In an effort at public sector reform (to down size and right size Liberia’s bloated government), the Chairman of the Governance Commission, Dr. Amos Sawyer, has recommended the elimination of Assistant Ministerial positions in government Ministries. Dr. Sawyer also recommended the establishment of the Principal Administrative office, PAO, as one of the next steps in enhancing the professionalization and merit-based character of Liberia’s public sector.Dr. Sawyer made the recommendations when he served as keynote speaker at the launch of the Public Sector Modernization Project held on February 6, 2015 at the Foreign Ministry in Monrovia. He made several other pertinent recommendations geared toward public sector reform in Liberia including:
a) The establishment of a Public Service Commission that will take our public sector reform agenda beyond the civil service;b) Redoubling our capacity building, especially human capacity building initiatives to service our growing public sector needs. Improve LIPA’s capacity building efforts giving it full attention, and also consider the convening of a national conference on corporate governance; and c) The need to break down the silos in our reform agenda created by circumstance which include the nature of donor interests, the struggles over turf and the nature of the reform environment, among others.
As government implements it decentralization plan beginning with the deconcentration strategy, calls for the reduction in transaction and operational costs have been paramount. President Sirleaf has, on numerous occasions, urged heads of government functionaries to coordinate and cooperated in cost sharing activities to reduce operational costs. Dr. Sawyer has also added his voice to the call.
“We must do our best to reduce the transaction cost of gaining results. Turf struggles, turnovers in senior public sector positions, delays including those from the side of our partners all account for high transaction costs. A related challenge has to do with Liberians taking greater ownership of the reform agenda and programs in conformity with the Paris Declaration and all its amplifications. As we proceed with the successful implementation of this public sector modernization project and other reforms which are ongoing, we must lock in the process of transformation and this administration will consolidate a strong legacy.”
As the well acknowledge driving force behind Liberia’s decentralization plan, Dr. Amos Sawyer, sees Public Sector Modernization as paramount to decentralization - addressing and effectively managing the machinery through which public goods and services are delivered. He noted that past and ongoing studies on Liberia’s governance performance have all pointed to “flawed public sector as a major contributor if not the most important contributor to state failure and persistent underdevelopment.”
Research analysis and other studies on factors that have help shape Liberia’s continuous state of underdevelopment show the dire need to address Liberia’s state capacity.According to Dr. Sawyer, “the paucity and weakness of state institutions and the inadequacy of human capacity ranked at the top of the list of factors”:
“In 2011 the Governance Commission and the then Ministry of Planning and Economic Affairs undertook a Retrospective in preparation for the National Vision Conference of 2012. The Retrospective was the base scientific study that sought to provide foundations for sound and realistic scenario construction of possible futures for Liberia. Data informing the Retrospective was taken from at least 6 studies of various sectors ranging from population and demographic dynamics to the economy and political and governance processes to Liberia’s social processes and educational system. Among the key questions asked were, “Where is Liberia coming from? What factors have shaped Liberia’s past—leading us to where we are today? The Retrospective analysis produced some very important findings. Out of 66 variables identified and analyzed in addressing the question, the most important factor was STATE CAPACITY.”
The second and third phases of the public sector modernization project intends to support some of the core areas of civil servicereform which have been carved out of the broader civil service reform agenda, and the broader public sector reform program. According to Dr. Sawyer, Phase 2 is the Improvement of pay management by introducing a civil service remuneration structure that is equitable and transparent,and the strengthening of payroll management to ensure effective payroll controls and reduced risk of fraud. Phase 3 seeks to address the mandates, organizational structures, internal institutional arrangements, business processes and human resource capacity challenges of select ministries, agencies and commissions.
Dr. Sawyerobserved that the Sirleaf government, over the last ten years, has made considerable achievements in public sector reform. Those that immediately come to mind include:a) the establishment of the General Auditing Commission, b) the Public Procurement and Concessions Commission, c) the Liberia Anti-Corruption Commission, LACC, d) new policies and soon-to-be-new legislation on land rights, e) the creation of the Liberia Revenue Authority, f) the new Ministry of Finance and Development Planning, g) a new Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection; h) The passage into law of a new Code of Conduct—after six years of efforts, among others.
Dr. Sawyer however, wants the links among these reform achievements to be strengthened.
At the same time, Dr. Sawyer has described the Governance Commission a good collaborator in the national reform agenda because it is at the intersection of policy and program design, and policy and program implementation. The GC has a mandate to look more closely at government functionaries and institutional performance, reinforcing each other and delivering as one, now and over time.Dr. Sawyer recalled the similarities of reform agendas of Governance Reform Commission and that of the current Governance Commission.
“Beginning at the beginning, when you, Madam President, were the Chairperson of the Governance Reform Commission, the commission’s approach to reform recognized the importance of the various parts of the reform agenda from a systemic perspective. Decentralization, legal and political reform, public service reform, economic governance reform and the building of a system of public integrity were all considered multiple sides of the same coin. And they all take their inspiration from our National Vision which in turn inspired our strategy for national reconciliation and transformation. This perspective remains fixed in the GC’s approach today so that in our partnerships we try to be helpful as we remind us all that building institutional synergies, building human resource capacity and learning the lessons from past initiatives are imperatives if reforms are to be sustained.”
Dr. Sawyer gave a historic overview of public sector reform in Liberia, dating as far back to the 1960s. Some, he said, were successful whiles others were not. For him, the Governance and Economic Management Program (GEMAP) put in place in 2005—2006 was the most successful, and of a slightly different genre than the others.
“Its intention was to kick-start financial management and governance systems that were being created. I might be wholly wrong but it seems to me that lessons learned from its limited success has led to the formulation and implementation of what I believe to be among the most successful capacity building support programs today—that is Governance and Economic Management Support program. I am of the view that GEMS is matched only by the Peace Corps among the successful USAID support interventions in Liberia that readily come to mind.”
However, the success of the public sector modernization project will depend upon how it succeeds in building institutional synergies, building human resource capacity and how it heeds the lessons of the past.
