Promotion Test Result, A Wake-Up Call To The Nigerian Civil Service-Afuba

The recent revelation of mass failure in  promotion exams in the federal service has been described as alarm bell on the state of the federal and state civil services.

Reacting to the media disclosure last week by the Federal Civil Service Commission that over 6500 workers failed the 2023 promotion exam, a public administration practitioner, Mr IfeanyiChukwu Afuba said the development serves as an urgent call to shore up the capacity of the administrative organs of government for effective service delivery.

Afuba said the issue was of grave concern because a country’s development was dependent on the ability of government machinery to execute public policies and programmes.

He submitted that the current challenge of competence could not be remedied solely by the Administrative Staff College of Nigeria.

Tracing the lack of requisite skills to poor quality of graduates, Afuba said Nigeria’s educational crisis was compounded by youth addiction to shallow offerings of social media.

He proposed continuous education programme for various cadres of the Civil Services, emphasizing that human resource evaluation should not be at promotion intervals only. He also called on federal and state governments to ensure the provision of well-stocked libraries for every Ministry.

Afuba, Director of a Public Administration Circle, Awka, submitted that though past civil service reforms tried to address the drawbacks of the Civil Service, the problems continue to vary in time, shape, and content.

He said under the present democratic order, there was a need for the blending of some political offices and statutory departments to achieve cohesion in the government machinery. The public administration analyst advised that the unhealthy rivalry between political appointees and civil service leadership cadres be replaced with cooperation and joint undertakings by the two sides for optimal results.

Afuba said an unwieldy Civil Service would have its manpower stretched thinly and unfocused.  He therefore supported calls for rationalisation of redundant  Commissions, Parastatals, and Agencies as recommended by the Stephen Orosanye Report of 2012.

He counseled the use of modern management practices and policy monitoring mechanisms to make positive difference in the performance of the bureaucracy.