In 2013, the total amount of money paid into the account of the last administration’s SURE-P was 2.5 billion dollars. Note that the payment was made directly by Nigerians and not from proceeds of sales of oil as many erroneously believe. Rather, oil was used to make money from the pockets of Nigerians. This money was paid by every Nigerian. Once you buy petrol in any petrol station, a certain amount of money will be deducted from your purchase price and the money will be given to SURE P. How many Nigerians know this?
The total amount collected from Nigerians and remitted to SURE P in this manner was 500 billion naira at the exchange rate of one dollar to two hundred naira. Out of the said amount, the Board of Directors of SURE P spent one billion naira for their board allowances and travelling expenses. SURE P was forced on Nigerians with the aim, according to government, of providing infrastructure in the form of good roads, intervention in health and educational facilities for the people, if the goals and mission of 2020 millennium were to be achieved.
Nigerians cried that they did not need SURE P, and for five days, they went into all forms of demonstrations. Their frustration came from the concern that they could not trust the government with their money and that they were better off as they were at that time without SURE P.
Rather than using the referent leadership model, the Jonathan government opted for the coercive style and simply told the people that there was no negotiation! Government made it clear that Nigerians just had to provide the money that was the source of income of the almighty SURE P.
The Jonathan administration simply displayed, in clear terms, what the famous professor of strategy, Peter Drucker, described succinctly in the following terms: “There is nothing as useless as doing effectively that which should not be done at all.”
I say this because it was simply useless to have established SURE P. Jonathan’s government displayed hyperbolic aggression against the people that voted her into power by simply doing effectively that which it ought not to have done at all.
SURE P did not have professional skilled people to manage it. From the context of programme design, there was no entry strategy, preparation, risk mitigation, stakeholders’ engagement and financial management. The complexity of managing such a programme was consumed in the paradox of its reality. The government did not listen to the people that elected her to office. Political legitimacy was totally irrelevant to it. The people had no option than to wait and exercise the power of the rule of the people at the appropriate time, which they did by voting out that government at the last elections.
Only in a country like Nigeria could a programme of such magnitude be established without moral and legal legitimacy from the people. This predictive behaviour of the Jonathan government was not far from a mission to Mars!
In terms of outcomes, SURE P was not only inefficient but also ineffective. The funds expended on the programme were a colossal waste, and like many of Jonathan’s government’s projects, it was a classical reflection of knowledge failure.
It is an undeniable fact that many projects failed in Nigeria even before SURE-P, but we selected the SURE-P programme because of the source of its income – the common people of Nigeria.
There is no assurance that many more programmes will not go the way of SURE-P in Nigeria, especially with the high level of systemic failure that seems to plague the nation. But it is our respectful opinion that whenever the people of Nigeria say they do not want a particular programme, government should not force it on them, especially when it is clear that the Nigerian people will pay for such programme. There is no gain in not respecting the opinion of the people.
SURE-P would not have been necessary if there was no systemic failure. Otherwise, why was SURE-P established to do the job of established government institutions? For instance, why should SURE-P be the one fixing the roads when there is a full fledged Ministry of Works? This is a clear case of lack of trust in government institutions and more particularly in the government. If government cannot trust its own establishments and superintending ministers, and is continually establishing hopeless institutions, it not too difficult to see that the motive behind such establishments is not too far from corruption! Otherwise, how best do we explain the resignation of the first chairman of SURE-P within such a short time and the resignation of the second chairman so closely on the heels of his predecessor?
The establishment of extra government departments is totally unnecessary if we trust the main departments of government. What is the work of the Federal Ministry of Works if we have to fund FERMA to do their job? This is nothing but a clear case of systemic failure. Why do we need SURE-P when it is too clear that the job they will do is primarily assigned by statues to a specific ministry? Is it the case that we cannot trust the established ministry or is it a reinforcement of the argument of systemic failure?
We are very concerned and worried as successive governments continue to re-establish the same institutions without regard for effectiveness and efficiency. If the presidency is recreated in another format and is headed by another person, how will the president feel, or indeed fare? Integration is imperative!
*Dr. Jimoh Ibrahim is the Chairman/CEO of Global Fleet Group and Publisher of the National Mirror newspaper.
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