Abia Reforms: Otti Canvasses Synergy among Perm Secs, Commissioners, Others

Emmanuel Ugwu-Nwogo in Umuahia

Governor Alex Otti has said that synergy among Permanent Secretaries and Commissioners was highly needed for the successful outcome of the ongoing reforms in the Abia State civil service.

He made this known while speaking at a two-day executive retreat in Aba, organised for the newly-appointed Permanent Secretaries and their Commissioners.
Both the Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Prof. Kenneth Kalu, the new Head of Service, Dr. Mrs. Ngozi Queen Obioma were also among the participants.
Otti charged the top civil servants to maintain a good working relationship with their respective commissioners and other stakeholders in government in order to birth a virile civil service.
He said that the retreat which ended at the weekend was an opportunity for the participants to sharpen their skills in order to effectively play the roles expected of them in their offices.

The governor reiterated that expectations of Abia people remain very high, hence the need for the Permanent Secretaries to get set for the task ahead.
“The most important thing which is why this retreat became necessary is that you need to get your acts together and understand how to have a seamless work environment between the Commissioners and other government appointees and your staff in the Ministry,” he said.
The Abia chief executive underlined the need for the top civil servants to have a clear idea of their job definition, how to go about it “and relate with others because you cannot do it alone”.

“So, if you have not learnt how to relate well with people, it’s timely now for you to learn it, and I believe that those that have learnt will also sharpen their skills after going through this two days retreat,” he said.
The governor advised the senior civil servants to strive hard and make their jobs smooth by taking from the retreat everything that they require to perform better and add it to the ones they already know.

According to him, “the civil service, like all of you know, in Abia, requires a lot of retooling, retrofitting and reformation,” adding that the new Permanent Secretaries were expected to hit the ground running.
“In the next few days after the retreat, I expect you to have settled down in your different ministries and begin the reform process and the reform has to be total.”
He stressed the need for putting square pegs in square holes and round pegs in round holes, saying that “it always pays to use the right people for the job”.
The governor told the new Permanent Secretaries that the process of their selection was transparent “to ensure that only the best emerged,” hence their guiding principle should be using the best to deliver the best results.

He stated that whoever was found wanting in doing what is expected of them would be thrown out as “our government is a government that doesn’t live in deceit”

“So, if you know we have given you a role and you are not able to do that role, we are humble enough to recall you and reassign you, or to extreme cases, retire you, and it is you that would give us the impetus, and the only area of measurement is performance,” Otti said.