Servicom (Service Compact with All Nigerians) was established in 2004 with the mission to improve citizen’s satisfaction by promoting service excellence in public services. On the logo of the agency is the inscription, “You Have The Right To Be Served Right”. In a piece dated January 13, 2023 and published by the agency, it stated that “quality service delivery is a critical aspect of any government Ministry, Department and Agency as it directly impacts the satisfaction and trust of citizens”. How far this agency has gone to promote and ensure service excellence in all government MDAs, and if the agency itself still believes in this mandate, is an investigation-worthy exercise.
For years, Nigerians and the entire world are inundated with tales of woes about degenerated services being rendered by the country’s public service.
Right from country’s entry-gate to contact-desks as well as back-end offices in virtually all the MDAs, not a few Nigerians have been talking about the alleged rottenness of the entire Nigeria public service system. However in this piece, we are going to premise this discuss, an introduction, on the latest development at the passport processing offices of the Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS).
Prior to the assumption of office of the Minister of Interior, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, Nigerians dreaded having to visit any of the passport offices as a result of what they daily encounter in the hands of the officials working at NIS. However, somehow, after the honourable minister read the riot acts in his much-publicised interaction with the officers of the NIS (September 2023), the backlog of international passports, about 60,000 of them – with some pending for months, were cleared within a space of four days. How possible this, in view of ready excuses of ‘no booklets’ or ‘shortages of booklets’; coupled with the nonchalant, carefree attitudes they, the officers, daily dished to applicants? Despite inflated costs for passport issuance that applicants were made to pay, the passport offices were centres of brisk and very injurious businesses with touting, racketeering and other vices thriving unchecked. The investigative report on the nefarious activities in the passport offices (carried out by the International Centre for Investigative Reporting – ICIR) published December 2021, would make any man with a pinch of conscience shed tears about the passport offices’ black market activities.
Initially, it was supposed to take only 48 hours after the capturing and enrolment of a fresh applicant’s biometric data (and a space of 72 hours for renewals) for the passport to be ready for collection. But after the “complete clearance of passport application backlogs nationwide” in line with the directive of the Minister of Interior, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, a new timeline of two weeks for processing and issuance of Passport was announced by the Minister, 4th October, 2023. But it seems the fresh breadth of air is going to be short-lived with a report that the passport issuance racketeering is not dead yet, and that the NIS ‘has commenced investigation into the unprofessional practices and misconduct of some officials in Passport Offices across the country’ (PRNigeria report).
Servicom, in its published piece titled, “The Role Of Leadership In Driving Quality Service Delivery In Government Ministries, Departments And Agencies” (referenced above) places the bulk for quality service delivery on the doorstep of leadership because they, the leaders, impact service delivery through creation of an organizational culture that values and prioritizes service quality by also playing crucial roles in setting clear expectations and holding employees accountable for service delivery, ensuring that employees are held accountable for their actions; and that there are clear consequences for poor service delivery while (the leaders) working to build trust and satisfaction among citizens and improving the overall effectiveness of government service delivery. Can we say the minister, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, follow the rules but not enough to just read the riot acts?
This brings everyone to the issue of work ethics and it is a matter of urgency to re-examine it in the Nigeria’s public service. It is often said that good policies are necessary but they are insufficient for delivering high quality public services. The real task is in building organisations and structures capable of implementing policies that give real values to all. In the piece titled ‘Corruption in the Workplace’ published by ‘Insight for Professionals’, there is insidious and pervasive problem of corruption in the workplace; and while its manifestations may vary, the potential consequences of corruption are undeniably far-reaching – impacting not only the individuals involved but also the organization as a whole. This corruption in the workplace do manifest in the form of extortion, bribery, nepotism and favouritism, fraud, and embezzlement. They fester where there is weak control and error-proof process system. This being the case in Nigeria, how long shall we wait before we start the total overhaul of the public service work ethics? This is a task that cannot be left to the government and the civil service to handle.
Ola Emmanuel is a business planning consultant
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