Turnaround Plan Or A Way Out For Non-performers?

WHEN Prime Minister Nahas Angula announced the ‘reshuffle’ of Permanent Secretaries this week, he said the changes had been motivated by media reports on public service delivery and that Government had decided “to retool its machinery, deepen its delivery strategies and refocus its operations”.

In addition, he emphasised the importance of this being “a first step in our drive towards ensuring ongoing quantitative and qualitative improvement” in public service performance and that in future Permanent Secretaries would undergo performance evaluations. Reading between the lines then, it appears that the two Permanent Secretaries most often under public scrutiny and criticism of late, namely the former PSs of Health and Trade and Industry (Kalumbi Shangula and Andrew Ndishishi respectively), provided impetus for the ‘reshuffle’.We are aware that President Hifikepunye Pohamba himself was the proponent of this move, having made a surprise visit to the Katutura State Hospital last week to see for himself the conditions there.This is a very positive thing and the President must be commended for his first-hand investigation of a public health facility that has come under increased fire in recent months.In the same spirit he undoubtedly requested the Prime Minister, as head of the civil service, to take action, which the latter then did in the form of the ‘reshuffle’.What is difficult to understand, however, is why people who don’t perform in their jobs, particularly high-ranking public servants, are transferred from one Ministry to another rather than simply being removed from their posts.It would have been helpful for the Prime Minister to motivate the rationale behind the whole reshuffle and why it was thought that certain Permanent Secretaries would do better in one post than they had done to date in another.It is also difficult to assess whether all of the Permanent Secretaries affected have either not performed or under-performed in the positions they’ve been in to date.Or have some just been moved simply to accommodate others? Or has there been a thorough look at their various skills and where they can be most effective and new placements made accordingly? If, as the Prime Minister maintains, this constitutes the start of a new ‘turnaround plan’ for the civil service, when and how will the public know if it has been successful or not? Also how will the performance evaluations be done and who will do them? Unless the public is equipped with the knowledge of how and why Government did the reshuffle in the way it did, it will be hard for them to accept that this is not just another reshuffle, done in order to get certain people out of awkward situations rather than being for the greater good of the country and its people.The argument in the past has been that Permanent Secretaries are administrators, first and foremost, and that in-depth knowledge of the Ministries they are placed in is less important than being good at managing their Ministries.If that is the case, one wonders how a PS who doesn’t administer well in one Ministry will be able to be effective in another? One also wonders at what point Government will deal decisively with senior civil servants who are not performing, or will we always have this culture of shifting people around rather than taking the difficult decisions that must sometimes be made in the interests of open, accountable, transparent, and more importantly perhaps, effective government.We hope that the Prime Minister will, as soon as he is able, give us more information on the subject of more qualitative government and job assessments for Permanent Secretaries.These are very key posts and if held by the wrong people, can do a great deal of damage to both the Government’s image and its performance in the eyes of the electorate.We look forward, in short, to hearing more about the rationale behind the reshuffle.Reading between the lines then, it appears that the two Permanent Secretaries most often under public scrutiny and criticism of late, namely the former PSs of Health and Trade and Industry (Kalumbi Shangula and Andrew Ndishishi respectively), provided impetus for the ‘reshuffle’.We are aware that President Hifikepunye Pohamba himself was the proponent of this move, having made a surprise visit to the Katutura State Hospital last week to see for himself the conditions there.This is a very positive thing and the President must be commended for his first-hand investigation of a public health facility that has come under increased fire in recent months.In the same spirit he undoubtedly requested the Prime Minister, as head of the civil service, to take action, which the latter then did in the form of the ‘reshuffle’.What is difficult to understand, however, is why people who don’t perform in their jobs, particularly high-ranking public servants, are transferred from one Ministry to another rather than simply being removed from their posts.It would have been helpful for the Prime Minister to motivate the rationale behind the whole reshuffle and why it was thought that certain Permanent Secretaries would do better in one post than they had done to date in another.It is also difficult to assess whether all of the Permanent Secretaries affected have either not performed or under-performed in the positions they’ve been in to date.Or have some just been moved simply to accommodate others? Or has there been a thorough look at their various skills and where they can be most effective and new placements made accordingly? If, as the Prime Minister maintains, this constitutes the start of a new ‘turnaround plan’ for the civil service, when and how will the public know if it has been successful or not? Also how will the performance evaluations be done and who will do them? Unless the public is equipped with the knowledge of how and why Government did the reshuffle in the way it did, it will be hard for them to accept that this is not just another reshuffle, done in order to get certain people out of awkward situations rather than being for the greater good of the country and its people.The argument in the past has been that Permanent Secretaries are administrators, first and foremost, and that in-depth knowledge of the Ministries they are placed in is less important than being good at managing their Ministries.If that is the case, one wonders how a PS who doesn’t administer well in one Ministry will be able to be effective in another? One also wonders at what point Government will deal decisively with senior civil servants who are not performing, or will we always have this culture of shifting people around rather than taking the difficult decisions that must sometimes be made in the interests of open, accountable, transparent, and more importantly perhaps, effective government.We hope that the Prime Minister will, as soon as he is able, give us more information on the subject of more qualitative government and job assessments for Permanent Secretaries.These are very key posts and if held by the wrong people, can do a great deal of damage to both the Government’s image and its performance in the eyes of the electorate.We look forward, in short, to hearing more about the rationale behind the reshuffle.