NPC performing below expectations –FG

From Adanna Nnamani and Nmasi Okwor, Abuja

The Minister of Interior, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, has called on the National Productivity Center (NPC) to up its performance, saying that the organisation is yet to attain 10 percent of its potential.

Tunji-Ojo stated this at the 5th National Productivity Summit held in Abuja on Tuesday.

The Minister harped on the need for the NPC to improve the low productivity level of the country by conducting routine audits and gap analysis in various organisations.

He said: “I want to beg you, the National Productivity Center, you have a lot to offer this country. But, I will tell you, I am a very frank talker. Anybody that knows me, knows that I always  speak my mind, and I move on.

“You are not the agency at the moment. You are just scratching the surface. You have not attained 10% of your potential and I will tell you why. Because, productivity is not just about labour. Even in terms of business operations, in terms of even capacity building, collaboration with government agencies.

“For example, I want to welcome you to the Ministry of Interior and see you carry out productivity audits of my agencies, and see how productive they are. Look at gaps, do gap analysis and be able to proffer solutions. “These are things I want to see. If you do this in all agencies. Just like we have procurement audits.

You should be able to give me productivity audits. Which will contain my technology audits, gap analysis, my skills set audits and all the rest. It is a complete circle.

“In case you do not know, you are one agency that cuts across every sector, every ministry, and  every agency in Nigeria. You are a sleeping giant. This is the time for you to wake up and let Nigeria feel your impact.

The Minister, who highlighted the importance of technology in boosting productivity, explained how his ministry was able to clear 204,000 international passports backlogs, using automated processes, when he came on board in 2023.

According to him, “We cannot be productive if we are not efficient in life. And I think as a nation and as a country, we must be concerned about the super-productivity of the business environment.

“I will  give you an example. When I became the minister of interior, I looked at the whole process and the workflow, andI saw that we cannot keep doing the same things year after year, and expect a different result. I called my management and I said, listen, this is 2023, we are not in 1983. This is the era of technology. Because for you to be efficient, you cannot divorce your processes from technology. Once you accelerate technology in your operations, you will activate incompetence and inefficiency.

“That is just the way it is. And the first thing we did was we went through the whole workflow. Because I noticed that one problem we always have in government, or in the public sector, is that we run public enterprises the way we would not run our private enterprises. That is the truth. Because when you run your business, you run with a high level of efficiency because you want a high return on investment. But when you run a government enterprise, it becomes everybody’s business, nobody’s business.

“And so, we had to bring an unusual approach to government business. And what did we do? We looked at the work process and saw what we could automate. And I tell you, it used to take us months for instance in the area of international passports. In two weeks, I met a backlog of 204,000 passports.

“In two weeks, the same set of officers, the same technology, the same people cleared 204,000 backlogs. And what did we do? We brought in what I call the hybrid approach. What is the hybrid approach? For you to be efficient, for you to be productive, you have to use a combination of technology and human factors.

“If you develop the human factor and you neglect the technology, you will keep moving around the vicious circle. And if you bring in the technology without a motivated workforce, technology will not work.

“So, motivating your workforce and of course, bringing in innovation and technology needed to automate the process will give you a higher yield and a higher return on investment.”