Nigeria’s reward system
BY Bayo Fasunwon
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Britain has given access to Nigerians who wish to leave their motherland to seek solace the bosom of their colonial masters. Although the gestures seem an understanding benevolence to many who wish to study in the United Kingdom, many Nigerians seeking for greener pastures are heaving sighs of relief, and are sure that their beginning of the year fasting and prayers had paid off. Those medical doctors who had failed to connect the Saudi Arabia jobs have the opportunity of flooding Europe with their hard-earned medical certificates. The brain drain continues unabated.
Despite the terrible tales from Nigerians who burnt their bridges to seek ‘better lives’ in Oman, Libya, Kuwait and many Asian countries, the Airport is filled with many more Nigerians who wish to ‘check out’. Today, Nigeria families rejoice over one soul that successfully ‘cuts out’ of this nation as if such had become an instant billionaire. Many of these ‘escapees’ from Nigeria are most time oblivious of the conditions awaiting them, but are quick to believe that ‘the grass is greener on the other side’.
Over the years, yours truly has researched into the lives of Nigerians who took the flight into the their El Dorado and observed that many live in more horrendous situations than when they were at home. One has also observed that the various menial jobs which did not ‘measure to their qualifications and dignity’ are what they joyfully accept as flourishing tickets abroad. If the issues of insecurity are the cause of this exodus, truth be told that the problems of insecurity do not, in the magnitude described affect every city in Nigeria, and most ‘escapees’ are not victims of this epidemic. If unemployment is the reason, there are many farms, organisations, private sector and even skill acquisition centers seeking for hands on a daily basis. Besides, the countries to which we run to also have problems of insecurity and unemployment.
While it is understood that lack of infrastructures could be a good reason, but as it is being said, even abroad, ‘your wealth determines the extent to which you enjoy the white man’s innovations’. But before one is regarded as Nigeria’s apologist, it is without doubt that one basic viral disease, which promotes exodus, is weak or collapsed institutions. The Nigeria laws exist, but are implemented on the basis of nepotism.
Various institutions exist, with intertwined functions and powers, yet without results. Be that as it may, weak institutions were not intended in the acts that established them, nor in their operational codes. Why are the institutions and people weak? The answer to this, and major cause of exodus is our bad, and faulty reward system. Many who leave the shores of Nigeria are engaged in one economic activity or the other before, ‘burning their bridges’, selling their assets to board the ship of ‘no return’. The complaint is often that their expected destination would ‘recognise their worth’ and ‘pay them accordingly’.
The commonest reward in Nigeria is salary. The ‘magnanimous and benevolent’ President Muhammadu Buhari regime had approved a N30,000 (72.15 US Dollar) minimum monthly wage, which many States have either reduced or refused pay. If this is for government employed workers, it is left to your imagination what private sector pays. Small as this salary is, the Nigeria reward system ensures that many workers are still owed several months of salaries for the hard and dedicated work they do. In the United States of America, where many skillful Nigerians run to, wages have been increased to 24.79 USD per hour. In the Philippines, the minimum wage, a reward for hard work, is 537PHP (that is 10.47 USD per day), while in Dubai, a place where Nigeria would be turned into if a Presidential candidate becomes our President, the minimum monthly salary is 4,810AED, that is 1309 USD. Many were taken aback when Comrade Dele Ashiru informed on Channels Television that the salary of an experienced University Professor in Nigeria is rewarded with averagely N416,000 monthlywhile that of his counterpart in the United Kingdom ranges between £68,531 – £113,251 per annum. The conversion is alarming, so let us keep it off record. In Africa, the reward for a University Professor ranges is 129,787,723 UGX ($36768.86) per year. It is therefore strange that only 100,000 Lecturers teach millions of students in all our tertiary institutions.
Related to Salaries are the rewards given to Retirees in Nigeria. After unstained meritorious service, they are treated as Lepers, and subjected to humiliating experiences in order to get feeding allowances. Many States have jettisoned the domesticated laws of Pension schemes and have by their action showed that the reward for dedicated services and hard work is suffering. One has witnessed situations where secondary school students who perform well at Quiz competitions are given paltry sums of money, while the teachers who groomed are unrewarded for their sacrificed hours. Given, these scenarios, how would a Nigeria worker see opportunities to steal, and remain holy, and how would they see avenues to travel out and still remain.
Our society also give high rewards to entertainers than to those who burn the midnight candles to become the skilled human resources the nation really needs. When young Nigerians come forth with great inventions that could help the technological advancement of this nation, ordinary letter of recognition or recommendation is not given, not to talk of scholarships or international internship to horn the skills.
Time and space would not permit me to speak of the dehumanizing rewards given to those who report crimes; or to those who lose their lives trying to save many more in Nigeria. Many widows of slain officers and workers are left to wail in vain, as they seek for the release of their loyal hubby’s legal entitlement. The Nigeria reward system is such that does not recognize human beings as the builder and the most important element in the society. Therefore, the common phrase in Nigeria is ‘monkey dey work, baboon dey chop’. Unfortunately, while those in power are ready to employ a sledge hammer in dealing with erring workers, they are quite reluctant in acknowledging and rewarding excellence in their people.
Let me sympathise with Nigerians over the rude loss of the Super Eagles to the Carthage Eagles. Many of the Boys have since gone back to their clubs, to which they owe more loyalty and dedication. The loss however saves the players and technical crew the heartaches of waiting years to receive the rewards which might have been promised had they brought the trophy home. Or have you forgotten that the 1994 promise to their ‘Seniors’, only got delivered just recently?
In order to prevent the ‘sales’ of our sons and daughters to Ships of modern slavery, it is high time we revisited our reward system in this country, so as to encourage those who do well to do more, and those who do less to aspire for greater excellence.