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Momodou
Denmark
11634 Posts |
 Posted - 21 Sep 2018 : 11:30:04
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Building The New Gambia
By Madi Jobarteh
The Secretary General is the Key to the New Gambia
Yes, the highest office of the land is the Office of the President, but the most strategic office, especially in our current incomprehensible circumstances, is the Office of the Secretary General. The President sets an agenda, an idea or a policy but the implementation of that policy and vision of the President lies with the Civil Service.
As head of the Civil Service it means therefore the Secretary General bears the greatest responsibility to translate policy into practice through public institutions and officials. How well public institutions and officials perform therefore is determined by how effective, efficient and results-oriented the Secretary General is.
The Civil Service is the engine of growth. It is the civil service that enforces all laws and regulations and provides the services that citizens and the private sector require. It is the civil service that registers companies, regulates business and private activities, issues licenses and certificates, monitors compliance with the law and decides cases.
The level of efficiency, discipline and effectiveness, in other words the quality of professionalism of the Civil Service therefore determines how accessible, affordable and available public goods and services will be. Furthermore, a Civil Service that is transparent, accountable and law-abiding will become open, just and honest hence prevent corruption, abuse of office and respect for human rights.
When civil servants respect and apply the law in full then no other citizen could have the audacity to break the law with impunity. When civil servants manage the resources in their care it means there will be no wastage. If civil servants understand public policy and national development and perform accordingly then it means citizens will enjoy quality standard of living. If civil servants abide by the rule of law, then democracy and good governance will prevail at all times.
It is therefore clear that for any society to be democratic and enjoy good governance and sustainable development then it must have a professional, transparent and accountable civil service. All those countries of the world that enjoy such status have one thing in common, i.e. a professional, transparent and accountable civil service. One can have a poor political leadership at State House and even a weak Parliament but when the civil service is intact, professional and accountable then the country will be salvaged.
Considering the above, I wish to welcome the appointment of Ebrima O. Camara as the new Secretary General and Head of the Civil Service of the Gambia. This is the most appropriate appointment that Barrow has made for this post in the past 18 months. We only hope that Camara will not disappoint the nation and become another number in the list of secretary generals of the civil service.
Certainly, Ebrima Camara cannot pretend he does not know the enormity of the task before him. He cannot feign ignorance. He cannot claim excuses because he is a career civil servant who had in fact served formerly in this very position. Therefore, there is no one who better understands this position than him for which he has no excuse to fail.
In order not to make himself fail it is important that Camara takes a serious rethink on the state of the Gambia, in particular the Civil Service and the position he occupies. In the first place Camara must recognise that the Gambia Civil Service has lost its salt since a long time ago. Consequently, the Civil Service has become a hotbed of indiscipline, corruption and inefficiency. It is simply because of the unprofessional nature of the civil service that this country has failed to grow and develop into a viable nation.
Of course, the APRC Regime under the misrule of Yaya Jammeh bears primary responsibility for the bastardization of our public service. They have not only succeeded in killing professionalism and efficiency in the service but went further to politicize the Civil Service while deeply entrenching nepotism, favouritism, factionalism and corruption. Barrow and indeed no President will succeed so long as the current Civil Service remains as it is.
For that matter, Camara must bring back professionalism, efficiency and discipline into the Civil Service. To do this it is urgently necessary that Camara, first of all, makes the President, above all else to understand the role and function of this position so that Barrow does not see the Secretary General as Yaya Jammeh did. In this regard one of the first things Camara should seek is to rebrand and reposition the Office of the Secretary General. In that rebranding and repositioning exercise Camara should seek the relocation of the Office of the Secretary General out of the Office of the President.
The Secretary General is neither a minister nor a secretary for the president. The SG is not a politician or the spokesperson of the president. Rather the SG is a professional technocrat who implements the agenda of the President through a bunch of technicians and functionaries who are collectively called the Public Service. To do this task the Public Service must be seen to be non-political, merit and performance-based, and results-oriented.
The Secretary General must have its own office and staffs to design, implement and monitor programs and activities intended to make public institutions and public servants perform their functions efficiently and effectively. To achieve this, Camara must realise that his bible is the Public Service Act and the Public Service Regulations otherwise known as the General Orders which must be implemented in full. He must establish other structures and tools that can develop the capacity of the public service and enhance their performance and accountability.
Finally, Camara needs to be highly innovative and strategic in the way he would transform an almost dead public service into an active and robust tool for national development. This country shall never ever develop unless there is a strong civil service thriving on the principles of transparency, accountability and efficiency. How to bring this about will determine if Camara is a good or bad choice and if Barrow will fail or succeed.
For the Gambia Our Homeland
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A clear conscience fears no accusation - proverb from Sierra Leone |
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The Secretary General is the Key to the New Gambia
