X-Raying The Pains And Gains Of Bayelsa Staff Verification

Source: Perezilagha A. Orutu

Governance is not a capsule terminology or a separate entity beyond the realm of society. It is encapsulated in plans, policies and programmes carefully designed to touch lives, address challenges and cover gaps clearly identified after need assessment. No government policy is fool-proof hence every responsive government creates room for policy revisionism depending on the impact of the policy on the people.

Thus every government policy or programme come with its own challenges, and when such challenges arise, restructuring comes to the rescue. Pleasantly, there are some policies with short-term, medium term and long-term impacts with their attendant benefits. Policies with long-term benefits are usually accompanied by some sacrifice. More often than not such sacrifices are misunderstood to be punishment because of the perception of the beneficiaries.

Government policies verging on tax, wage cuts, verification of workers subsume under this category. Similarly, sound policy prescriptions are misinterpreted because of incompatible partisan interest. What is paramount however that is a government that gives primacy to policies that have the best possible positive impact on the greatest number of people in a utilitarian sense?

The Governor Seriake Dickson administration inherited three main liabilities. One of them was an over-bloated wage bill with the vouchers inundated with “Ghost Names” At inception, serious attempts were made to weed out ghost names, and some success was recorded. For instance, the N4.8 billion wage bill of the past administration was reduced to N3.8 thereby creating room for some employment. Government’s thrust is to undertake the verification exercise periodically. It is against this background that the verification exercise executed by the Restoration Administration was timely even though some opposition politicians thought otherwise.

Invariably, the verification exercise was carried out not as a punitive one because Governor Seriake Dickson had established his reputation as a worker-friendly leader, but to ascertain the actual work force of Bayelsa State. When the vouchers are cleaned-up, fraudulent rackets in the civil service would be detected and “Ghost Workers” weeded out. Recognizing the fact that Ghost workers are a liability to Government, detecting them through verification was a sine qua non. From the budgetary point of view, a massive recurrent expenditure stultifies development and does not encourage government to meet its macroeconomic goals of wealth and job creation and above all poverty reduction.

At the Local Government level, the Commissioner Mrs Agatha Goma the Commissioner for Local Government Administration said that the conduct of the exercise in the local government councils had already reached an advanced stage and would soon be concluded. According to her the verification is yielding the desired results; it will assist us to plug the wastages we discovered in the payroll of local government councils in Bayelsa”.

“The verification teams in each of the local government councils have concluded their aspect of the assignment and we are working on the reports they submitted which formed the new basis for payment of salary. “When the exercise is concluded, we shall be in a position to quantify the number of ghost workers and the amount saved from the verification,” she said.

If the verification exercise has the ability of reducing the cost of governance, then it is equally capable of reducing recurrent expenditure. A reduction of the recurrent component of the budget implies that mpre capital projects would be embarked upon to re-position the economy on a strong pedestal to create jobs. The verification exercise was actually intended to block leakages in an era when the Nigerian economy is hemorrhaging, with profound backlash on staff salaries and its attendant unmet expectations in service delivery. There is no denying the fact that most States in Nigeria cannot meet basic salary obligations because of the less than edifying management of the economy by the APC Administration. The poor posturing and performance of the economy is not likely to abate in the foreseeable future.

The Restoration administration has carried out far-reaching reforms in the Civil Service. The State Treasury was decentralized. The business-as-usual scenario was abolished while prudential ethics were entrenched in line with the vigorous push for transparency and accountability. Verification seeks to free some money for investment in critical infrastructure with spill-over effect capital development. This indeed is the crux of the matter and the overarching goal of the verification exercise. Ostensibly, in seeking the “public good” there might have been delays

Another very germane reason is the desire for transparency and accountability. The notion of transparency refers to the communication of timely, reliable, clear and relevant public reporting on its status, mandate, strategy, activities, financial management, operations and performance. In democratic governance, it includes the obligation of government to report how resources are received and spent and the extent to which governmental powers are used based on the social contract. For any social contract to take place, the governed must of necessity obtain accurate facts and figures on the staff strength and how much is needed to defray outstanding government expenditure such as payment of pensioners, the dead weight debt the Restoration Administration inherited from the immediate past administration.

The civil service is the live-wire of Government, which requires periodic restructuring for effective and productive service delivery of government policies and programmes. This lofty objective cannot be accomplished without staff verification, which helps in planning, policy packaging and implementation. Implementation of as the engine room of Government. Besides, in Bayelsa Stat, although the embargo on employment has been lifted, the civil service is bogged-down by unbelievably high wage bill thereby making it difficult for government to employ genuine workers. For instance, the Verification exercise has revealed that in Sagbama Local Council, the money for personnel emolument was Thirty Million (N30 million as against Two hundred Million N200million). A Secretary to the Local Government who was culpable was detained for some weeks and there is no doubt that he would be charged to the Payroll fraud Tribunal. It is important to note that Governor Seriake Dickson has set-up a Payroll Fraud Tribunal for the trial of Payroll fraud syndicates. This underscores the premium government places on transparency.

A comment made by an anonymous economist credited to an editor-in-Chief of a popular Newspaper in Nigeria said ‘ for now, Bayelsa State is the only transparent State in Nigeria, as it conducts a Transparency Briefing to keep the citizens abreast of what comes in and how public monies are spent. Most States cannot do this and I think it is the hallmark of financial accountability”. This has been the consensus of Public opinion.

Whereas the staff verification exercise is a step in the right direction, it might have inflicted some pains on civil servants by way of delay in the payment of salary. This is expected because the process took place at the level of Ministries, government Agencies right through the Local Government Levels. But a woman cannot take a decision not to get pregnant again because of birth pains.

So whereas the verification has resulted in delay in the payment of salaries, it is indeed the right thing to do as a panacea for a long term solution. Any policy that is capable of yielding a long term effect can be painful but civil servants should look beyond the temporary pains and rather concentrate on the long term benefits of the exercise.

Today, an individual’s identity can be verified using physical means by scanning the fingers, hands, eyes, or face. Or, a person can be verified using behavioral means, such as gait, vocal pitch, signature, and typing speed. Biometric technology offers an easy, secure method to make highly accurate verifications of individuals.

Not only does this technology eliminate the need to carry badges and other identification, it also prevents the use of forged tickets, badges, or passports. Biometric verifications have broad applicability, and are already used in airports, office buildings, manufacturing centers, hospitals, and even amusement parks. A government that does not know its workforce soon meets its waterloo, as recurrent expenditure will skyrocket to the detriment of capital project.

It is germane to conclude that verification is one of the most important steps in the push for transparency and accountability. Whatever pains civil servants might have suffered cannot be compared with the long term gains of the exercise. While the pains are temporal, the gains are robust and permanent. The exercise cleans-up the vouchers, ascertains the existing work force and can create room for employment if ghost workers are shown the way out. In good governance, structures and initiated sometimes with some pains on society insofar as the gains ultimately outweighs the pains.

The verification exercise is a confidence building measure and to build the transparency and accountability profile of government. It is against this background that Bayelsans should be ready to bear the pains, like a pregnant woman and deliver safely because the benefits of having a child far outweighs the birth pains of the mother. Bayelsans should embrace staff verification anytime they are called upon so to do.

Perezilagha Orutu, is a member of the Bayelsa Social Media Team

26th June, 2016

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