CIPM President calls for people-centred transformation of Nigeria’s public service

At the Ogun State 2026 Public Service Day Celebration Lecture, held in Abeokuta on Thursday, August 13, 2026, Mallam Ahmed Ladan Gobir, President and Chairman of the Governing Council of the Chartered Institute of Personnel Management of Nigeria (CIPM), urged a complete overhaul of Nigeria's public service system. His speech, titled “Transforming the Public Service: Advancing Innovation, Accountability, Participation and Inclusion,” emphasized the need for a people-centered approach to governance. Gobir, who is also a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel Management of Nigeria (FCIPM) and a Fellow of the Nigerian Law Society (fnli), addressed public and civil service leaders, scholars, organized labor representatives, private-sector figures, and other stakeholders during the event hosted at the Cultural Centre, Kuto, Abeokuta. Gobir argued that the core mission of public service extends far beyond administrative tasks such as processing documents. Instead, he contended that the true measure of government effectiveness lies in how well it improves the daily lives of citizens. He stated that citizens interact with government primarily through the quality of public services they receive, describing government as an abstract concept and public service as the tangible experience. This perspective led him to urge public institutions to shift their focus from tracking activities and procedures to evaluating the real-world impact of their work on communities. Innovation, according to Gobir, should not be limited to digital upgrades of outdated systems. He warned against merely digitizing flawed practices, arguing that technology alone cannot fix deeply rooted inefficiencies. Instead, he called for a rethinking of existing procedures to ensure they deliver genuine public value. He encouraged public-sector leaders to question whether current methods still serve the public interest and to design processes based on citizens' needs rather than bureaucratic ease. Accountability, Gobir explained, is essential for maintaining public trust. He framed it as the "mathematics of trust," emphasizing that institutions must demonstrate competence, fairness, transparency, consistency, and responsiveness to gain and retain citizen confidence. Meaningful participation, he added, should not be a post-decision ritual but an integral part of decision-making. Citizens, he said, should have the opportunity to shape policies that directly affect them. Inclusivity was another key focus of his message. Gobir stressed that public services must be accessible to all, regardless of socioeconomic status, geography, technology access, or demographics. He pointed out that availability does not equate to accessibility, warning that a service is only truly inclusive if it reaches and benefits everyone. Human resources were identified by Gobir as the cornerstone of public-sector transformation. He asserted that no organization can evolve beyond the skills and capacities of its workforce. He advocated for strategic talent management, leadership development, performance evaluation, and continuous capability-building. Emphasizing that the greatest national infrastructure is not physical but human, he urged public-sector organizations to cultivate environments where competence, integrity, innovation, and excellence are recognized and rewarded. Gobir also acknowledged Ogun State’s ambitious development goals, encouraging the state to adopt a transformative model that prioritizes responsive, effective, and citizen-focused institutions. He outlined four key imperatives for this transformation: innovation must reshape methods, accountability must redefine organizational culture, participation must alter the relationship between government and citizens, and inclusion must reform the structure of public service. Leadership, he concluded, plays a vital role in realizing these changes, as institutions do not transform themselves, they are transformed by the people who lead them.