Analysis of performance ranking of Ministries & Parastatals in Bayelsa State

Being an Interim Report of A Study Carried Out By The Niger Delta Integrity Group

My creed is that public service must be more than doing a job efficiently and honestly. It must be a complete dedication to the people and to the nation with full recognition that every human being is entitled to courtesy and consideration, that constructive criticism is not only to be expected but sought, that smears are not only to be expected but fought, that honour is to be earned, not bought. (Margaret Chase Smith 1897 - 1995 ).

The NIGER DELTA INTEGRITY GROUP (NDIG) is a non-profit, Non-Governmental Organization established with the aim of improving governance in the core oil producing Niger Delta States of Delta, Rivers, Bayelsa, and Akwa Ibom. The overarching objective (NDIG) is to promote good governance through the prudential deployment and utilization of resources to re-engineer good governance. The (NDIG) believes that the efficient and effective performance of Government Ministries/Parastatals will complement the efforts of political power holders to implement government policies and programmes in a sustainable manner. The spill-over effect would be to create job opportunities for the legion of unemployed and curb the monster of militancy in the Niger Delta Region. The NDIG, also seeks to analyze governments’ concrete achievements, identify areas of critical challenges with a view to making recommendations for effective policy formulation and implementation.

In executing this assignment, the NDIG holds the view that good governance is characterized by many variables. It is aimed at providing an environment in society where every person can have an equal opportunity to allow his genius to flourish, to promote a good quality of life based on the recognition of dignity, decency, equality, equity, social justice and freedom of all individuals and simultaneously promote order and stability. Essentially, apart from providing the basic necessities of life, good governance is supposed to be considerate and compassionate for everyone in the society with a view to enlarging peoples’ choices for the holistic development of all. This Interim Report is a synopsis of the Performance Ranking analysis. A more comprehensive Report shall be published in a bulletin/Newsletter and made available to the Government of Bayelsa State as a policy document.

Bayelsa State is characterized by widespread poverty with about 70% of the population living below the poverty line. This is partly attributable to low the level of industrialization and the activities of oil corporations, which have adversely affected subsistence fishing and farming. Infant mortality is estimated to be 20% which is among the highest in the world. Transportation is inadequate and being hampered by a poor road network and difficult conditions especially in the riverine areas. While there is absence of electricity supply in many riverine communities, telecommunication facilities are in acute short supply. These bad statistics are compounded by the frequent environmental pollution exacerbated by the activities of oil companies. These harsh conditions provide a fertile ground for social unrest, conflict and instability.

However, for the past 13 months the State has remained in the front-burners of socio-economic and political discourse. Socially Bayelsa State is widely acknowledged to be one of the most unstable States in Nigeria prior to the Amnesty programme, the State was reputed to have had the highest number of militant camps; the highest Hostage Taking Index (HTI) and highest cases of violation of oil facilities. This truism came to the fore during the Amnesty programme when Bayelsa State turned in the highest number of arms and ammunitions turned into the Amnesty Committee. The implication is that the State Government spent huge resources on security by way of curbing youth militancy, paying ransom for the release of hostages, maintenance of the Joint Militancy Task Force (JTF) on land and sea as well as the State Volunteers who participated in surveillance and security of major flow stations/oil facilities.

Economically, Bayelsa State depends almost entirely on allocations accruing from the Federation Account. The State has a very low Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) base due largely to lack of industrialization and indigenous entrepreneurship. The situation was rendered more precarious by the dwindling receipts from crude oil occasioned by heightened militancy and low oil production quota. Thus when militancy got to its crescendo, the State barely met its financial obligations and implemented its budgets.

Politically, Bayelsa State has been a hotbed of political crises. The ruling peoples Democratic Party in the State suffers from dual types of crisis: that of leadership and crisis of confidence. Because of conflicting, incompatible interests, the Bayelsa PDP Chapter has two main factions and till date the leadership is being contested as manifested in the supremacy contest. It may be recalled that because of these factions, political positions were harmonized and merit was sacrificed on the altar of sectional interest in the April 2007 elections.

As a result of the circumstances of his ascendancy, the serving Chief Executive Governor of Bayelsa State Chief Timipre Sylva is believed not to have had a fair share of political positions during the harmonization process that preceded the April 2007 elections. Consequently, the first Executive Council was constituted mainly by the factions - leaving little room for the Chief Executive to exercise much-needed discretion to select technocrats into the cabinet. Most Bayelsans believe that the continued existence of those political factions and the attendant conflicts gravely negate government’s policy thrust of accelerated development. Ostensibly, when principal government functionaries do not work in synergy, development is usually made a scapegoat.

The Bayelsa State House of Assembly (BSHA) is not spared this agony of divisive politicking. There are allegations of lack-lustre performance in terms of quality of bills, motions and resolution passed. Apart from popular dissent about the law-makers inability to engage in adequate consultation, need assessment and execution of constituency projects, there are proven cases of primitive accumulation and self-aggrandisement perpetrated by the legislators at the expense of the electorate. There are complaints, and it is a statement of fact that most communities in Bayelsa State lack basic amenities such as potable water, electricity, healthcare facilities, and well equipped schools. The situation appears to have deteriorated because of the lack of substantive, elected Local Government Chairman to deliver the dividends of democracy through purposeful and people-oriented governance.

The general perception among the populace is that the high-wire politics at all level of government has negatively affected the performance, efficiency and productivity of key government Ministries, Board and parastatals. In a stable democracy, bureaucracy with its impartial and apolitical disposition is supposed to provide the needed catalyst for policy formulation and implementation. In the words of Vaclav Havel “Genuine politics -- even politics worthy of the name -- the only politics I am willing to devote myself to -- is simply a matter of serving those around us: serving the community and serving those who will come after us. Its deepest roots are moral because it is a responsibility expressed through action, to and for the whole”

The civil service is the main instrument and institution of public service delivery. Traditionally, the civil service performs three functions: supporting the policy making function of government, facilitating or regulating the private sector; and providing managerial leadership for operating pubic sector enterprises. However, the capacity of the State civil service to perform its statutory functions is critically dependent on its ability to attract and retain competent and highly skilled persons in the professional category; the willing to offer attractive pay and benefits package; and the modernisation of the office infrastructure, especially ICT infrastructure. The study revealed some obvious capacity gaps especially at the top echelon of the Public Service.

To review the performance of the employees in government Ministries/Parastatals with a view to determining their productivity and provide feedback to the employees regarding their performance.

To identify the gap between the actual and the desired performance in government Ministries/Parastatals in order to identify the factors that militate against their productivity.

To rank the performance of government Ministries/Parastatals and provide necessary information to assist in the making organizational decisions concerning performance improvement

To help to strengthen the relationship and communication between the bureaucracy and the political elites in pursuance of the goals of developing the State through effective communication and synergy.

To assess the adequacy or otherwise of capacity building programmes in of government Ministries/Parastatals towards the effectiveness of the public service. In addition the study seeks to diagnose the strengths and weaknesses of existing training and development needs in terms of manpower needs and abridgement of capacity gaps.

To estimate the expectations of Bayelsa people from of government Ministries/Parastatals and administrative practices and equity considerations such as employment recruitment, selection, deployment, training and development.

To make recommendations to government to improve the actual performance of the Ministries and Parastatals for optimum productivity and evaluate the contributions of every Ministry towards the achievement of set goals.

There are twenty 20 Ministries and Parastatals in Bayelsa State, which seem to have been bogged-down by bureaucracy, power tussle and unnecessary politicking. They include:

Broadly speaking, some of the Ministries are core Ministries by reason of the fact that they are indispensable to the effective functioning of any administration. Such core Ministries include: Works & Transport; Agriculture and Nature Resources, Finance & Budget; Justice, Education and Health. Other Ministries and Parastatals evolved as a result of exigencies and dynamics of society. Such Ministries as Youth, Conflict Resolution & Employment Generation and Gender & Social Development are peripheral Ministries, which establishment was necessitated by circumstances of increasing militancy and gender equality movements after the Beijing platform of 1989.

Against the background of the developmental challenges and the need to place Bayelsa State on the speed lane of development, the Niger Delta Integrity Group (NDIG) resolved to conduct an empirical study with a view to executing an impartial rating of Ministries and Parastatals in a systematic way of reviewing and assessing their performance during the past 12 months with a view to planning for enhanced and sustainable development.

The investigation seeks to the performance of the various Ministries and parastatals with a view to ranking them based on the following criteria:

Efficiency in the optimization of human, material and fiscal resources to achieve results.
Transparency in terms of conducting governmental businesses.
Accountability in terms of accuracy in keeping government official transactions and making such record available got public scrutiny.

Fiscal Discipline in term of budget implementation to meet government long, medium and short term targets and to build trust that money is spent in the right way.

Public Performance Index: The performance of government Ministries and parastatals in the eyes of the people

Budget Implementation: The degree to which Ministries and Parastatals comply with budget implementation guidelines to meet projected targets in a fiscal year

Result-Oriented Programmes: This explains how the projects and programmes of government Ministries and Parastatals yield tangible results in terms of SMART: Sustainable, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic Timeliness.

Due Process Compliance: The ability of any Ministry/Parastatal to comply with stipulated due process and public procurement procedures in terms of contract awards

Contribution to the economy: Here, what is considered is the extent to which Government Ministries & Parastatals contribute meaningfully to the growth of the economy.

Synergy: This criterion concerns how government Ministries/Parastatalscollaborate and work cooperatively with other Ministries and Parastatals to implement the policies of government.

The researcher adopted the descriptive research design for the study. The rationale is that the investigation deals with variables that are already in existence. This presupposes that there will not be manipulation of variables in the sense of true experimental research. The research design is also suitable in that the researcher seeks to describe analyses and interpret existing phenomena. The 20 Ministries and Parastatals in Bayelsa State have been in existence since the State was created in October, 1996. Ostensibly, too, successive administrations have had to contend with the challenges of bureaucratic corruption, counter-productive work-related behaviour under-performance, lack of transparency and accountability - which are the paraphernalia of good governance. The study therefore aims to rank the performance of Government Ministries/Parastatals against the background of clearly established parameters since the inauguration of the Governor Timipre Sylva administration in May 29, 2007. It is not a substitute for a scorecard.

The population of this study comprised all the 20 Ministries and Parastatals in Bayelsa State. The target population however, consists of 8 Ministries and 2 Parastatals, which brings the number to 10 or 50 % of the total number of Ministries and Parastals. This sample conforms with the statistical protocol that when dealing with a small population in a non-empirical setting 50 percent should be the upper limit.

A list of the 20 Ministries/parastatals was written down on a slips of paper and folded. Each Ministry/parastatal was given equal opportunity of being selected. The folded slips of papers were put in a basket and a toddler was asked to select 10 of the slips, without replacement. Balloting without replacement was done to avoid double-sampling, which would negate the non-probability sampling technique. The ten (10) Ministries and Parastatals that were selected for the Performance Ranking were as follows:

The Instrument used for data collection is the Performance Ranking of Ministries and Parastatals in Bayelsa State Questionnaire (PRMPBSQ). The instrument was designed to elicit information from respondents on their perception of the performance of Ministries & Parastatals, with identifiable parameters. The (PRMPBSQ) questionnaire is divided into two Section A and B. Section A deals with the biographical data of respondents, while Section B contains 20 Likert type questions dealing with some critical aspects performance ranking of Ministries and Parastatals in Bayelsa State. Furthermore, ample opportunity was provided for respondents to comment freely on aspects that are not covered by the questionnaire, especially in respect of the development challenges facing Bayelsa State.

Two (2) Research Assistant were employed to assist the Group in the administration of the questionnaire instrument. A total of 250 questionnaire were administered to the 10 Ministries/Parastatals, with each Ministry/Parastatal getting 25 questionnaire. An equal number of questionnaire was distributed to each Ministry/Parastatal to ensure orthogonality and uniformity of analysis. The questionnaire items were validated by the researchers to establish the content and predictive validity of the questions.

However, only 200 questionnaire were retrieved. All the 200 questionnaire retrieved were usable and consistent with the parameters established for completing the questionnaires. This brought the return rate of the questionnaire to 80 percent, which the researcher believes has high internal and external validity strong enough for a descriptive research. The split-half reliability test was used to determine the consistency of the PRMPBSQ. The calculated co-efficient index was 0.66. This value was stepped up using the spearman-brown formula and the value of 0.80 was obtained. Thus, the reliability of the instrument used in this research was established at 0.08, which was sophisticated enough for a descriptive study of this nature.

The statistic techniques used for the study were basically percentages and the t-test. Simple percentages were also used in frequency distribution table to analyze the biographical data of respondents and some of the dominant reasons adduced by bankers on the impact of recapitalization on the banking industry in particular and the overall economy.

Prior to the establishment of the Ministry of Energy, petroleum and power matters had been handled by different ministries/parastatals. The implication was that this major sector has no strategic focus, as there was no policy coherence in responding to energy matters at all levels of government. In response to the premium given to the hydrocarbon industry, the Ministry of Energy was established to provide energy security that Bayelsa State needs necessary to kick-start technological, industrial, economical and social development. The Ministry of Energy is saddled with the responsibility of formulating long term energy strategy for the State as well as Initiation policies and programmes for the overall development of the energy sector. Given the peculiar energy problems confronting Bayelsa State, the Ministry was designed to initiate a survey of development requirements in the State, co-ordination of all bilateral and multilateral relations affecting the state energy industry and the coordination of the activities of the Bayelsa State Oil company(BOC), Bayelsa State Electricity Board (BEB). Apart from creating an enabling environment for effective generation, transmission, distribution and marketing of energy.

This is one of the core Ministries of the State. Its mission is to generate sustainable wealth and employment of indigenes of the state through the development of agriculture and natural resources. The will be achieved through the income generation by capitalizing on the development of the abundant fisheries potentials of the State. The short and medium-term goals of the Ministry are carefully designed to produce sufficient fish to meet domestic needs and for import. Accordingly, government has pledged to Institute a major fish farming program and produce sufficient fish for export. The State also has potentials for the cultivation of plantain and banana and ice. Respondents believe that plans are underway to revive the Peremabiri/Isampou/Kolo and Burma rice farms to meet domestic and export needs. When agriculture is made attractive, job opportunities would be created to accommodate the unemployed graduates in the State.

Fondly described as the engine room of government, this is one of the most strategic Ministries in Bayelsa State. The Bayelsa State Ministry of finance and Budget was among the core ministries that were established with the creation of the state in 1996. In 2004, the Ministries of Finance and Budget were merged to form what is now known as the Ministry of Finance and Budget in the state.
The ministry was created with the sensitive responsibility to drive the business of governance and indeed ensure the realisation of the developmental aspirations of the government and other State agencies. This strategic ministry is entrusted with the responsibility to ensure effective generation and management of funds needed to prosecute government business through statutory allocations from the Federation Account and internally generated revenue in the state. The main statutory responsibility of the Ministry is the effective and prudent management of the financial resources of the state. It is also the ensure an improvement of the internally generated revenue of the state to put the government in the pedestal to rise effectively to the challenge of development in the state.It receives and ensures effective management of the state’s allocation from the Federation Account. The Ministry also has a responsibility of efficiently managing and harnessing government resources for optimum productivity. It also explores avenues and means of revenue generation such as aids from foreign and local donors.

The Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development has a mission to ensure local government councils adhere strictly to the State laws governing local government administration; facilitate the formation of community foundations, support rural development initiatives and enhance local government accountability and transparency and produce skilled craftsmen who are employable and self-reliant. The long term goals of the Ministry are the construction of community infrastructure, establishment of functional craft development centers in each Local Government and to ensure high standards in Local Government strategic planning, accountability, project management, transparency and effective administration. Further, the Ministry has a responsibility to facilitate the establishment of community development committees and modern fire service in Yenagoa and at least one well equipped modern fire service in each senatorial district headquarters. All Local Government Areas in Bayelsa State will draft a sustainable development plan. The Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development will assist in the drafting of LGA sustainable development plans and work cooperatively to ensure appropriate deployment of LGA resources within the plan.

The Ministry of Works and Transport in concert with the Yenagoa City Capital Development Authority where applicable, will deliver in an efficient and effective manner, a quality infrastructure base as is required to sustainably grow all related sectors through implementation of priority projects, with the major goal of making a positive and significant difference in the infrastructural development of Bayelsa State. Bayelsa State is a riverine State, where more than 80% of the settlements are located near rivers creeks. Accordingly, one of the objectives of the Ministry is to connect the major populated islands in the State with an efficient transport service and ensure that adequate physical infrastructure are provided to meet the transportation needs of the state. This would be accomplished with the identification of key residential and business areas vulnerable to flooding and implement a flood remediation plan. Moreover, the Ministry through the formulation of a transport policy, would develop transport arteries to facilitate associated product distribution and market access.

The Due Process and e-Governance Bureau was established to ensure the Sustainable Development of Bayelsa State through procurement best practice in the part of all government departments. enabling Sustainable Development through the integration of ICT solutions state-wide; and ensuring that the state sustainable development strategy is properly and adequately deployed. The objectives of the Bureau are to improve good governance, including transparency, accountability and civil society participation in governance by the deployment of e-Governance Strategies and technologies. It was conceived that the Bureau would eliminate all forms of fraud and corruption from the state public service through the deployment of appropriate ICT infrastructure and procurement best practice and regulations. This will contribute to the improvement of the state’s economy to support the Bayelsa vision of building a united, secure and prosperous society, in addition to the proper coordination of the Bayelsa State Sustainable Development Strategy. These lofty objectives would be achieved by deploying e-Government coordination systems for Finance, Project Administration, Electronic Document Management, Human Resources Management, Schools Administration, Geographic and Land Management, construction of an Information and Communication Strategy that can be applied to the Sustainable Development of Bayelsa State and the growth of the ICT sector.

The Capital City Development Authority (CCDA) will transform Yenagoa into a globally recognized city with modern infrastructural facilities and appreciable aesthetic conditions to become a model for other states in Nigeria. The principal goal of Capital City Development Authority is to establish a strategic and long term vision for Yenagoa, as the State capital city which provides a robust foundation for future developments, with flexibility to accommodate unforeseen demands and changing priorities in line with the provisions of the New Yenagoa Master Plan. The policy thrust of the Capital City Development Authority is derived from the Yenagoa City Development Strategy 2007 otherwise referred to as the New Yenagoa Master Plan. Section 5 of the law establishing the Authority empowers it to prepare and adopt a Master Plan for the Capital City and provide infrastructure development services for the city in line with the Master Plan.

The Public Service will ensure efficient service delivery by providing line services in a timely, effective and proactive manner in the best interest of the public of Bayelsa State. The overarching goals include the training of civil servants to ensure that 80 percent of the work force is computer literate, 50% human resource development at management level, production of data processing officers and to Institute training programmes for 20 percent of top level management between each year. The Bayelsa State Government will be served by a well trained public service that will provide professional and a political advice to ministries. The State Public Service will deliver on Bayelsa State Government policies and programmes with integrity and the highest levels of accountability.

The Ministry of Housing and Urban Development in concert with the Yenagoa City Capital Development Authority where applicable will promote and facilitate the provision of affordable and convenient houses for its residents; provide land for residential, commercial and industrial use and undertake general land reforms by computerization of the land administration processes for speedy issuance of certificate of occupancy to applicants. The responsibilities of the Ministry include: to revise, consolidate and finalize master plans for Yenagoa city and other urban centres’ in Bayelsa State, significantly improve the efficiency of land administration by completing the digitalization of the Bayelsa land administration system and eliminate all slums in Yenagoa. Others include the provision of sites and services in the capital city (Yenagoa) as a means of kick-starting the Central Business District and to create more residential areas in accordance with the Yenagoa master-plan and ensure sufficient levels of infrastructure support (roads, power, water, schools) in every area.

Education is critical to Bayelsa's future economic growth and social well-being. The Ministry of Education will provide continuous improvement in education through provision of relevant, quality education that is affordable for all Bayelsa residents who desire it. The Ministry of Education will ensure education in Bayelsa state is available, accessible and affordable to all children of school age and for every other person who wishes to be functionally literate. Accordingly, the Ministry aims to improve the level of enrolment; to meet the provision of the 'Education for All' (EFA) goals at the basic education level. This would be achieved by expanding and improving comprehensive early childhood education especially for the most vulnerable and disadvantaged children, ensure that all children, particularly girls and those belonging to ethnic minorities have access to free and compulsory primary education including skills acquisition and adult literacy. The policy thrust is to Improve all aspects of quality of education with a view to ensuring excellence and eliminating gender disparities in primary and secondary education and achieve gender equality in education.

Respondents pointed out numerous development challenges facing the State. Whereas some of these challenges are normal challenges that face administrations in transitional societies, others appear to be peculiar to Bayelsa State. Respondents referred to the Due process and e-Governance Bureau as a delay process, which is not accountable and responsive to peoples demands. Some respondents called for the total scraping of the Due Process Bureau.

There was almost consensus that the Bayelsa Public Service is fraught with lack of ethics hence it is characterized by absenteeism on the part of the political class and the career officers. Worse still, there is general lack of accountability to the people by law-makers and political appointees. Whereas the Legislature is accused of not performing its oversight functions of scrutinizing appointments, the State can be said to be in trouble because The mistakes of the present government are irredeemable. There is a pervasive sense of anomie and despair hence some have resorted to divine solutions of prayer, as a rescue plan to save the State from utter collapse.

On the general living conditions of people in the State, a preponderant majority of respondents agree that the prevailing hardship seems to be unbearable, especially with the non-payment of overhead and sundry allowances to Ministries and Parastatals. Respondents lamented the absence of regular power supply and poor sanitation, adding that people are metaphorically dying of hunger and nothing good can come out of the administration, hence expressions such as ‘Bayelsa is dead’, the state is trouble,Bayelsa our state have nothing to write home about, Everything is a disaster and hopelessand other similar expressions of despair were commonplace.

Against this background, respondents expressed an urgent need for change in the policy thrust of government. Most respondents agreed that the caliber of people appointed to positions of trust is questionable character and integrity. Lack of experience in public service is generally identified as a principal reason for underperformance of some Commissioners, Heads of parastatals and political appointees. Respondents also expressed deep concern about the use of inexperience contractors for road construction projects especially at Swali community. This is generally believed to be reason for the abandonment of most road projects, such as the Arkaba and market roads. The market road is a ‘no go area’ some persons remarked.

Respondents complained about the appointment of incompetent persons into positions of trust and argued that appointments should rather be based on merit rather than political considerations. The general perception is that the core values of morality, sincerity and policy consistency are jeopardized because of political patronage. Critical observations were made about the lack of due process in appointment and the award of contracts. Analysis of responses showed that more than 87% of respondents believe that the Due Process Bureau delays, distorts and mystify contract awarding processes because of lack of transparency.

The deep-seated perception among a section of Bayelsa people is that while revenue distribution declined owing to militancy, the Ministry of Finance and Budget has to intensify more efforts in sourcing for funding from international donor agencies. Again, Bayelsa people evade taxation because they believe that the people are not getting what is commensurate to her based on her oil and gas production quota. This explains why the advocacy for fiscal federalism has become more vehement than ever before.

A greater percentage of the respondents scored the administration a pass mark in the provision of electricity, but generally decried the low environmental consciousness in the State in spite of the existence of the State Environmental Authority. Respondents especially women lamented that they have not been given enough opportunity to participate in government.

Respondents pointed out some challenges facing Bayelsa State. criminality it prevents flow of scarce resources to projects dedicated to human development; it undermines compliance with environmental, employment and wage regulations. Most of those interviewed by the researchers perceive that although the ‘business as usual scenario’ has been abolished, there is still entrenched corruption in some Ministries/Parastatals. Corruption distorts the process of rational allocation of resources, dilutes the effectiveness of democratic institutions and debases human values.

About 73 percent of the respondents do not believe that the economic team has added value to policy formulation and implementation. A preponderant majority of Bayelsa People believe that the Due Process Bureau is one of the worst parastatals created in the present dispensation. Other concerns raised by respondents are lack of sincerity of purpose, misplaced priorities, misappropriation of funds, ‘me first syndrome, lack of focus and accountability are militating against good governance. Amidst these challenges, the political leadership seems helpless because most people capitalize on the prevailing political factionalization to further emasculate the system.

Bayelsa people seem to be unanimous in agreement that what has killed diligence and patriotism in the public service is governments’ inability to payment overhead to Ministries/Parastatals. Payment of salaries alone is not enough, as the political class such as Law Makers and Commissioners are not affected by the harsh economic realities. A huge segment of the people lamented the absence of good quality public education amidst the harrowing cash crunch worsened by the global economic recession.

The Ministry of Finance and Budget is hamstrung by the diminished accruals from crude oil owing to militant activities in the pre-amnesty era. However, Bayelsans expect the Ministry to exercise stricter budgetary discipline, enforce statutory taxes to boost Internally generated revenue and be more pro-active in engaging foreign partnerships in the execution of capital-intensive projects such as roads. If the leadership is transparent, some of us will not evade tax, some respondents remarked.

Democracy, development and governance cannot be compartmentalised; we have instead to fuse them into an organic whole. Such an organic whole or unity will not be possible without collective self-empowerment. Poor governance and ineffective administration. Accountability also implies an objective and implies an objective and dispassionate ground-level assessment of the mandate of the administration, the extent of its honest and faithful implementation and sharing it accurately and objectively with all those who are concerned the donors, government, community and people at large.

Every transaction must stand public scrutiny and everyone in administration or, for that matter, in any organisation/institution must be accountable, answerable and actionable for any act of omission or commission which comes to the surface as a result of public scrutiny.

Most Ministries develop unrealistic targets fixed or imposed on them by the politicians and overzealous bureaucrats. The functionaries of the administration vie with each other in a bid to report an exaggerated achievement of the target. This often results in inaccurate reporting or half-hearted and unprofessional reporting by the fudging of figures. Respondents are criticize the fact that fraud and graft are routinely and systematically built into all government transactions especially by the Due Process Bureau, because in the view of the public, there can be no accountability without public scrutiny. Transparency, accountability and public scrutiny are essentials of good governance. Analysis of responses showed the following results as presented in table 1 below:

Table 1: Results of Performance Ranking of Ministries/Parastatals in Bayelsa State

The process of ensuring good governance and good life for a section of the society to the exclusion of others will be non-sustainable and a self-defeating proposition. We cannot promote order and stability by restraining political participation and competition. Good governance is eventually a question of the method, system, style, policies of the government, any other organisation or institution which governs in a manner that is conducive to a clean, safe, secure, dignified and congenial human existence which is also inclusive. Good governance is anchored on a value system that places premium on principles like accountability, transparency and popular participation.

There seems to be a disconnect between in governance especially at the grassroots level. This could be attributed to the fact that elections have not been conducted at the third-tier of government. A few of the Ministries/Parastatals have clearly spelt out mission statements but have not evolved sustainable implementation blueprints.

The civil service in Bayelsa State is generally characterized by lack of adherence to work ethics and other vices such as absenteeism, sloppiness partly because most of the personnel complain about de-motivation in terms of not receiving overheads and other allowances. The myriads of complaints of Civil Servants is understandable in that Bayelsa State has no industries or companies, as most oil prospecting corporations have their headquarters outside Yenagoa. Accountability of the administration involves a lot of grit, courage and determination to own moral responsibility for the consequences of one’s action. This, however, does not always happen. What invariably happens is the tendency to stonewall public outcry, if anything goes wrong, or to evade and circumvent responsibility and then do damage control. Damage control erodes the moral capital of the administration.

Ministries /parastatals should build capacity specifically target addressing key issues of discipline, mutual trust and transparency as well as facilitate re-orientation. The development of Bayelsa State requires a virile and effective civil service. Government should pay overheads to Ministries/Parsatatals, as it is a major incentive to work harder and show commitment to public service.

The State should facilitate multi-track approaches to conflict resolution among the political elites role in conflict resolution mechanisms world over. The world realizes that coercion exacerbates conflicts but that as a deterrence option, the military has a role to play in conflict resolution.

The Due Process Bureau should be reinvigorated and appointments to positions of trust should be scrutinized by the Legislature. This would make such role incumbents accountable and reduce the Public Corruption Perception Index and the ghost workers syndrome. The general feeling is that the Due Process Bureau as it is, does not serve the interest of the public.

The IGR profile of Bayelsa State is poor and inadequate to sustain the delivery of quality social services. However. taxes of any kind whether statutory or not should be introduced only after adequate sensitization through the mass media. Bayelsans seem to resist tax because successive administrations promised the delivery of FREE services. The reality however is that nothing is free, not even in Freetown. For example, the proliferation of private schools in Yenagoa is an indication that public education is failing owing to under-funding.

Physical infrastructure works such as road construction should be handled by professionals whether such contractors are indigenes or not. This does not imply that local content should be compromised.

Public office holders can cut down on foreign travels to conserve financial resources. The Due Process can be overhauled and a mechanism for boosting IGR may be put in place to enforce tax laws. The State Legislature may also spend quality time in making quality laws rather than embark on frequent travels. The study revealed that Bayelsans are generally benevolent people who can render selfless service and contribute meaningfully to the development of the State. In the words of Martin Luther King, Jr. “Everybody can be great... because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love”. Bayelsa State can attain greatness if only are given the opportunity to strive at the best.