Commentary@ITRealms:
"When the call came on September 13, 2013, to serve the Nigerian people as DG
National Center For Women Development, I took it as a call from God, and I
answered in the affirmative. I served for 2 years and five months and did my
best under very difficult conditions. We hardly had money to operate, and the
place was badly run down.
"Worst, there was low morale
and lack of commitment among the Staff. Most spent the day loitering and
gossiping. Many would not show up for work or arrive 11 am, only to leave
before 3 pm. Some were absent for months, and were just collecting their salary
at home.
"My administration changed
all that. Most Staffs were turned around and became passionate about the work,
appreciating also the changes they thought were not possible but were happening
right before them. There remained, though, a remnant who felt that the centre
was their personal preserve and that the position of Director General should
only go to someone from their part of the country. I was initially dismissed as
just a Musician.
"When that did not work, I
was targeted and abused for being for an Igbo woman who came to give jobs to
and elevate my people while sidelining them. When these detractors could not
provide answers to the spate of improvement we were bringing, they resorted to
sabotage and blackmail.
The first such salvo was
fired when a Senate Committee visited on an oversight mission a few months
after my arrival. All three Generators at the Center were cannibalized,
overnight, just hours to the visit.
"We got over that incident
and trudged on. The rest of our activities and accomplishments, modest as they
is public knowledge. I have never in my life been an unfair person. I never
favored any group I carried everybody along.
"But I did not put up with
deliberate incompetence and a refusal to learn, an attitude of entitlement
which some people displayed. We brought back a level of professionalism and
commitment to deliver on our mandate. Without these attributes, the Center
would have fallen apart.
"When the call came for me
to disengage from the Center, I took it in good faith and with thanksgiving to
the Almighty, Yes some stakeholders were upset and tried to make a case for me
to continue. Their effort was a testimony of God’s grace on my administration,
but I also knew that it was time to go. God, who sent me, there was taking me
to a higher level of service.
"His infinite wisdom is
unassailable. That is my faith. Besides, I was exhausted and had abandoned many
personal projects to devote myself, 200% to the Center. The abuses and lack of
cooperation from a mother Ministry, from those who felt that the Center
overshadowed them, to the extent that they tried to discourage others from
working with us, were just a bit much for my comfort.
"I did not lobby for the job
in the first place, and I was not going to lobby to keep it. I actually looked
forward to leaving. But some people were going to exact their pound of flesh.
"They organized some staff,
mostly Northerners invited the Press and set about to disgrace themselves. By
mid-afternoon, while the Heads of Departments were putting together the
handover notes, they seized the keys to my official car, even with my personal
items still inside. Threats began to fly. “That Ibo woman must, we will
disgrace her.”
"Their Chief organizer, the
Acting DG, went about whipping up ethnic sentiments against me. Late 2015, the
same officer had gone to the Center’s Mosque to ask for the issue of a Fatwa
against me, claiming that I was working against the interest of the North. We
nipped that in the bud by calling a town hall meeting and asking that proof be
provided. The Fatwa was denied and peace reigned for a while.
"Police were called into the
Center to escort me out and avoid bloodshed as I disengaged. Eventually, in the
midst of insults and name calling, with an angry baying crowd, some of whom
were brought in from outside, I entered my official car and left.
"At no time during this
melee did I threaten to sue Mr. President for asking me to disengage. Why would
I? Is it not within his authority. Even if it were not, is the Center my
personal property. I had done my best, and if it was time to go, it was that
simple.
Life continues.
"I had a thriving career
before my appointment. The Center did not make me. I have so much to do. I am a
multitalented, multifaceted and multitasking child of God. By His grace, the
future is greater. So what is the problem?
"Let me say here that The
Federal Government should really look into the Parastatals and take note of the
fact that many people who work on them do not have the requisite qualification.
Many contribute nothing, and many see their job as a personal entitlement.
They are owed because
Nigeria belongs to them and them alone. Somehow, these people were given the
impression that they could attempt to do what they did to me, and nothing would
happen. That is very sad indeed. The Ministry also has a case to answer. They
helped to create that impression.
A situation where the
Ministry could invite a Management Staff to a trip abroad without informing the
DG, and the Staff would only inform her principal via text message, from the
Airport as she is leaving the country, creates an atmosphere of indiscipline,
and anything goes. The Ministry should restrain itself to its spelt out
function and not undermine the authority of the DG.
.
Finally, I declare that I
am a Nigerian citizen who should enjoy the rights attendant to that privileged.
I am Oyingbo and proud of it. I respect myself, and I love and respect all for
who they are. We are all God’s children. No one has the right to insult or
abuse me or deprive me of my rights. Nigeria will not hold unless and until we
all come to that realization.
*Being a text of handover speech by Onyeka Onwenu, the immediate past Director-General of the
National Center For Women Development, Abuja.
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