Dora Akunyili, leadership and performance

In 2006, I examined the relationship between leadership and performance and one of my case studies was NAFDAC under Dora Akunyili. In 2010, I took the subject matter further at an international conference and the NAFDAC-DORA story was a part of the discussion. Today, Professor Akunyili is no more and as a tribute to her, I shall reproduce some of those things I wrote, especially as they relate to Dora and her NAFDAC years.  Before doing that, it is necessary to note that Dora’s public service days have validated two leadership perspectives. In NAFDAC, she validated the great-man theory: that it is the leader that makes things happen in an organization. In the Ministry of Information, she performed, but her performance was not as spectacular as it was in NAFDAC. She therefore validated the contingency theory that the performance of the leader depends a lot on the environment.

The impact of leadership on performance was very obvious in the case of Professor Dora Akunyili and NAFDAC. This case is very outstanding because it was in the public service where generally, nothing works. NAFDAC had been in operation for 7 years before Akunyili came on board in 2001. For those 7 years, Nigerians barely knew of NAFDAC’s existence and its impact on its mandate was infinitesimal. By 2001 for instance, Nigeria had the world record in counterfeit drugs, expired drugs and other unwholesome products which stood at about 70%; made in Nigerian drugs were banned in West African countries; the local pharmaceutical industry was in chaos: the local manufacturers faced declining fortunes while the foreign ones like Boots, ICI, and Sandoz closed shop and 90% of the pure water manufactured in the country was contaminated

Under Dora’s tenure, the picture dramatically changed. The Nigerian pharmaceutical industry returned to the path of growth and prosperity ; the incidence of fake drugs fell to 20% in 2004 and 10% in 2006; the level of unregistered drugs declined from 68% in 2001 to19 % in 2006 loaves of bread with potassium bromate  nose-dived from 95% to 1%; sachets of pure water became relatively safer, Nigeria was no longer a heaven for expired or substandard drugs while Nigerian drugs became accepted in our neighbouring countries. Paradoxically, regulatory officials from those countries that banned our drugs came to learn from NAFDAC/Nigeria while NAFDAC formed and led the West African Drug Regulatory Agency! And whereas heads of government parasitic parastatals were held in disdain in Nigeria, Dora was literarily worshipped in Nigeria, even by those who were on the receiving end of her medicaments-drug manufacturers, importers, retailers and pure-water

 manufacturers. She received up to 200 awards locally and globally; including the Integrity Award by Transparency International in 2004, a year when TI rated Nigeria the 2nd most corrupt country in the world; Special Award For Combating Economic Crimes by the Intl Chamber of Commerce, Commercial Crime Service, London, 2004; Pharmacist of The Year Medal Award by the Intl Pharmaceutical Federation[FIP], 2005; and Honorary Doctor of Law Degree by the University of Bristol, London, 2006. She also graced the cover pages of several international magazines and newspapers including the New York Times[6/7/05] and had the special honour of addressing the US congressional hearing on the Dangers of Internet Medicine[5/9/06] and the singular honour of addressing the European Parliament at its public hearing on “ Counterfeiting Medicines” on 10/4/07 in Brussels; the only African so honoured. These were not arrange awards! 

So effective were her strategies that Nigerians even surrendered substandard products to NAFDAC for destruction-on their own! Why and how did Akunyili succeed? Knowledge of the job: she has an incredible mastery of her area of expertise and speaks/acts with intimidating confidence. Passion and commitment for the job ( and that was why she was not deterred by attempted assassination and death threats); she wept when the NAFDAC laboratory was burnt down and she used every opportunity to speak about her holy war on drug faking. People management: she was able to motivate, inspire and empower her staff to go for gold. One of the tricks was surely her personal example-walking the talk. Integrity: most of the victims of her policies were Igbos-who will always be traders- and she continued to do what had to be done. She had zero tolerance for corruption. Public education and awareness: she used the mass media to great advantage and succeeded in convincing

 Nigerians to shine their eyes whenever foods and drugs were concerned. All NAFDAC activities were made public including names, dates and figures. There was no case of “‘a company located in Kano [name withheld]”

Other reasons for her spectacular performance included compassion/consideration: she was considerate in handling those who fall short of NAFDAC’s high standards. She explained why a given course of action was necessary, gave adequate notice before introducing new regimes and she dialogued directly with the stakeholders. Effective surveillance and enforcement: about N27bn worth of fake and unwholesome products wereby its ubiquitous enforcement unit headed by D. Ejionueme. She was even-handed and did battle with whoever ran foul of the regulations-big or small. 

 She used an ingenuous mix of strategies in the pursuit of her holy war. She took the war to India and Pakistan from where most of the fake drugs were imported and brought the banks into the war (you could not open a drug Letter of Credit without NAFDAC’s knowledge).

Dora Akunyili and NAFDAC produced excellent results that amounted to miracles. The difference was leadership which, operated within the environmental opportunities, threats and constraints to ensure that the right things were being done and that they were being done rightly. May her brave and patriotic soul rest in peace and may others in the public space learn from her exploits.

 Ik Muo