Some civil servants have lauded President Bola Tinubu’s decision to merge, scrap and subsume departments and agencies of federal ministries to reduce the cost of governance.
The civil servants who spoke on Tuesday in Abuja said, “It is a right decision that came at the right time,” as the country is battling an economic downturn.
They commended Mr Tinubu for his courageous and purposeful leadership in implementing the Steve Oronsaye reports on cutting down the cost of governance, which they said previous administrations failed to implement.
The Oronsaye report was submitted in 2012 to former President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration, which released a white paper on the report. Ex-President Muhammadu Buhari inherited the report and released a second white paper on it in 2022 but failed to implement it.
Doris Nsa, a civil servant, lauded the decision by the Tinubu administration to carry out the recommendations of the Oronsaye report.
“I believe that if the contents of the report are followed and fully implemented, they will address a lot of issues because the cost of governance in Nigeria is outrageous.
“I am very sure that the money being given to some of the heads of these parastatal agencies will now be channelled into other things that will directly mpact the economy and alleviate poverty,” Ms Nsa said.
Muhammed Dada, another civil servant, said the report directed for implementation was aimed at restructuring and rationalising the federal government’s parastatal agencies and commissions.
Mr Dada commended the Tinubu’s government for taking such a decision even when Nigerians had lost hope of implementing the reports.
A lot of us have even forgotten about the Oronsaye reports, not knowing that the president was still having it in mind to work on it. This is highly commendable,” he said.
Another worker, Christopher Ukpana, said the decision was right because many of the affected agencies were playing duplicated roles.
“Let’s take a critical look at the mandates of the National Agency for the Control of Aids and the Centre for Disease Control. These two agencies are functioning in almost the same way.
“You will agree with me that the budget of the year for both agencies will also come together; their CEOs too will now become one person, and the money will now go for other things,” said Mr Ukpana.
Similarly, Ijeoma Ikechukwu said the measure became necessary to enhance efficiency in service delivery, adding that it will go a long way to reducing the cost of governance in Nigeria.
“I was expecting this decision since the Buhari’s administration as Nigeria is owing a lot of foreign and local debts. So, merging them or even scrapping some of them will save the country a lot from wastage,” the civil servant said, urging the government to ensure that the process of merging and scrapping the agencies followed due process and legal provisions.