‘We ensure the best are selected for jobs from everywhere’

Does your commission have any provision for waivers in Ministries, Departments, and Agencies’ (MDAs’) employment?I think the concept of waivers needs to be understood clearly in two different contexts. First, the MDA that wish to recruit seek waivers from the Head of Service as in connection to some facts, known or unknown. As at now […]

Does your commission have any provision for waivers in Ministries, Departments, and Agencies’ (MDAs’) employment?
I think the concept of waivers needs to be understood clearly in two different contexts. First, the MDA that wish to recruit seek waivers from the Head of Service as in connection to some facts, known or unknown. As at now there is an embargo on recruitments but anybody who wants to recruit outside that embargo must seek waiver in respect of that. Two, the waiver that we do have here is to allow people opportunity or chance to not fully comply with the provisions. But we give waivers to MDAs that want to recruit on advertisements only. Ordinarily, the federal character principles guidelines insist that anyone that wants to recruit must advertise in two national newspapers. But if you want to recruit sixteen persons for instance in an organization, you may seek a waiver not to advertise because of the costs and time that will be involved. So sometimes they come and seek waiver on advertisement only but they comply with all the other provisions. So those are the conditions which waiver applies.
What does the federal character principles say about government scholarships?
Scholarships are acceptable ways of human capital development by either state or federal government to enable their citizens pursue higher educational qualification. I am concerned as the chairman of the Federal Character Commission about the operations at the  federal level. For instance, the Federal Ministry of Education has a scholarship and that positions are in context of federal character and administered in such a way that will ensure equity and fair play.
What is the commission doing about under representation of some states in federal government establishment?
The issue of under-representation is not a static or permanent situation. It can change from time to time. A state that is over represented in a particular organization today may by the end of December become not over represented but adequately represented. State that has been under represented by December becomes fairly represented.
The idea of federal character intervention is to reduce the gap between the over represented and under-represented. So at any time it is clearly dynamic. So there is no state that could be said to be permanently disadvantaged because movement of state is a function of guidelines in the service.
Some people have argued against the retention of federal character principle in Nigeria against the dictate of global practices?
We have a peculiarity of our political arrangement in Nigeria. The country is a plural society; multi-ethnic and multi-religious society that has agreed to come together under a political arrangement to be called a nation. And to build one nation you must bring every party as a stakeholder and everything within that country must be brought together and shared in such a way that no part will feel excluded. The idea of federal character is permanent in every plural society whether in Africa or Europe. If you study the history of multi-ethnic societies, even America and Canada up till now, they are considering situations for affirmative action.
Even the ongoing National Conference is talking about expanding the scope of federal character and equal opportunity. So it is going to remain a permanent feature of our political arrangement.  
Some people are of the opinion that ensuring the federal character and quota principle promotes mediocrity over merit?
That is a very unfortunate prejudice that people have continued to live with for quite some time. We have done our best at the Federal Character Commission to educate people to move away from that prejudice and to look at our circumstances objectively. One, federal character cannot be antithetical to merit. Our job is to monitor equitable distribution of jobs. We do not recruit. Those agencies that recruit set the condition required for placement. They set examinations for them and conduct interviews for them. So the issue of quality resides with them. For instance the federal character guidelines set the criteria for recruitments and scholarships. We are not saying don’t take the best, but what we are saying is give the best possible opportunity to the best from everywhere.
What is the result of the sensitization workshops that the FCC has been organizing?
 I am satisfied with the progress we are making. The federal character principle must be predicated first on convincing people on what they must do. So rather than invoking the force of law, we believe in interacting with people to buy into the concept because it is critical to the growth of the country. And they are responding very positively.
What is the update on your second mandate?
The first mandate concerns getting jobs- white collar or blue chip jobs. Incidentally that affects only a minority of Nigerians.  Assuming the total number of people employed in white collar jobs is three million, we say multiply that by five being those benefiting from each of them, that gives you fifteen million benefitting from white collar jobs and you have 170 million Nigerians. That is where the second mandate comes in; it is blind to gender, religion, and ethnicity. It is dealing with infrastructural facilities. The government that focuses on that would have touched the lives of the people more expressly better than giving government jobs. So when government wants to distribute infrastructure, it is the job of the federal character commission to ensure that these infrastructures are distributed in such a way that no part of the country is excluded.
Is it easier to secure a job going through “who you know” or the federal character commission?
We don’t recruit at federal character, what we do is when we have an organization that is finding it difficult to attract people from a particular part of the country, it comes to the commission because the commission has a commissioner from each state of the federation.  As I speak now three new universities were established, we asked our commissioners to go home and tell their people that these new universities have been established.
How do you use your prosecutorial powers?
We have the powers to prosecute but we are being reminded always by stakeholders that the powers to prosecute are weak and the chances that we would win in court are remote. So knowing that, there is need for amendment to our law to strengthen that very part. That is why what we have been doing is getting institutions sensitized so that they might willingly buy into the federal character principle. But we have had to take a number of our institutions to court. The cases have not been concluded in court.