In the past few months, there have been tell-tale signs of trouble in the near future that ought to be taken seriously if Nigerians are determined to achieve the change that we seek. The signs have emerged on two very crucial fronts. First, is the gradual return of brazen violence in mainstream politics and the second is the general lack of discipline on display in the civil service.
In a throwback to less civilised chapters in the country’s history, the chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Ibrahim Magu, has been subject to three attacks on his life and property this year alone. The last attack on his farm house in the Karshi area of Abuja claimed the life of a police officer on duty at the property.
While Magu remains a controversial figure, these attacks directed at him raise concerns about the immediate future in Nigeria’s political landscape as we have seen these kinds of violence in the past. Usually more associated with electioneering and political tussles, the use of targeted violence as an instrument for settling disputes is unfortunately well entrenched in Nigerian political history.
A most perplexing example of this in the civilian era was the murder of a sitting Attorney General, Chief Bola Ige, in 2001. Till date, the cloud shrouding the truth of that murder has not been lifted. This is why the little signs of the return of violence to mainstream politics should not be taken lightly. This is not to say that the political landscape has been violence-free in the past few years. With particular reference to places like Rivers State, it is clear that violence remains a part of the electioneering tool kit of the country.
The problem with the repeated attacks on Magu is that its implications reach well beyond politics. The man is an unconfirmed appointee of the president with a reputation for dogged pursuit of his objectives as the head of an anti-graft agency. While people disagree with his true motives and integrity in performing his duties, it is undeniable that Magu’s approach carries the tenacity and fervour that is required in such a sensitive role.
One needs to go far back into mafia-controlled Italy to find similar tactics employed to influence or neutralise government appointments. A case in mind that is a close comparison to the attacks on Magu, was that of an Italian prosecutor and magistrate, Giovani Falcone, an unbending and relentless anti-mafia figure who was killed in his car by a bomb triggered by the Italian Mafia in 1992. It began with threats to his life and other forms of intimidation just as in Magu’s case.
The real problem is not that men are violent. The problem is that they have found the confidence to perpetuate violence brazenly, even towards a person with Magu’s stature and office. That is why this is a sign of worse things to come, especially in the run-up to 2019. If Magu is killed, the killings will not stop. Falcone’s fellow magistrate and friend, Paolo Borsellino, was killed 57 days after Falcone’s murder in the same way.
It is true that there is usually a forecast of possible violence in most election cycles in Nigeria, but recent happenings have wider implications. There is a message to would-be candidates and winners that the status quo must be maintained at all costs. The real fear is that the violence could spill into the election process itself.
While violence threatens the fragile system that we have, another threat from within the institution of government eats away at government productivity and credibility. On this second front, the citizenry, and not elected officials are closer to the problem. A cancer of indiscipline and selfish interest has coursed through the civil service at both state and federal levels all over the country. The problem has long existed and can be more damaging in the long run than any intermittent violence can.
In Nigeria, the government is the highest employer of labour. With a large civil service, the processes of government are placed in the hands of the people employed by the government. These ‘civil servants’ thus become key players in the dynamics of governance, with real sway in government outcomes and results.
However, many civil servants have proved to be neither civil nor willing to be servants of the country. They approach their duty with disdain and/or disinterest and the cloud of self-interest is thick in the service, often leading to unnecessary delays and errors in the command chain.
This problem however goes deeper than disinterest in the service by our civil servants. In many cases, civil servants are the active hands corrupting the process of government in exchange for personal gains. With many unlawful, money-spinning interests outside their official duties, some civil servants simply do not have the time or enough attention to spare for their duties.
In many cases, the illicit gains attained from corrupting the process of governance are shared throughout the respective departments, as far as the doorman. Thus, everyone is in the loop.
Some civil servants have grown so big on kickbacks and outright theft from the common purse that they become desperate to protect those interests and can go to any length. This is where the violence mentioned earlier and illegal enrichment within the civil service connect. All corrupt elected officials and shady private individuals who are benefitting from a corrupted system depend on equally corrupt civil servants to foster their activities. This means that one would find civil servants in every cabal and mafia working against the success of government processes.
Maina’s case for example aptly captures the picture on these two crucial fronts. Having probably benefitted from illicit enrichment himself while a member of the civil service, he compromised the interests of others who likely have a propensity for violence and are aggrieved.
Also, with the help of other civil servants and political appointees, he attempted a quiet return to the civil service outside the roving eyes of the law, an attempt which, unfortunately for him, failed. The brazen disregard for due process allies with indiscipline unearthed after Maina’s attempt is a practical portrayal of the unabashed acts of civil servants and their supervisors.
If the government allows violence to become a regular path to influencing its processes, with an increasingly corrupt civil service to balance the scales where violence fails, then we will be locked into our mediocre system for many decades more. The key is to break this emerging system as soon as possible before the country is caught up in a mafia style stranglehold that may never be broken. The mafia is still alive and prominent in Italy today.
It is a pity that whatever parallels to the mafia that may now exist in Nigeria have their backbone in the civil service. One only hopes that those in the government who are opposed to Magu’s continued role in the EFCC understand the need to protect him irrespective of their sentiments. An untoward eventuality in Magu’s case will be the cue for more ugly events and will signal the ceding of power to corrupt influences.
Most of all, the ground gained on the international scene in recent years will be lost, and much needed foreign investment will cease. We cannot be held to ransom by corruption and the agents of corruption within and outside the government. A wide overhaul of the civil service may be impracticable, but tactical dismissal and prosecution of known corrupt civil servants will go a long way.
In the end, the people make up the civil service, and the lowly civil servant sharing in a director’s loot today will become the money guzzling director tomorrow. It is imperative to plant the memory of consequences in the mind of civil servants and other agents of corruption by tackling the sacred cows now, through every available means and agency, so that there will be too many ‘Magus’ to neutralise.
