Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo has said that merit should come before Federal Character in the appointment of persons into public offices.
Osinbajo said this when he delivered a keynote address at the 10th memorial anniversary lecture organised by the Justice P.O.E Bassey Foundation held at the International Conference Centre of the University of Calabar, Cross River State.
He said “Nigerians expect the best to be chosen by the team manager or the coach in order to get the desired results.
“At that instance, nobody considers where a player or players come from. All they expect of the coach are players who merit places in the team and can get results.
“I don’t take my health for granted. So when going for a medical doctor, I go for the best not considering which part of the country the doctor comes from.
“If we take government seriously, we must as Nigerians look for merit before federal character.
“No society has developed that has not kept to some form of core values. Governance has to be based on principles and ideals. One of such principles is hard work. It is also critical that the work be positively directed and productive in the end.”
He explained that one of the reasons why Nigeria has not developed is because people are not paid for the hours they work.
He said “Most of the developed countries of the world run a system based on pay for hours worked.”
“The reason why we have one million preventable deaths every year in Nigeria is because of poverty.
“There is no nation that can tolerate the kind of poverty we have without social intervention, otherwise we will have an alienated society.
“There must be one form of social intervention or the other to stem the tide.”
Former governor of Cross River State, Mr. Donald Duke, who also delivered a lecture, also added that the state of the judiciary has to be radically improved.
He said “Deviants in society are related to the strength or weakness of the judiciary. For a nation our size and complexity, our judiciary is one of the most poorly remunerated in the world.
“It is the responsibility of the judiciary to apply the consequences of breaches to the law. Divine law provides consequences to keep a deviant humanity in check. The place of consequences is vital in society. It ensures general wellbeing of society. The rule of law should not be a slogan but our way of life.”
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