From Mohammed Nasir Shuaibu BAUCHI
Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi state has disclosed that the present government under his watch has since inception in 2019, placed priority to training and retraining of government officials to ensure good governance.
Governor Mohammed stated this at the opening ceremony of a 3-day sensitization workshop for Commissioners, Special Advisers, Permanent Secretaries and other top government functionaries at the Command Guest House, Bauchi on Wednesday.
Represented by the Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Barrister Ibrahim Kashim, the Governor expressed displeasure at lackadaisical attitude of Commissioners towards attending functions.
According to Mohammed, his administration has prioritised training and retraining of members of the service in order to have the best of results in governance.
He also called on the civil and public servants to be up and doing in order to achieve the set objectives of the present government, urging the participants to pay attention to the papers that will be presented.
The SSG frowns at what he described as “nonchalant attitude” of Commissioners and other top functionaries in attending public functions even when the Governor is in attendance.
The SSG said “the Governor, Sen Bala Mohammed Abdulkadir has always expressed his displeasure at this kind of attitude and it must be checked.”
According to him, “It is disheartening that when I looked at the seat reserved for the Commissioners, I could only count Eight of them out of the Twenty-four Commissioners we have in the state.”
“This is not good, the programme is meant for them and they are not here. Anyways, let their colleagues who are here call those who are not here to make it here,” the SSG added.
Barrister Ibrahim Kashim who informed the Head of Civil Service to direct the Permanent Secretary, Establishment Matters to call each one of them on his or her mobile phone number to attend the the workshop.
He said on the part of the government, the Chief of Staff and himself are supposed to be part of the programme, adding that they have made it a duty upon themselves to attend.
The SSG further said himself and the Chief of staff are going to also attend the workshop the next day to enable them have a comprehensive list of those who will attend or not for onward presentation to the Governor.
“I had a lengthy discussion with him late yesterday and he also talked about this our attitude of not attending programmes at all and with no justifiable reasons.” The SSG said.
The SSG while declaring the workshop opened, assured that everything discussed will be transmitted to the Governor for necessary action with the aim of improving on service delivery to the people of the state.
Earlier speaking, the Chief of Staff, Government House, Dr Hassan Gamawa, berated the Commissioners for their lackadaisical attitude towards attending functions, a development he said was not speaking well.
He stressed the importance of attending public functions, saying that it will afford the participants the opportunity to know the current happenings and how approach them.
The Chief of Staff urged those that were present as of the time of the opening ceremony of the programme to make it a point of duty to remind those who were not there the need to attend the programme which was organised for them.
In his opening remarks, the Head of Civil Service of the State, Yahuza Haruna Adamu stated that the workshop was necessitated by the fallout from the retreat held last year with the aim of improving service delivery in governance.
“Some time last year during our retreat, the Governor in consultation with the lead Consultant and in order to move the State forward found it necessary to have this capacity building workshop and remind you of the milestone we have reached”, he said.
