‘Nigeria’s Biggest Problem is the Civil or Public Service’
A Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Professor Fidelis Oditah, QC, SAN, has said that the biggest problem Nigeria as a country has, is the civil or public service.
Odittah said given the size of the public service, which he described as very incompetent, corrupt and inefficient, it is difficult to even know where incompetence ends and corruption begins.
The senior lawyer disclosed this last week, while reacting to a question on some new directives issued by the Acting President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, SAN, which are aimed at making the business environment in Nigeria more friendly.
While commending Professor Osinbajo, SAN for the initiative, Professor Oditah however, expressed fears that Nigeria as a nation, has shown very little capacity or willingness to enforce anything.
“I love those three policy guidelines, especially the one about the default approval that says that if the period for saying no has passed, then it’s deemed to be yes. It is fantastic. I hope they can follow up.
“The biggest problem we have in this country is the civil or public service. Given the size of the public service that is very incompetent, very corrupt, very inefficient, how do you deliver public services? You don’t even know where incompetence ends and corruption begins.
“As Nigerians, we have to be reasonably positive to believe that these changes and policy initiatives will provide some good, at least in the short term. I want to believe that in the short term, there will be some initial response, which will help the ease of doing business in Nigeria.
“My fear is that Nigeria as a nation, has shown very little capacity or willingness to enforce anything; so where would they suddenly have capacity or willingness to enforce this new initiative?”, he queried.
According to Oditah, Nigeria as a nation, has laws to tackle virtually all crimes, but enforcement of those laws are usually the problem.
“We have laws and policies, but who is going to enforce? It is the same civil servants, who will find some kind of justification for not enforcing it. You want to retire someone who is very well connected, and suddenly you get a call from the Presidency telling you to hands off. That is the end.
“The problem is not that we do not have laws or policies, the problem is the inability or unwillingness to enforce them. That is why someone commits a crime today, nothing will happen to him, so long as he is connected. Of course, if you steal a chicken, you are more likely to go to jail, than if you steal, say, N1 billion. When you have N1 billion, then you can hire a good lawyer, you can reach out to whoever you need to reach out to, to make sure that you are kept out of jail.
“If you steal N1 billion, the EFCC will come in a Gestapo style and then there will be a headline, you have been arrested; at most after two weeks, you have fulfilled all the bail conditions and you are a free man or woman in Nigeria, living large, because the country has no capacity to enforce its laws”, the SAN said.
While admitting that the inability to enforce laws frustrates him sometimes as a lawyer, Oditah said, “Because I had developed as a lawyer abroad before I came to Nigeria, I was shocked at what I saw. I did not think that there was any justice administration, that could go as low as the Nigerian system.
“I was used to English courts where things are reasonably efficient. When you get to Nigeria, nothing prepares you for the chaos, that is, the civil and criminal justice system. You wonder, how is it that we have good lawyers and good justices, but no collective capacity to deliver a good criminal and civil justice system? It is a tragedy.
“It starts from wrong recruitment policies, to questionable promotion policies, to lack of infrastructure, to corruption at all levels. You can go to court and they say the judge has travelled. Where in England will you go to court and they tell you that the judge has travelled? It is impossible. There are all sorts of reasons why judges don’t come to court - they went to a conference, funeral. It can be that there is a wedding. It can be that someone is having a birthday. It can be that there is half-term break or they are ill or there is traffic or that there is no light. Why don’t you simply re-assign the case to another judge? That case will still go ahead.
“Sometimes I arrive from London to find that a court session that was duly scheduled is not sitting. Look at the risk. Even if I was travelling from Lagos to Benin or Uyo, I have taken a risk. Lawyers die in car crashes all the time. Why do they make you take unnecessary risks? We have so much to learn. When you tell them, they say no, we know what we are doing. We have been doing it like this. We are so conceited. If you go to a place like Singapore, they are eager to learn. They ask, do you think you can help us. They are very strategic and open to new ideas. We sit here and say we know it all. Who are you? Do you know who you are talking to? And then nothing happens.
“In Nigeria, you can find a chief judge lamenting that judges are overworked. That is unacceptable. If the system is dysfunctional, I expect the chief judge to know what to do”, he lamented.