What do civil servants think of their masters – ministers and commissioners – who the media claim to have hit the ground running? I discovered this secret in July 2017 when I resumed duties as a cabinet official in a state government. Politicians appointed into public offices want people to believe that they hit the ground running. Hardboiled civil servants are, however, used to their artifices and have coined a name to describe the theatrics they put up on assumption of office.
Here is my story on the subject. Everywhere I went before resumption, friends and well-wishers drummed into my ears the admonition to hit the ground running. Soon enough, this began to wear on my nerves as it played like a broken record in many conversations. Those who noticed my growing impatience warned that there could be consequences for not doing this.
Consequences!
When I sought for clarification, I was told that Mr. Governor employed me for action and I must demonstrate action from Day One. You won’t believe that when I pressed further on how to demonstrate action, I was served very interesting and sometimes wacky answers. Make some noise (this was before Ali Bongo of Gabon, mind you). If possible, issue boastful threats here and there. Mesmerize them with big grammar, you know, like that Edo legislator (“after all, you are commissioner for information!”). Do something drastic to show courage (“Let civil servants know that you’ve arrived and will not tolerate nonsense”).
But how will all this help Mr. Governor? I found that pressing them further forced them to think and freed me from the admonitions.
Of course, I knew what ‘hit the ground running’ meant – to start something and proceed with it at a fast pace and with enthusiasm. What the wacky answers suggested was that the people may not have understood that one cannot hit the ground and run on nothing, without aa plan or programme of action. As a professional, I already created a draft strategic plan that I needed to sell to obtain buy-in from both Mr. Governor and civil servants that would execute it.
Getting the support of civil servants is crucial. When one substitutes a saleable plan with boastful threats, big grammar and noise-making, one is like a hunter who noisily rushes into a jungle in search of game. Frightened civil servants will scamper out of one’s way and allow one to blunder along until one is completely spent.
This was the discovery I made about how civil servants approach the hit-the-ground-running fever from political appointees. Five days after selling my plan and generating excitement from the ministry’s civil servants, a classmate of mine, a civil servant in the same ministry, came to congratulate me on “our beautiful plan” and the enthusiasm that it has generated. I could see that she was, however, trying hard to suppress a laugh, which made me wonder aloud what was so funny.
It turned out that her husband, a permanent secretary, apparently listened to the story of how I hit the ground running, nodded knowingly and pointedly asked whether what I was doing was not “the usual IGG.”
“What’s IGG,” I asked suspiciously.
“Initial Gra-Gra,” she said, and immediately released the laughter that she was trying hard to hold in.
This is the problem with classmates, I grumbled inwards. They never fear “big men and women” that they have “seen finish” in class. Woe betide you if you used to arrive in class wearing “okrika” or are known to “eat 0-1-0” in school but your chi later cracked your coconut. They will still remember what you were in the bad old days! Even if you were one of the big boys and girls on campus, some will start by warning that you shouldn’t expect to be addressed as “honourable this, and dishonourable that!” But rejoice if you have those kinds of classmates, they keep your feet on the ground while fully supporting you to succeed.
I looked at my audacious classmate, laughed out loud and threatened to deal with her for “toying with a whole commissioner like this!”
This hilarious encounter played out in my mind this political season when “hit the ground running” resurrected as a media buzzword. A section of the media bandied the phrase about in praise of President Bola Tinubu and some of his key appointees who made noise, displayed courage or issued boastful threats here and there as they hit the ground running.
On this, the colourful Rivers man, Nyesom Ezenwo Wike, is the champion. The Igbo would say that he is eze amana o’ga echi (literally, the king we know will be crowned). Unsurprisingly, he deployed the strategy of boastful threats delivered in his trademark gruff voice and dramatic gestures to frighten Abuja FCT residents and show that he had arrived. The following day, newspapers screamed: “Wike hits the ground running.”
It made me pinch myself as I remembered the advice of 2017, which I ignored in place of a plan of action that I proceeded to sell.
Can one forget the immortal words of Inspector-General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun? His name rhymed with a dreaded community security outfit in the South West. Perhaps to live up to his name or to be seen as one who hit the ground running, he took off like this soon after he was decorated with his new rank:
“I really can’t describe how I feel currently, but, if I must tell you anything, I will tell you that, right now, I feel like a tiger inside of me, ready to chase away all the criminals in Nigeria. And some other times, I feel like a lion in me, ready to devour all the internal enemies of Nigeria.”
I again pinched myself on reading this vintage boast, the exact thing I was advised to do by my well-meaning friends and well-wishers way back in 2017. These examples of impulsive executive statements and actions designed to get people to think that they came to indeed hit the ground running can be found in all states with new governors.
Mr. President himself did not resist the temptation. By his own account, he became “possessed with courage” on the day of his inauguration to announce removal of fuel subsidy and abolition of dual exchange rates. His courageous words threw the Nigerian economy into a tailspin. The twin policies succeeded in pushing the prices of everything beyond the reach of everyone in the middle and lower classes. It was like scooping up the economy from the sizzling pan where Muhammadu Buhari was frying it the day before and tossing into the raging fire underneath.
Again, was this not another act of courage, the type that I was advised to but refused to display?
These are a few examples of the impetuous hit-the-ground-running fever of 2023, a phenomenon yet to be experienced with as much intensity as we did in this election cycle.
There is a sense in which we can say that Candidate Bola Tinubu instigated this frenzy. Shortly before the February 25 polls, an interviewer wanted Mr. Tinubu to be specific about the programmes he would pursue to get Nigeria out of the woods, if he won the election. Recall what he said in these three short, sharp and memorable sentences:
“Day 1, hit the ground running. Day 2, continue running. Day 3, don’t stop.”
In a sense, hit the ground running is like the finish-to-start strategy of project management. We can see that, today, they have finished running and are now settling down to start with their plans and fulfill electioneering promises.