Local Government and
Development Studies (LGDS) is a unique discipline being offered at Ahmadu Bello
University, Zaria and IBB University, Lapai. This course is a multidisciplinary
one that arms students with skills cutting across different fields of human
endeavor. It is the melding of two
independent but mutually reinforcing disciplines that have been noted to affect
the lives of people at the grassroots.
It is the unification of Local Government Administration as an academic
discipline and Development Studies. Whilst the former has been around for quite
a while, the latter is a budding discipline that only very few universities
around the world offer.
Within Nigeria, universities offering Bachelor’s
degree courses related to LGDS include; Obafemi Awolowo University; (Local Government Administration),
University of Nsuka (Local Government and
Public Administration) and a host of other polytechnics offering National
and Higher National Diplomas in Local Government Administration. At Masters Level,
University of Jos offer M.Sc. Political Economy
and Development Studies, University of Nsuka, Benue State University as well
as the Nigeria Defense Academy (NDA) offer Masters
in Development Studies, University of Ibadan Offer Masters in Sustainable Development, while University of Lagos Offer
Masters in Development Finance.
Ahmadu Bello University also offers Masters
in Local Government Studies, Masters
in Public Administration and Local Government, Masters in Development
Communication and Masters in Rural
Development.
At Ahmadu Bello University where I got my training,
the discipline is seriously enriched with courses from Political Science, Public
Administration, Development Economics, Law, Geography, Finance and Accounting, Business
Administration, Management, Sociology, Operational Research, Municipal
Administration, Environmental and Sustainability Studies and lots more. The
course exposes students to the practice of drawing knowledge and skills from a
multiplicity of disciplines to solve societal problems. The idea is to breed
all-round administrators and facilitators that will provide the much needed
expertise lacking in Nigeria’s , and indeed Africa’s, governance arrangement—especially at the level
of government closest to the people—Local Government.
This does not by any means imply that holders of this
qualification are condemned to work only in Local Government Secretariats and
their paraphernalia, it rather suggest that the first and most appropriate
place for such holders to work and effectively contribute their know-how will
be Local Governments, Local and
International Donor Agencies, Non-Governmental
Organizations (NGOs) and Community Based Organizations (CBOs). However,
like any other academic discipline, holders of a B.A LGDS degree are at liberty to explore as much fields as
possible and creatively apply their knowledge to the betterment of any
organization where they find themselves either by accident or by design.
It is, however, rather unfortunate and saddening that
at the labour market, Recruiters are either clueless as to the content and
relevance of the discipline or they are narrow-minded with regards to the
nature and character of possessors of such a qualification.
Yours sincerely, the author of this paper, have been
fortunate enough to be privy to interview sessions where the interviewer,
simply because he had no knowledge about the existence of such a discipline,
had decided to turn down the applicant, even though the latter had performed
above per during aptitude test.
Do I really blame such interviewers? Partly yes and
partly no! The reason for my equivocal position is premised upon my objective
observation of the matter and I marshal my argument on the following grounds.
There are certain variables that I have come to observe
to be responsible for the wrong perception and poor reception of the discipline.
For the sake of simplicity, I have attempted to categories these variables as follows here-under
.
There are variables that are associated with the Issuer
of the qualification as well as those pertaining to the Holders, these I refer
to as the Supply-Side of the matter.
On the other hand, there are issues that are specifically related to the Recruiter,
these I refer to as the Demand-Side of
the matter. I will expatiate thus;
The Supply-Side; as mentioned earlier, this has to do with two
characters— the Issuer and the Holder.
The Issuer; this refers to the school or institution providing
the training and awarding (issuing) grades and certification to students on the
completion of a stipulated period of study having met certain rigorous requirements. The questions for
this group relates to;
·
Whether the Issuer
had been duly accredited by bodies of competent jurisdiction to offer the
course;
·
Whether the Issuer
have the requisite qualified manpower to provide the training;
· Whether the Issuer
is well equipped with the necessary infrastructure to deliver the training;
·
Whether the
Issuer is maintaining acceptable standards in training the student
· Whether the Issuer is making awareness efforts towards alerting the outside world about the availability of new courses and disciplines; and
·
Whether the
Issuer is constantly reviewing its curriculum to keep up with a fast changing
world.
All of these will determine, partly, the quality of
knowledge and skills possessed by the student.
The Holder; this refers to the student, the one who has acquired
the training and carries or hold a certificate of competency in the discipline.
By default, he must have meet all requirements including having his primary and
post primary papers cleared and must have also passed all his semester courses
to earn the award of the certificate. The concern for this group thus includes;
- Whether the Holder had been grounded enough to fully appreciate the content and relevance of the training;
- Whether the Holder had been attentive enough during training in acquiring the skills taught;
- Whether the Holder had been exposed enough to the level of applicability of his/her knowledge and skills;
- Whether the Holder has been making genuine effort at self-improvement and development; and
- Whether the Holder is creative enough to apply his/her skills in fields traditionally thought to be unrelated to Governance and Development.
The Demand-Side; this angle has to do with those who are supposed to
engage the Holder, and they include characters such as (interviewers, employers
and their various agents and agencies) which I may simply call the Recruiter.
The Recruiter is the one who, to a very large extent, determine whether a
candidate is fit or otherwise to occupy any given office. As such, they are
very important in shaping the fate of Holders of any qualification. Pertaining to
our subject matter, issues with the Recruiter revolves around the questions
of;
·
Whether the Recruiter
has any knowledge of the content and relevance of the course and indeed other
novel courses springing up all over the world;
·
Whether the
Recruiter understands the need for diversity in a work environment;
·
Whether the
Recruiter is creative and bold enough to experiment and venture into the
unknown; and
·
Whether the
Recruiter is open-minded enough not to subject the Holder to any form of bias,
discrimination or stereotypy.
On the Supply-Side,
although the Issuer has the responsibility of ensuring that the Holder is well
groomed with the necessary and relevant knowledge and skills that will make
proper functioning within a modern economy possible, the onus is on the Holder to
ensure that he/she is well grounded in the field such that he can stand
shoulder-to-shoulder with anybody coming from other academic discipline
including the much revered fields of Accounting, Engineering, Law, Medicine etc.
To do this, the Holder must commit himself to Continuous Professional Education
(CPE)
Thus, Issues related to the Holder are equally as
important as those related to the Issuer as it is the combined effect of these
that will ensure that at the mention of LGDS people will pay attention. Where
the issuer is found wanting in its ability to transfer the proper training to
the Holder, the Holder is said to be ‘half-baked’, and where the holder is
unable to defend his/her qualification in the eyes of the world, the Issuer is
said to be of a poor standard.
On the Demand-Side,
the Recruiter must make genuine efforts at updating their knowledge pertaining
the growing numbers of new disciplines evolving everywhere in the world and
finding out how such novel discipline may be relevant for their own purpose and
benefit. Attempts should be made to keep tab with the changing trends at the
academia so as to know what to expect from the Holder in terms of his/her
training, knowledge and skill.
Change, they say is the only constant phenomenon in
the world and if you don’t grab it by the hand, it will grab you by the throat.
The changing nature of academic disciplines going on today is worth paying
attention to. Any Recruiter who decides to close their eyes to the development
happening in the academia does so at their own peril, as young and bright
brains are being churned out from universities with competencies in novel areas
of human endeavor unthought-of before. They are well groomed with modern tools
and techniques relevant for engendering progress and society benefits nothing
by discriminating against them on account of their areas of discipline.
The rate at which my colleagues are losing employment
opportunities both in the private and public sector is an indication of the
wrong and poor perception of the purpose, content, and relevance of LGDS. Most Recruiters
automatically assume that they will not earn value by recruiting an LGDS
graduate. They believe that such a graduate is only trained to work in Local
Government, and this is wrong.
The value of a B.A LGDS degree, in all honesty, is not
very high out there. This is not because of any fault of the Holder or that of
the Issuer per se, but simply because the Recruiter have decided to stick with
the tried-and-true thereby shutting their ears, eyes and mind to anything new.
Thus, although not their fault, Issuers and Holders must rise to the occasion
by deploying every skill at their disposal to either force or persuade the
Recruiter to change their current stance. And this requires a lot of tact,
resources and commitment (which I shall discuss in a later paper). Until
something deliberate is done to reverse this trend, it is most likely that
colleagues of this great discipline will continue to carry long faces because
of the ill treatment they suffer from Recruiters
.
Ours is a very interesting discipline and deserves to
be properly placed and recognized outside the four walls of the Ivory Towers.
If the rest of the world has decided to go blind and not give us our due, we
must become miracle workers and heal them of their disease.
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