Beyond NGF’s Retreat in Rwanda

The Nigeria Governors’ Forum has come under fire for snubbing the facilities of the one-time Giant of Africa to travel to the once war-torn Rwanda, to ‘seek leadership tutelage’ at a time when President Bola Tinubu’s administration is seeking investors and Nigerians are being encouraged to patronise made-in-Nigeria goods and services to cut costs and revive the ailing economy, writes Louis Achi

The Nigerian Governors’ Forum (NGF) is in the news again for the wrong reasons.

The NGF in partnership with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), convened a three-day “Executive Leadership Retreat” for first and second term Nigerian governors in Kigali, Rwanda from 24 to 26 August 2023, reportedly on the invitation of President Paul Kagame.

The retreat was “dedicated to fostering dialogue on reimagining leadership and leveraging innovative technology, drawing inspiration from Rwanda’s transformative journey.”

Rwanda’s idyllic capital city of Kigali and President Kagame who hosted the retreat hardly diminished the trip’s considerable negative public perception.

Themed ‘Reimagining leadership in a fast-changing world’, the participants, representing 19 Nigerian states, engaged in sessions that explored Rwanda’s successful investment destination transformation in digital technology, urban planning and socio-economic transformation, capping off with private dialogue with President Kagame.

A communique from the retreat, signed by NGF Director of Media, Abdulrazaque-Bello Barkindo; as well as Christabel Chanda-Ginsberg, and Michelle Mendi Muita, both of the UNDP, significantly identified Nigeria’s challenges as a complex web.

“Nigeria faces a complex web of interconnected development challenges stemming from a huge trust deficit, an economy highly dependent on oil exports, a job crisis and growing youth population, rising insecurity and separatist agitations, and a growing number of multi-dimensionally poor,” said the communique.

Director General of NGF, Asishana Okauru, in the same statement, explained that: “As a non-partisan organisation and policy arm, the Nigeria Governors’ Forum organised this gathering with the objective of fostering transformative leadership and facilitating honest, frank and open dialogue to shape the discourse on these cross-cutting themes.”

According to the UNDP Resident Representative in Nigeria, Mohamed Yahya, “recognising these complexities and aligned to UNDP’s mandate as the lead UN agency on development, the retreat offers an opportunity to reimagine Nigeria’s leadership to achieve transformation and nationwide sustainable development.”

The three-day retreat also focused on learning through dialogue – with sessions on rethinking leadership, leading systems, leading self and leading to deliver, as well as learning through observation – with an interactive programme exploring Rwanda’s emergence as an investment destination through visits and exchanges with innovation hub, Norrsken House, the Rwanda Development Board and the Mayor of the City of Kigali.

Described as a “jamboree” by some critical stakeholders, the governors’ retreat in Kigali has come under intense criticism by many Nigerians who sharply disagree with both its timing, venue, expenditure implications and even its conceptual outline.

A clearly miffed ex-Foreign Affairs Minister, Professor Bolaji Akinyemi described the NGF/UNDP-organised governors’ retreat in Kigali, as shameful and humiliating for Nigeria.

Akinyemi, also a former director-general of the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA), while speaking on ARISE NEWS Channel on Tuesday, said the retreat should have been organised within the country by relevant Nigerian institutions.

His words: “When you think things cannot get worse, then they do get worse. I can’t believe we will fall into the pit of shame by 19 of our governors going to Kigali, Rwanda, to learn how to govern. Our governors have no business – the UNDP has no business taking our governors there. In any case, the UNDP has no business putting on a training programme for our governors.

“Is the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS) not there? We have several training institutions – the National War College is there, the Nigerian Defence College is there. These are Nigerian institutions that could put up training programmes or retreat programmes for our governors. They didn’t need to humiliate us by going to Rwanda.”

Questioning the reasons behind the decision to stage the retreat in Rwanda, Akinyemi noted that the East African country was not a model for democracy.

“What is the UNDP up to? Are they sending a signal to Africa that they prefer development to democracy? Is that the message they are sending to Africa? And is that the message that our governors are going to Rwanda to embrace? Kigali of all places?

 “Yes, I do admit and I concede that the President of Rwanda inherited a terrible situation when he came to power and he came up with his own system of dealing with that terrible situation. And what did he come up with? Not allowing human rights, not allowing civil rights, one-man rule, one-man narrative and it seems to be working in Rwanda.

“But a word of caution here: We saw one-man rule in a lot of the Francophone African countries and when the strong man died, they descended into civil war. I think the answer is still out there about whether it is going to be a successful experiment in Rwanda,” Akinyemi added.

According to notable columnist and public affairs analyst, Comrade Wole Olaoye, “the only thing on which members of the forum have ever reached any sort of unanimity is the need for the federal government to cede more money to the states. Beyond the Kigali faux pas, next time, they should insist on Obudu Cattle Ranch, Yankari, Ibeju Lekki, certainly not foreign soil.”

Though the existence of the governors’ club is accommodated in a democratic milieu, the association nevertheless must face-up to the core developmental imperatives that under-pin its conceptualisation.

The Nigerian governors should stop ridiculing Nigeria and focus on giving real hope to their people and lighting genuine candles in the stark darkness of their turfs.

 As unhappy and disgusted as many Nigerians are over the trip, it hope that the governors will not only replicate the orderliness and infrastructural development they saw in Kigali, but also implement to the letter the communiqué  of the retreat.

They must be ready, more than ever before, to do all it takes to free up resources for the provision of infrastructure, and ultimately boost investments that will have attendant positive impact on employment.

To demonstrate minimal modicum of seriousness, cutting cost of governance must begin with or include a drastic reduction in the number of political appointees and the number of vehicles governors and other appointees use in their convoys.