The question as to whether the economy should be managed as a machine or as an organic system, has been an age long argument and represents a fundamental debate between classical/mainstream economics and evolutionary/complexity economics. While the proponents of machine view economy as a predictable, interconnected, and stable system that moves toward equilibrium, managed via central intervention (e.g., controlling interest rates, fiscal policy) to fix malfunctions, an organic system advocates sees the economy as a “messy, fractal living thing” that is constantly evolving, self-organizing, and learning, similar to a biological ecosystem.
Again, whereas the economy as an organism group describes the financial system as a living evolving entity that grows, adapts, and self-regulates rather than a fixed machine, it highlights dynamic interdependencies, where sectors (like organs) depend on each other for survival, often characterized by health, sickness, or “life blood”.
However, the ghost of such arguments and counter arguments appears to have been put to rest for now at the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) as the agency’s leadership has progressed beyond idle arguments and rhetoric. It is now using healthy public policy, as brickbats, institutionalized proposal, set of elements like laws, regulations, guidelines and actions to solve or address relevant and real-world problems, guided by a conception and often implemented by programs and encompasses what the government does, or does not do to solve problems of the Niger Delta region.
A typical example of such creative leadership move was the recent declaration by the Managing Director of the Commission, Dr Samuel Ogbuku, that the NDDC’s processes will be fully automated by the end of the first quarter of this year.
Ogbuku announced this during the Mandatory Continuous Procurement Capacity Development Training Programme, organised by the Bureau of Public Procurement, BPP, at the PTDF Centre for Skills Development in Port Harcourt.
He stated: “We will soon automate our procurement processes to ensure compliance, transparency, and better service delivery. We have recently reformed our corporate governance structure and internal processes.”
According to the Managing Director, the NDDC had commenced implementation of a new Governance Advisory Service to ensure accountability and transparency in service delivery. Ogbuku observed: “Holding this training in the Niger Delta demonstrates that there is peace in the region, which translates to peace in Nigeria. We have transitioned from transaction to transformation, and this is evident in our public procurement processes.”
“In NDDC, we take public procurement very seriously. Last year, we collaborated with BPP in training some of our staff. Training and retraining are essential in every organisation. We are also training our staff in ICT to enhance their digital knowledge. He noted that the NDDC had 35 BPP-certified Procurement professionals in the Commission’s Procurement unit. We try in various ways to train our staff on procurement processes.
Highlighting some of the achievements of the NDDC, Ogbuku stated that the Operation Light Up the Niger Delta, one of the Commission’s flagship programmes, had been very successful. We undertake projects based on needs assessment. “Mr President loves the Niger Delta, and we are doing our best to bring his programmes home to the people,” he said.
While the above initiatives and policies remain admirable, there is another policy by the Governing Board and Management that this piece would underline as something massive and positive.
Some months ago, the Commission’s leadership, during the presentation of its N1.91 trillion 2024 budget to the Senate Committee on NDDC, emphasized priorities such as security, job creation, youth and women empowerment, social welfare, education and the profound initiative to raise N1 trillion, from development and commercial banks, for the completion of 1,006 legacy projects spread across the region. These projects were reportedly in specific areas such as roads, bridges, electricity, schools, hospitals, shore protection and reclamation, among others.
Aside from the awareness that when abandoned projects are completed and put into use, the nation is saved from wastage, national assets are boosted and socio-economic development of the people, region and the nation in general promoted. There are, however, other covert reasons that render this present development as newsy and commendable. Students of history familiar with the origin of project abandonment and neglect of national assets in Nigeria and the politics that fuels this will agree that the NDDC governing board and management are on the path to ending an ugly ‘culture’ that has over the years held down the region’s development.
And if this policy framework is achieved as envisaged, it is abundantly clear those future historians and, of course, development professionals shall definitely refer to the present board and management as a bunch that restored new order in the region and hope to the people.
Beyond what future historians may say, there is equally the need to highlight why this piece is fixated with NDDC’s departure from the old order, and at the very moment on a mission to tackle a challenge that has not only become a culture of a sort but has its origin deeply rooted in history that predates the nation’s independence in October 1960.
Beginning with the historical undertone as to why Nigerians and successive leaderships in the country daily demonstrate lackadaisical attitude towards national assets and see nothing wrong with project desertion, history has it that during colonial rule, Nigerians developed anti-colonial belief that public property is no man’s property. This belief, according to reports, was intended to fight colonialism but it continued after independence and brought insensitivity to government property as well as ineptitude, nepotism, neglect of duty, etc.; it gravely offers explanation as to the reckless way in which government property and projects are handled.
Indeed, what the above information tells us is that both project abandonment and public asset neglect in the country are two striking human tragedies, that the pain they inflict on the nation are deepened by the realization that they were avoidable.
Beyond this understanding, there are reasons to believe that this piece is not alone in the understanding that NDDC leadership is doing something positively new.
A few months ago, the Pan Niger Delta Development Forum, PANDEF, commended the leadership of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) for its commitment to transparency, accountability, and infrastructure development in the region.
Giving the commendation during a courtesy visit by a delegation from the umbrella organization of Niger Delta people at the NDDC headquarters in Port Harcourt, PANDEF’s National Chairman, Ambassador Godknows Igali, lauded the Commission’s leadership, describing it as visionary and result-driven.
His words: “We have never seen a leadership team like this, and we thank President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for his support. Your interventions in infrastructure, particularly the Benin-Ore Road and the Light Up Niger Delta initiative, are commendable. Your youth development programmes are also making a significant impact.”
He further assured the Commission of PANDEF’s continued collaboration, reiterating the group’s role as the voice of the Niger Delta people in the civic space: “We believe in working closely with you and reaffirm our support for your administration. We urge Mr. President, the governors, and other stakeholders to provide you with the necessary tools to succeed,” he concluded.
No doubt, there are books that teach how to build a house, how to repair an engine and how to write a book, but there are no codified books on how to build a region, society or nation. Conversely, nation building, in my view, depends on ceaseless creative and far-reaching public policies designed and implemented by well foresighted leaders – a case in point is the NDDC’s resolve to complete abandoned projects that presently litter its mandate states.
This author, therefore, believes that closing ranks with a view to learning from NDDC’s latest template is not only important but eminently desirable for other agencies and Commissions in the country as “we cannot continue to do one thing repeatedly and be expecting a different result or tackling our societal challenges with the same mentality used when the problems were created”
While it is obvious that it is a season of public good for Niger Delta region and its people, for me, the positive public policies so far generated by the Governing Board/Management of NDDC align with the famous words of Martin Luther King Jnr: “Human progress never rolls in on the wheels of inevitability but is achieved through the tireless efforts and the persistent work of dedicated individuals who are willing to be co-workers with God”.
