I stood on this floor not up to 5 years ago when I had my first address with the staff. I remember very vividly the institution that I met, and the many things that have changed in that time.
In the three years before I took office, there were five people that were Executive Secretaries in NIPC. There were three substantive Executive Secretaries and two that were acting. So, in many ways I was not expected to last very long. That is on the NIPC side. Coming from investment banking as I was, a lot of my clients, a lot of my colleagues, given the person that I was, also did not expect me to last this long. A client told me that they had taken bets about how long I was going to last in the public sector, because they did not think my style would work well in the public sector.
I remember that in many meetings at the beginning, there were always issues about promotion, there was the 2013 promotion that was unresolved and there were people who joined NIPC in 2009, 2010 and 2011 that had never sat for any promotion exams. There were no exams in 2014, 2015 and until I arrived in November 2016. There had been no promotion exams for a while.
When there was talk of welfare, it was about a N200 million staff housing loan scheme that was not funded; even though it had been approved, there was no money that was put aside for it.
The Pioneer Status Incentive was on an administrative suspension; the biggest source of revenue for NIPC was suspended on account of allegations of abuse and there were all sorts of issues.
I did not appreciate this at the time, but obviously I have a better experience and understanding of it now: NIPC’s history was one that was chequered with what I will call volatile industrial relations, because the supervising Ministry, the Ministry of Labour and the Presidency had been involved in resolving industrial disputes since 2014. It did not start with me.
I found that the focus of NIPC was largely on Pioneer Status and arranging Business Forums in many countries. The engagements in terms of the style of investment promotion was largely reactive. We went to where we were invited to, spoke about the topics that they gave us to speak about and as long as they asked us to speak.
I remember the first time I saw the Compliance and Transparency awards and NIPC was rated 116 out of 137 agencies, I did not know what it was then.
NIPC’s place in terms of the compliance ranking, I am very proud of. We moved from 90th in 2016 to 2nd in 2019 and 2020. I believe the next awards will happen next week, and hopefully NIPC will retain its 2nd place position, may be NIPC will even do better.
There are many accolades that NIPC has got and respect that Nigeria has earned on account of NIPC’s work. I am particularly proud of the fact that Nigeria is now regarded as a thought leader in the reform of international investment agreements, because of NIPC’s work in reviewing our bilateral investment treaties. For that reason, NIPC is often invited to speak on the subject at international events. I have been referred to as Dr Sadiku, Prof Sadiku and the like at such events and I have sat in forums where people from all over the world cited the Nigeria-Morocco BIT that NIPC negotiated following the reforms as an example of a “balanced new generation investment treaty that developing countries and emerging countries have been encouraged to emulate”.
We have started profiling investment opportunities, trying to build a modern database of investable opportunities in Nigeria. Obviously there is still a lot of work that needs to be done.
We started the idea of the OSIC Lab, finished the reforms of the Pioneer Status Incentives, identified 20 countries of strategic importance, upgraded the website and have a fancy database of State Investment Promotion Agencies.
From a financial perspective, obviously NIPC staff have done very well. If I dwell on the changes in NIPC in relation to welfare, I am very proud of what we have done in the last five years.
I am delighted that we put some institutional things in place including approval for NIPC’s Schemes of Service; approval from Salaries and Wages for allowances that NIPC has had literally since the beginning that had never been approved.
Also, we have a Group Life Insurance Policy which provides for staff who are lost in service to give their families three times their earnings.
We introduced a Productivity Allowance which was changed to Peculiar Allowance by Salaries and Wages. It was originally approved for 50% of quarterly remuneration. We went from a N200 million unfunded staff housing loan scheme to a N1.2 billion Staff Housing Loan Scheme, of which N1.1 billion has been disbursed.
We have a Post Service Benefit Scheme for which N500 million has been set aside, but the work of putting that in place needs to be completed.
From the governance perspective, NIPC has earned the respect of many, for its compliance with its obligations under IDITRA, FOI Act and the Fiscal Responsibility Act.
My time in NIPC has certainly been interesting. I will read to you a quote that I stumbled upon in 2009: “Never regret a day in your life, good days give you happiness, bad days give experience, the worst days give lessons and the best days give memories.
In my time in NIPC, I have had many good days, and I have had many best days. I have had more bad days than I would like, but I have learnt a lot from the worst days. I would like to thank all of you for whatever role you played in the journey of my time in NIPC.
Excerpts from transcript of the speech made by Ms Yewande Sadiku, ES/CEO of NIPC, in her final meeting with staff on Wednesday, 22 September, 2021
