The practice and improvement of democratic and good governance systems and values are anchored on the vibrancy, capacity and competencies of the public service institutions tasked with delivering governments’ core business. All governments invest heavily on firstly creating the structure of public service institutions, secondly, governments extend their resources build capacity and develop the key competencies of public servants to position these institutions for optimal care and use of government resources.
Lastly, governments are required to continually ensure that within these public service institutions, officers are not only well trained and possess the right competencies and skills, but more importantly is the need to have these officers in the places to maximize on their productive capacities. It is in the context of the afore that I want to discuss the importance of having well crafted, capacitated and productive public institutions whose performance and operational levels are guided by well developed and entrenched organizational cultures. These cultures are rooted on the core mandate, values, practices and general public service ethics promoting the collective above any individual based interest.
Let me start of by acknowledging that all public services institutions are made up individuals spread across the structural levels of the public service machinery. These individuals possess different skills and competencies matched with the requirements of their varied levels of responsibilities. These skills and competencies were acquired often through well coordinated training plans whose ultimate aim is to develop individuals with appropriate and requisite potential to enhance and promote effective service delivery by government. It is often on the basis of performance by these institutions that the public develop levels and degrees of trust and these trust I am going to argue that is necessarily on the institution and not any particular individual necessarily. The composite of a group of individuals of different professions, specializations and varied experiences ought to produce the output that satisfies the customer (citizens). Any dissatisfaction and loss of trust by citizens on any public institution often can extend to the entire public service losing its face within members of the public.
I wish not to be seen to de-emphasize the importance of individuals in any organizational setting, especially those in leadership positions, but my take is that any individuals traits possessed by a leader at any level of the public service structure, must translate into the collective and stand out as purely individual brilliance. This is a practical necessity for modern day operational dictates of well resourced and stable organizations, for the simple reason that individuals come and go but institutions often have a very long life line. It is on the basis of the above arguments that I am of the view that anytime you see individuals within the public service institutions rise above the institutions they work for or lead, it’s a recipe for possible dysfunctional practices and ultimate loss of trust by the public. This is particularly so if decisions by those individuals fail to attract public trust and necessary backing.
When society begins to lose trust and confidence on any public service institution, government must necessarily introspect and establish why that trend. It is acknowledged that sometimes public opinion can be driven by unfolding events whose public interpretation may conflict with government perspective or even intentions. It is also possible that public opinion against certain government actions, usually undertaken by specific institutions, can be based on misinformation, lack of understanding or even perceptions that may be viewed as misplaced by government. My view is that irrespective of the reason behind possible miscommunication leading to public mistrust on public institutions, it is the responsibility of any government to always pause and ask the question, why the rift, why misunderstanding and why public opinion or even perceptions seem to be not correlate with expectations from the official side? As the organ responsible for the practice and protection of democratic and good governance practices, government must at all times seek to find out where she could have gone wrong or simply what she could have contributed to the rifts between citizens and public institutions.
The above includes challenging practices that may not be acknowledged as problematic at face value and one of such is the dominant role of individuals in public institutions that are known to require and demand collective decision making to protect not only the integrity of the institution itself, but more importantly to advance and protect the public good/interest. Anytime there are indications of certain individuals dominating the focus of institutional operational activities, even when as leaders, there is every reason for government to worry. This is so because as indicated earlier, all institutions are crafted and resourced such that the collective of professional, politicians and skills and competencies brought under one roof can advance that rich collective output that has no signs of individual dominance or self seeking interest. The extent to which governments are able to ensure that their public service institutions define their mandates, value systems and the culture of delivering services purely on the basis of the public good, creates a fertile ground for good democratic and governance practices that are a reflection of preferred and sanctioned public preferences.
It would be very helpful if as a nation we could reflect and pin a finger on those major events, decisions, policies and activities that seem to have sparked current trends in a growing mistrust on public institutions by the public. This is important if we agree that continuation of mistrust on government institutions should not be allowed to entrench in the long term for that will make it impossible to actualize and protect good governance and democratic practices. Institutionalization of rifts and strained relations between any government and its people often breeds resilience and hardened attitudes amongst citizens and these may just be what this country has ever imagined could happen. At our level of development and the experience we have as a nation we must know those factors that are antithetical to good governance practices and we should do better to protect this country’s public service values, practices and culture. Failure to protect our systems’ values through allowing individuals dominance over the collective is not a good recipe for our national survival.
