those privileged positions.

Let me start by taking us back to that golden era. When at independence in 1960 Maitama Sule was named a Federal Minister, he travelled to Kaduna from Kano to link up with other ministers-designate to pay their respects to the Premier, Ahmadu Bello, Sardaunan Sokoto, the leader of the party, Northern People’s Congress (NPC), then forming the federal government. It was already arranged that from there they were to be led to Lagos by their seniors in the party, Muhammadu Ribadu (2nd Vice-President of NPC), Inuwa Wada (Magajin Garin Kano), Zanna Bukar Dipcharima and Musa Yar’Adua (Tafidan Katsina).

Party affairs done, Maitama headed to see his father Abba Sule who happened to be in Kaduna that day. Abba Sule was a courtier in the homestead of Madakin Kano, a powerful official in the Kano Emirate Council. Abba had followed the Madaki to Kaduna in the contingent of the Emir for the Northern Region self-independence celebrations. Maitama was of a tender age of 30 when he was named a minister. He loved his father. He was beholden to him and looked up to him for guidance always.

In the very engaging biography, Maitama Sule, Dan Masanin Kano, written by Ayuba T Abubakar, Maitama recalled that he had a memorable talk with Abba that night. Abba gave his son some pieces of advice that he hoped would help him in his conduct in the pre-eminent position he had found himself. Abba pointedly told him that since the Prime Minister placed so much trust in him he must not fail him in any way. He must not cheat the government a penny (now kobo) throughout his time as a minister. He must work his utmost to honour the trust given him. And Maitama should not go out of his way to do anything he could not afford.

You might dismiss Abba Sule as a mere courtier who would not be in a position to advice a minister-designate and you will be forgiven, for thinking so. However, you must recall that by the position Abba occupied in the palace, he had for many years a ringside view of the revolving door from where high officials come and go. I guess Abba must have kept an eagle eye, noticing and recording their rise and fall. And that was at a time when the palace in Kano was clearly at its heydays. Emir Muhammadu Sunusi’s Kano emirate was one of the richest and most influential in the country. Its well-developed bureaucracy, along with Borno’s and other emirates goes back a thousand years.

These nuggets of wisdom passed from father to son must have served Maitama Sule so well in the conduct of his public life considering the high public offices he held successfully throughout his lifetime. Maitama was a both parliamentarian and a Federal Minster in the First Republic. When the military took over in 1966 he was appointed a commissioner in his home state Kano and later in the mid-1970s had other high profile roles at the federal level. During the Second Republic, President Shehu Shagari appointed Maitama as Nigeria’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations and in his second term made him a minister. It is common knowledge that Maitama acquitted himself in all these positions with a good deal of finesse. I commend these pieces of advice to the present ministers – old and new. They are worthwhile homilies, well-tested and universal.

Personal conduct aside, our ministers need a certain amount of knowhow to succeed in their assignments. I am not privy to what happened during the two-days retreat prior to their inauguration, but I guess they must have been fed a large dose of inputs on the priorities of government and what their role would be in their actualization. For the ministers that are returning for the second time I suppose, it will be business as usual. They are only marching back to their beat. But for the new ones the first few days in their ministerial turfs would be quite an experience.

I raised the issue of advice with a friend who was, until lately, a civil servant. My friend had served in many federal ministries over the last thirty or so years and of course had witnessed dozens of ministers come and go. He was reluctant to talk initially but opened up later. He said from what he had seen in his time most failures of ministers arose from lack of engagement with the civil service. Ministers arrive at their beat deeply suspicious of the top officials in the ministry. Thus they bring in a retinue of special assistants who invariably are deficient in many ways and just become a clog in the process of government. It all ends up as the blind leading the blind.

My friend contends that a minister’ success largely depends on the support he is able to garner from the bureaucracy he is sent to superintend. This bureaucracy includes the core ministry and the parastatals attached. They are the ones who would deliver the mandate given to the minister by the President. Therefore, it is even trite to say that for the minister to succeed he must take the leaders of the bureaucracy on board. In this regard the Permanent Secretary holds the key and the earlier the minister engages and keeps him on his side the better for him. The minister should know the heads of departments, that is the directors because they are the stockists of all projects and funds and nothing substantial gets done without their input. Naturally they are jealous of their turf and keeping them out of the loop of decision making leads only to resentment and ultimate failure.

The minister should also keep in close touch with the heads of parastatals. In many ministries, the parastatals are the drivers of projects and have budgets that are bigger than what obtains in the parent ministry. Nevertheless, in all these efforts to know the ministry and coordinate activities, the minister must always exercise care not to impugn the pecking order in the bureaucracy. There is some sacrosanctity attached to that pecking order and any attempt to scatter and disorganize it, is usually met with the stiffest resistance, a sordid situation which no minister would like to experience.

Of course the minister can always be helped by special assistants and consultants to get things done. My friend agreed but he said all these can never be a substitute for the accumulated wisdom and knowledge within the bureaucracy. He added that special assistants sourced from within the system and not exceeding a certain grade level could be of help so long as they are kept away from dabbling into major policy matters that are within the jurisdiction of the Directors and the Permanent Secretary. The contribution of consultants would always be needed in many projects but the minister would always help himself and the project itself by getting the opinion of his bureaucracy before implementation.

We shall return to the subject. Keep a date with this page.