Speeches

1000 Days In Office

Feb 22, 2010 - It is exactly a thousand days this morning that I took the oath of office before God and Lagosians to use all my best endeavours to deliver a bright and rewarding future.

Although our work is not finished, I stand here very proudly today to assert that the results of our collective efforts have become visible for all to see.

As I have said in the past, it is no longer important whether people believe what we say. What is important is that they cannot disbelieve what we do. The evidence of the unmistakable transformation that is taking place here is there for all to see.

My colleagues and I resolved to dedicate this milestone day, the one thousandth day to the hundreds of thousands of you that constitute the Lagos State public service as a token of the expression of our sincere gratitude for you unflinching support, your renewed passion and your resolve to undertake this journey with us, in spite of the odds and even cynism when we started.

Many of your will re-call that when we started we were accused of being in a hurry. It was even alleged that we were running a marathon like sprint race and we would soon tire. It is now clear that our morning has showed our day. One thousand days after we are still running, and because you have refused to look back, we remain focused, on course and untiring.

Permit me however to contextualize our role and our goal, by reminding all of us where we started from.

This journey of transformation started in 1999 when I was not here. It started at a time that Lagos was generating only about N600 Million internally every month. It started when staff salaries and pensions were in arrears and nobody could be certain whether the next one would be paid.

This journey started when Lagos was taken over by refuse, which took over our highways and prevented traffic from moving. This journey started at the time when Victoria Island and Ikoyi used to live in fear of flood from the Atlantic Ocean anytime it rained heavily.

This journey started at a time that the streets of Lagos were daily taken over by dead bodies, many of them mutilated and when there was no ambulance service, traffic management or refuse disposal service.

It started at a time when morale was at its lowest in the public service and many were leaving the public service to the private sector.

This journey started with all the signs of failure of a society that you could think of. Broken roads, high crime, decrepit infrastructure and a seeming lack of capacity or will to set about righting it.

That was the situation until we chose democracy and elected my predecessor, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who led this journey to reclaim our State. That was the beginning of the reforms, computerization, restructuring and rebuilding that forms the foundation on which you and I continue to build.

I re-call that on the 30th day of May 2007, my first day in office as the 13th Governor, you all turned out in very large numbers, under the leadership of our Head of Service, Alhaji Yakub Abiodun Balogun to receive me and usher me to my office with very strong words of assurances and promises of support to give your best in the discharge of our common responsibility to our employers, the tax payers of Lagos.

I will never forget that day and its impact on me and I continue to hold on to those assurances and promises because I treasure them.

They have really brought us far. You have, by keeping those assurances and promises transformed the Lagos State Government and its public service to models of reference for the entire continent and beyond. You have restored the confidence of the public service and demonstrated that Nigerians can manage and operate a Government that responds.

From those gloomy days, Lagosians now have street signs, street lights and traffic lights, they have a vibrant traffic management agency called LASTMA, they have a bus service, the BRT, that is now a global model, they have an ambulance service, LASAMBUS, that is saving lives, a fire service that arrives with fire engines and water, a Rapid Response Service, whose response is now truly rapid, to curb violent crimes and emergencies, Lagosians now have emergency numbers 767 and 112 to call in times of distress and they now have a City State that has moved from the dirtiest to the cleanest.

Today, the Lagos that once was described as a concrete jungle is now adorned with green lawns and trees in places where they used to have refuse dumps, they have improved public health care facilities and there is more to come. They have sporting facilities, new markets, an operational ferry service and more is coming. School children now have books, laboratories and more facilities are being delivered. Water supply is daily increasing and desperate living conditions are daily being mitigated.

The Office of the Public Defender and Public Advice Centre are daily protecting indigent citizens, by providing them with free and qualitative legal advice and defending their rights before our courts.

Today, the State of Lagos is at the threshold of building its intra city rail service and in spite of global depression, the Lagos economy continues to provide and create jobs and opportunities for employment.

Today, unlike anywhere else, Lagosians are voluntarily paying taxes and obeying laws and are happy to do so.

I did not do it all these. You did it. You resolved to change what you did not accept and in so doing our public service has become a service of pride, and one that I feel humbled and privileged to lead.

Every time I get letters from people in other state public services asking if they can transfer to Lagos, or from the private sector within and outside Nigeria offering to join our team.

Dear colleagues, as pleasing as these are, they impose an even greater burden of public expectation and responsibility on all of us. Our action will come under greater public scrutiny, criticism and even cynism by those who do not mean our State well. We must resolve to give more than a 100% if that is what it will take.

I renew my commitment to that solemn cause today.

We must see every demand on us, not as a bother, but as a vote of confidence in our ability to deliver, and do our best to respond even beyond the call of duty at all times. Truly, if people did not believe that we can do it, they will not ask us.

The level of public belief in your abilities is at an all time high and we must all stand up now to be counted; because the only reward for hard work, is more work, but I assure you that it is all worth it, because we have the unique privilege to determine today what this State will look like in future and whether it will be able to protect us, after we have left and we are advanced in age.

As the leader of this team, I am aware of your expectations and your needs and I will continue to do all that I can in mitigating difficulties that limit your abilities to discharge your duties and in improving the conditions under which you work and the remuneration for your effort and I will never hesitate to reward outstanding service, characterized by integrity, utmost courtesy to the members of the public, compassion and dedication.

In the last 1,000 days, policemen, LASTMA officers, teachers, healthcare workers and many of you have been rewarded for bravery, gallantry, sterling services and so much more.

Within the limits of constrained resources, unlimited demands and the increasing cost of running the machinery of Government, we have tried to respond to your demands; and there have been many firsts.

Cars are being provided for doctors and other health care workers, and for our principals to ease transportation problems and elevate their status, a new mortgage plan is being worked out, we are liquidating arrears of pensions and gratuity in LAWMA, the Local Government and other parastatals and these exercises will continue until we totally complete the processes.

We have kept our promises to review allowances for teachers, judicial workers, approved the payment of Hazard Allowance to Non-Teaching Staff in the State public schools, approved the payment of Clinical Allowance and increased Journal Allowance for Health Workers in the State.

We have approved the payment of 15% Basic Salary as Furniture Allowance to Public Servants in Lagos State and also the review of allowances to Judicial Service workers and the processes for implementation are underway. You should receive payments shortly.

I assure you, that our best days lie ahead of us.

Our workforce has grown from 100,737 (One Hundred Thousand, Seven Hundred and Thirty Seven)in May 2007, to 114,516 (One Hundred and Fourteen Thousand, Five Hundred and Sixteen) as at December 31, 2009 and we have just approved the employment of 3,636 (Three Thousand, Six Hundred and Thirty Six) teachers and 1,555 (One Thousand, Five Hundred and Fifty Five) Non-Teaching staffs, the promotion of 13,528 (Thirteen Thousand Five Hundred and Twenty Eight) teachers 1,375 (One Thousand, Three Hundred and Seventy Five) Non-Teachers to new grades with increased salaries and today our wage bill has grown from N2,461,000,000.00 (Two Billion, Four Hundred and Sixty One Million Naira) as at May 2007 to N3,221,000,000.00 (Three Billion, Two Hundred and Twenty One Million Naira) as at January 31, 2010.

Many of you have been sponsored to local and overseas courses to improve your skills and develop capacity. The procedures for project inspection has been largely reformed, as allowances are being paid to project officers, project vehicles are being provided especially in the Ministry of Housing and this model is being replicated gradually across the service Ministries to ensure that public officers are motivated to deliver the highest possible value with our limited resources.

We have embarked on a reform programme through a Committee of the Executive Council and Permanent Secretaries, called the “Ways and Means Committee”, whose mandate is to review our processes, to highlight things that we can do better and those that we should change or discard.

The objective is simply, to make life better for the people we serve, to reduce the time it takes to get things done and to bring about a greater efficiency in Government. We have resolved that if banks can reduce the process of getting a bank draft from 3 (three) days as it once was in this country, to a few minutes, the public service can do better in reducing its response time.

The public service is the largest employer in the economy and it is our responsibility to carry our burden and lead from the front. Patients in our hospitals must see compassion and care in the faces and actions of our health workers, those who breach the law must be treated with decency and firmness by law enforces and we must use the instrumentality of public authority to protect rather than oppress.

In all of this, I assure you that in a lifetime, we cannot finish the work, but we have an opportunity to demonstrate that the African is not doomed. Our society will get complex and new demands and problems will arise and even in periods of great prosperity, the problems will never finish as long as people remain on earth. This is the case in every country and ours is not different.

Indeed, in his final address to the Congress of the United States delivered on January 27, 2000 before he left office, President Bill Clinton, easily the most successful American President of the last century said:-

“Never before has our nation enjoyed, at once, so much prosperity and social progress with so little internal crisis and so few external threats…but we cannot finish the job when a third of all our schools are in serious disrepair. Many of them have walls and wires so old, they’re too old for the internet. So tonight, I propose to help 5,000 schools a year make immediate and urgent repairs; and again, to help build or modernize 6,000 more, to get students out of trailers…”

Distinguished ladies and gentlemen, that was in the United States barely 10 (ten) years ago; the reality therefore is that there is no difficulty that we experience that has not happened somewhere else.

What we must do is to rise up and confront those difficulties with courage and optimism.

History beckons on us now, to make the difference while we have the opportunity, the talent, and the energy, we therefore cannot afford to turn back; we are too far gone on this great journey, the Lagos of our dreams is within reach.

I am hopeful that we will make it, but I am sure that if we do not confront history, it may all be lost.

Thank you for listening.

Eko o ni baje o!

Babatunde Fashola, SAN
Governor of Lagos State