Permanent Secretary Seeks Review of Order 1

By: Wisdom Acka

The Permanent Secretary, Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA), Olusade Adesola, has called for the review of Ministry of the Federal Capital Territory Dissolution Order No. 1, 2004, to address burning administrative issues in the Territory.

Adesola made the call while speaking on Wednesday at a get-together in honour of Senior Special Assistants on Media and Strategic Communication; Monitoring, Inspection and Enforcement to the FCT Minister; and Special Adviser, Media to the FCT Minister of State, Abubakar Sani, Attah Ikharo and Austine Elemue, respectively.

The Permanent Secretary noted that though the implementation of the order was “desirable and expedient, it did not cater for the career of the civil servants element, who should be the largest beneficiaries of it”.

He also bemoaned Order 1 for making the Secretary of the FCTA Secretariat a Legal Adviser between levels 10 and 12, meaning that the Directors in the offices would have to be reporting to the Mandate Secretary as the chief accounting officer, “which is a disservice to them”.

His words: “The Order 1, 2004, that withdrew us from the mainstream service and benched us in this system did not do anything to look at what will be the future career of civil servants in the FCT.

“What this speaks to is that the conversion on Order 1, 2004 is just begining. We need to sit down and to review this Order particularly as it concerns the civil servants”, he said.

The Permanent Secretary also noted that establishment of the FCT Civil Service Commission has not bridged the gaps; adding that the Commission has its functions different from those of the offices of the Permanent Secretary and department of Human Resource Management.

The call by the Permanent Secretary may not be unconnected with persistent calls by labour unions in the FCT Administration for full implementation of the Executive Order 1, 2004 to make room for their career progression beyond the position of a director.

Olusade, therefore, provides a way forward: “A lot of proposals and initiatives are in the offing, and I believe when the new administration comes, this will be a very major issue that will have to be reviewed, in order to address issues affecting the career of the civil servants”.

“I believe going forward that the media will join hands with us from the position of information rather than position of misinformation. This is because the media had been used to propagate the demand for civil service commission for FCT, without which, there will be no peace in the FCT”, he stated.

He wondered: “Today, can civil service commission declare vacancy? Can Civil service commission do promotion without vacancy been declared? Who will declare the vacancy?

“It is still the office of the Permanent Secretary, through the Director of Human Resources. Civil Service Commission cannot recruit unless you give it the vacancy to recruit into, otherwise the civil service commission will come in as a lame duck as it would have only added additional layer of administrative bottlenecks in the career,” the Permanent Secretary restated.

Adesola expressed confidence in the incoming administration, pledging to sufficiently brief it to enable it “look passionately into the career of the civil servants and address the bottlenecks that we currently have”.