 It is a great pleasure to be here with you, the pioneering razor-sharp cohort of public community. And I must say that just listening to where you're all from and the various talents and skills that are here, even without the training, you know, it's evident that our country is going places. And this program is obviously one that will ensure that that happens just as we heard from Mr. Heidi Mokwede. It's equal to overstate the importance of having well-trained, knowledgeable, and well-motivated public health. Our governments have never been short of ideas, and I'm sure you know that. They're not short of ideas, policies, road maps. We have some of the best written and most insightful policies on practically all issues, but we always fall flat on implementation. The reason is the quality of human resources that we deploy in the public sector. Unlike the private sector, where usually at least the profit motive makes it imperative for them to provide relevant and cutting-edge training to ensure that their staff are equipped and to be able to deliver on targets and KPIs. The public service, on the other hand, will usually take a traditional approach. The result is a bureaucracy that's unable to develop, but more importantly, to deliver on government initiatives and programs. And that's really the problem that we have in the public service. So we have the best programs. In fact, when I came to the office of the vice president in 2015, you know, of course, you know that people write us as a proposal, see us as a thing. One thing I discovered very quickly was that on practically any day there was already government policy or proposal or some incredibly insightful policy already. So there are piles and piles and piles of policies, piles and piles in the public service already. Once public goods, once you can't deliver public goods effectively, development suffers. The commons are all at risk, and the overall quality of life of the people is undermined, which is why I think this program is so crucial. This is exactly what the public service needs. And just as Mr. Ayub Mukherjee has said, this is exactly the point, you know, and this is what informed a lot about discussions at those initial stages of thinking this room. Everyone agrees that this is the problem. We need a bureaucracy that fully appreciates how to think, how to act, how to plan in a world that is completely transformed, especially in the last two decades. Almost every old assumption about commerce, about lifestyle, even about gender issues, political ideology are now being obtained, or at least every day they are not being obtained. They are seriously challenged. Practically everything that we used to take for granted is now being challenged and so on. We have spoke about technology and what it means today. So the old notions of official secrecy. I wrote a book in the 90s on Nigeria Media Law. I devoted the whole chapter for official secrecy. I looked at the book again, I think about two years ago, and I couldn't just believe the nonsense. That is now new knowledge. Because of reading that book, if anyone read it, of course they are doing a revision of it. If anyone read it today, you wonder what part of the world are these people living in. Everything has changed. The sanctity of government information, sanctity of communication is cracking all around. These days it's easier to put even hard copy public information in the public space. Every device has a camera. Electronically stored information can also be hacked. So what are the new protocols that we must now adopt? What are the safeguards that we must put into regulations? What are the rules for using private phones or emails for public policies? How about the images of tech companies and tech-enabled companies? What sort of regulatory environment will grow and not stifle innovation for the lady from central bank? And all the others from regulatory, financial regulatory agencies? What are the rules we need to write? Some may remember the arguments back and forth about regulating cryptocurrency. Sec, as you know, at the time I've drawn up rules about registering cryptocurrency companies. You see, they had a different view. Now that is all extremely healthy because cryptocurrencies were completely new. No one knew where cryptocurrencies were headed. But that is the sort of thing that we're going to face now almost on a daily basis. The world is changing. Things are moving fast. There is nothing that we used to assume before that is going to be the same. So the sorts of individuals in the public service who write the rules and regulations, people like yourselves, must be people who now understand what is new. It means that you must read and I'm going to come to that in a moment. But it also means that you must ready for the changes. You can't sit down and say, well, this is how it is to do it. Or this is what is in books and what is in the rules. We've got to change that. Writing the rules for new phenomena. Stuff that the whole world is trying to grapple with. I'm doing so quickly. I'm with the understanding that there are types and challenges. These are the types of things that today's public officer will face. How about governance issues? Recognizing that ensuring integrity in the workplace is not just a moral issue. It's an existential issue for the country itself. If there is anything that is big, if there is any problem that today, the governments, our governments, what was federal government, what state governments face, it is governance, integrity, corruption, petty corruption, grand corruption. Those are the major problems today. Everyone knows that. Everyone knows that there is a problem. You want to get a passport. You want to get a license. You want to get a contract within the public service. Whatever you're trying to do within the public service. There are obstacles of various kinds. We all know that there is a governance issue. And this is so. This is so. We have all the aspects of the project. How do we deal with these issues? How do we let our organizations know that this is existential? It's not just a moral issue. The mere fact that one or two people can make money within an organization and possibly get away with it like this for a while doesn't mean that that is the end of the matter. We are incrementally and installmentally destroying not just our institutions but our nation. One of the reasons why prosperity is difficult is because of the problems that we have within the public service. Somebody comes with an idea. In fact, I recall that there was a particular person who donated a cancer treatment facility to an agency. It took, when we got here in 2015, the person who was from an embassy was saying to the president that we are now, thank you very much, we have now been able to install the cancer treatment facility after almost six years. Why? Because people who were supposed to put the public office within some of those places were asking. I'm asking for PR as they called it, of the impright. They were saying, you have to give us something here people donating a facility. So all those kinds of things, of course, and this distributor here and there. So for me, one of the central questions that we have to answer, all these central questions that I will pose to you is how do we deal with these issues? How do we deal with these government issues? Because they are fundamental and nothing, nothing gets done unless we're able to deal with some of those kinds of issues. Why do systems anywhere else in the world uphold basic notions of honesty and transparency and integrity? It's because it makes economic sense. Dishonesty undermines the entire enterprise. It's not a moral issue, it's not just a mere moral issue, it's not a religious issue. No, it makes sense. The reason why the Singaporean government decided that they were going to be ruthless on issues of corruption is because they realized that the middle nation would be completely destroyed if they allowed dishonesty within their system, simple. And that's why they moved quickly to become the first world nation. We need to deal with that issue also. How was I understand I'm able to disseminate our rules of governance in such a way as to make it clear that whatever type of breaches of these rules of governance will kill progress. And as the President says, not only if we don't kill corruption, corruption will kill us. I was fascinated by the contents of the classes on strengthening public organizations, especially the question of who sets goals and values and what counts as high performance. And I thought that was really quite interesting because the public service, for the public services is a crucial issue, especially regulatory agencies. Because regulatory agencies generally tend to see their roles as either policemen or revenue generation. Yes, they may have those roles, but their real role must be how to make life easier for the private sector, small and large businesses, individuals who are the ones who create the jobs, they create the wealth, they leave millions out of poverty. The business of the regulator cannot be just to be a policeman or revenue generation and all of that. Your business must be to facilitate all of the private sector, enterprises, businesses and individuals. Because that is where the wealth of the nation lies. People in the public sector, all of us complain, there are no jobs, there are no jobs, there are no jobs, but we are responsible to pull. Because if you don't, if, for example, NAFDA, and they saw from NAFDA, if, for example, it takes a year, and I'm not necessarily criticizing NAFDA, what I'm saying, but if, for example, it takes a year for me to register my product from an entrepreneur, selling beauty products. And it takes me and I've invested all the money I have trying to develop a product. I now develop 10, a range of 10 products, of each product, and it takes me one year to get a NAFDA number, and I don't get the NAFDA number in one year. What happens to a business? What happens to a business? If I don't have a NAFDA number, I can't put my stuff in the supermarket. I've got to be setting up everything. Meanwhile, somebody else, who is off to Ghana, gets the equivalent of the NAFDA number. That person can sell in the supermarket in Nigeria, as sidewalks. So the person who is sitting on the desk in NAFDA who feels that, look, I'm a policeman, or who is making all sorts of demands, must ask the question, how am I damaging the economy of these countries? How am I preventing people who want to make, who want to create jobs? Who, because they're going to make money, will create jobs and create opportunities for everyone? How am I delaying that? How am I stopping that? Those are the sorts of questions that we must ask ourselves. What does high performance mean in your regulatory agency? Is it how many people you stop? Is it how many people you delay? Or is it how many people you are able to ensure, get along and do their business? So we must be facilitators. In the various agencies, we must be facilitators. What we do with our regulatory agencies, you know, we have the MSME clinics, which go all over the states of the Federation. We'll go with the regulatory agencies, all of the regulatory agencies. The whole idea is for the MSMEs to meet with the regulators so that they can complain, tell us about them. Everybody has a huge complaint about something or the other. But the whole point is that we want the regulators to understand that you are a facilitator. You are a business facilitator. If you are not facilitating a business, if you are not making it easier for people to do business, then we'll have a problem. And that's one of the reasons why people complain about our business environment in Nigeria. I met with a group of ladies who do business in Apuja, almost 200 of them. And everybody had a complaint about somebody or the other who is environmental. The next one comes and says you haven't paid this, you haven't paid that. It's difficult to get practically everything. So that kind of environment kills enterprise. And now people are very surprising. They want to do business. And so we ought to be able to support that. So performance must be determined by fidelity to the ultimate values that we pursue. What we want is an economy that is robust and prosperous. The only way by which we should be able to enjoy the performance of regulatory agencies is how are you faithful to those values? Are you developing the sort of society we want? Are you developing the sort of economy you want? Or what exactly is it that you are doing? So finally, if I may offer just one piece of advice and it is really about self-development. About self-development. I think that, you know, most people from how part of the world, from Nigeria, that is like the idea of certificates and getting some education. Everybody likes to, you know, display certificates and all that. But these things are merely a process. The best people that you'll ever find anywhere in the world are people who are continuously educating themselves. People who are continuously reading. Reading is crucial especially today because things are changing at lightning speed. Anyone who is not reading whatever you've learned from the AI-GPSG course. In another couple of months you've got to be always surprised to find that there are all sorts of new ideas and new phenomena. All sorts of new things that are developing. So constant engagement, constant self-development is so important. And that simply comes from reading. And today there are all sorts of ways of reading. All sorts of ways. In fact, I don't know how many people have that app. There's one app that helps you to read very, very quickly. I mean, it summarizes things for those who want to be able to read a 400-page book in 15 minutes. It gives you a sense of what is in the book. So at least you can keep reading. So I'd like to thank a dear friend, Aik for and of course his dear wife also for all the work that they've done. First there is most people who do the sort of work that they're doing. So it's a service to society, social enterprise of one sort or the other. Always able to discuss themselves from it. So if you have a land or a list of some sort, things happen. You are not a part of it, you are not invested in it in the way that this couple are invested in it. And I really want to thank you for commenting on that. That you are not just interested in the idea that you set up a organization. You are working day and night looking at these issues and trying to do the very best you can. And especially for the public service of Nigeria and everyone who if you work hard with poor funds and with the very poor and all that, I think you always feel that maybe God at least will reward you for it. I'm not so sure how one feels maybe I'm wrong but I feel the same way but I must say that all of this work is service to God for as long as we are serving man and we are improving the quality of people we are improving the quality of governments serving God is very very unique and exceptional. So I want to thank you and commend you all for that. And also to thank the school of government and the Oxford University for all of what's all of this and to say to the ladies and gentlemen who are here that I wish you all the very best in the coming years and I'm frankly waiting to see all of the great impact that you will make. I don't think we need to have the whole of the public service only a few people will make this difference so long as the few people are committed to making the difference I'm quite sure that you will make the difference. Thank you all very much but I also want to commend the IU Mogo Foundation for ensuring that we have an all-female for a good way of compensating or to send something soon to the women and my wife in particular for the loss of the amendments at the Matala Assembly I thought that was really quite a terrible thing to do so I'm looking for something some silver lining somewhere and I think this is really nice thank you all very much