By Abdullahi Jamaa
Wajir is a county of 661,941 people, six constituencies and 31 electoral wards; it has a workforce that is approaching 4,000 men and women. If you put this into a closer perspective it means Wajir has six employees serving every 1000 people or 667 serving every constituency or 129 employees serving each electoral ward.
In high productive counties elsewhere in the rich world this workforce may look lean and manageable; but to the standards of Wajir where majority survive on less than a dollar a day or cannot afford to have three meals a day, this size of a workforce is a huge burden that needs to be dealt with.
Although the current workforce as it stands is a vestige of the former governor, the problem of overstaffing will mean a legacy or a regression of the incumbent. If the governor continues to spend huge amounts of money on salaries and other administrative costs, then he may not manage and handle an efficient and effective public sector.
Wajir currently needs skilled technical workers in key sectors like health, water, education and livestock. As currently constituted county employees that have the necessary skills and techniques are less than 10 percent of the workforce. There is no doubt therefore that laborers inherited from the previous government will escalate inefficiency to a new low-level if the current administration continues to embrace the policy of hiring my nice and nephews.
The recent action by the new governor to do a physical headcount is a welcome note, this is a good action that if done in good faith and sincerity will reveal and help address the rot in our public sector. The scale of wastage of time and human resources is evidently slowing the fruits of devolution. The impact of a bloated workforce is too huge for a poor county like Wajir which has so many staffs who have nothing to do in our offices.
It is therefore the right time for the county government of Wajir to reduce and clean its workforce, train, pay well and motivate them to work for the people. A comprehensive and holistic public sector restoration is required in order to shield the county from hemorrhaging cash. The situation at the moment is grim with so many ghost workers who have never appeared in any office taking huge amount of salaries.
Redeployment should be done with utmost transparency to avoid victimization of patriotic county employees. A well-rounded workforce is key to maintaining the right balance of public satisfaction. Employment doesn’t stop at recruitment, it’s not an event, it’s a continuous process that requires an invigorated checks and balances.
County employees have to go through a system of orientation to instill work ethics, to explain the expectations of the public they are serving and above all to instill a sense of belonging. Many county offices remain disorganized lacking the impression of a public facility. Staff usually report late and leave early with little or no supervision. It is therefore the responsibility of the executive and top departmental managers to lead by example and serve the public with dignity and respect.
I hope that the current governor has the stomach, political wherewithal and willingness to streamline government functions by employing more high skilled persons, deploy an efficient lean workforce and overhaul the public sector so as to reduce the burden of paying more for less.
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Abdullahi Jamaa is a freelance journalist and a communication consultant. You can contact him at jamaa.abdullahi@gmail.com
