Sam Nwokolo writes that notwithstanding his huge frame, accentuated by a chubby cheek, Secretary to Government of the Federation (SGF), Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, has manoeuvred his weight effortlessly in the busy theatre called Abuja to record modest, but commendable accomplishments in Aso Rock.
Every national leadership looks for the kind of men it needs to drive policies. Some succeed and deliver on policy objectives, while some fail but contend with crises and mistrust among cabinet members. And once there is this problem of mistrust, the consequence is incoherence in the machinery of governance, leading to lost focus and policy somersaults.
On the other hand, when a leader succeeds in selecting the right team that buys into his visions, programmes and plans, he is less likely to have saboteurs within his cabinet. Consequently, he achieves his objectives. Which is why some presidents love to retain some elements in the cabinet for a long time without thinking of doing away with them. For instance, why would a President Goodluck Jonathan defy all manoeuvres by some politicians to drop his vice, Mohammed Sambo, in his second term project? For the uninitiated, Sambo has been loyal and has conducted his office peaceably to that of the president. So the moral strength and valid reasons for dropping Sambo were not just there.
President Jonathan’s chief overseer of government operations, the SGF, Anyim Pius Anyim, fits right into the mould of former United States President George H. W. Bush’s Chief of Staff, John Sununu, on account of his mastery of public administration and the intricate art of balancing policy priorities and political intrigues. It takes courage, vision, wisdom ability to build trust, couple alliances, build consensus and hold trust and keep track of possible sabotage as well as stick to timelines to be able to get the presidency, ministries, departments and agencies work in line with government’s objectives, and meet with the expectation of the ruling party and the public.
That was what made Sununu tower above even Bush’s vice, Dick Cheney, during their tenure at the White House (1988 to 1992). Mainstream Washington media know Sununu, celebrate him and adore his intellectual prowess and strength of conviction in defending Bush’ policies, especially the Operation Desert Storm that liberated Kuwait after the little kingdom was annexed in August 1990 by Saddam Hussein (now the late) of Iraq. Would Washington go it alone whether Europe and the UN Security Council give approval or not? More than Bush or Cheney or the fiery secretary of state then, James Baker, only Sununu, the professor of aeronautics, was doing the talking, defending Bush’s stance on why Iraq must first quit Kuwait before any other talks. Sununu’s absence at any strategy meeting was felt because his ideas are unassailable, even when other cabinet members had run out of clues.
Like Sununu, like Anyim
Anyim has, in similar ways, demonstrated how beneficial it could be having a trusted ally in moving policies forward. As chief supervisor of government operations, he knows the goings-on in government’s many deals with development partners locally and internationally. He understands the goings-on in federal ministries and departments, the politics in-between government programmes and opposition behaviours towards them. He is the backroom man of the president, his chief strategist, and having been a Senate president, he knows better how to fault or gauge the National Assembly (NASS) on issues of friction between the executive and the legislature.
The SGF knows as much as the Vice President and the Auditor General of the Federation or the Chief Justice of the Federation how NASS laws affect the operations of government, how the spending patterns of the states and the local government areas impact on the overall goodness or otherwise of Nigeria, and also the consequence of governors’ extravagance and indiscretion in the discharge of their service to the nation. So whenever Anyim speaks, it is only facts, and matter-of-factly information that can only be expected.
This derives largely from the onerous responsibilities of his office. He serves as secretary to the National Council of States (NCS), the Federal Executive Council (FEC) and other statutory councils which are chaired by the president. He sits as the scribe of any statutory council dealing with political, constitutional and socio-economic matters. He also sits as secretary to tribunals, commissions and panels conducting national security and public safety matters, national honours, prerogative of mercy and protocol matters.
The office of the SGF channels papers and directives of the president to the appropriate sub-authorities, Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs), etc. It also processes requests for overseas duty tours and conferences, coordinates the appointment of heads of statutory bodies, commissions and agencies by the president.
Anyim deals with matters relating to conditions of service of political office-holders, inter-governmental affairs and relations with states and local governments, including liaison with secretaries to states governments. His office equally allocates accommodation to political office-holders, among other stipulated and emergency functions. This makes the SGF’s office about one of the busiest bureaucratic hubs in government operations.
Yet it is admirable as one visitor stated after recently visiting the SGF’s office that: “I did not waste much time as I thought before I was attended to.”
The exigencies of Anyim’s office meant that he is almost like the satellite of the government, even defending its programmes and policies before fellow party men and opposition parties.
Impactful service
With his savvy, unobtrusive mien, Anyim has strutted the present regime’s trying periods and ably brokered truce and eased tension. During the 2012 petrol subsidy removal agitations, labour movements paralysed the nation literally. The tortuous negotiations that followed was unprecedented in the history of civil society doggedness to force government reverse to the N65 pump price of premium motor spirit (PMS), popularly known as petrol. With government insisting on full removal of subsidy because of the activities of smugglers and labour arguing that the masses should not pay for government’s failure to control the borders and arrest oil thieves, there was a deadlock. Full subsidy removal then would have left the pump price of petrol at N140 or above. Anyim ably mediated the negotiations until government and labour reached a compromise at N97.
Anyim also effectively mediated in the electricity workers’ strike that followed implementation of the Electricity Reform Roadmap. The office of the SGF and the Ministry of Mines and Power then under Barth Nnaji made sure that the new owners of whatever was then Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) paid off all the severance benefits of the workers. That no new strike threat has come from that sector to tamper with the elections was as a result of Anyim and Nnaji’s efforts to settle all the arears of former NEPA staff. Anyim has also been active in mobilising support for his boss in all parts of the country.
Transformation Ambassadors of Nigeria (TAN) chieftain, Longers Anyanwu, says “Anyim is a vibrant man whose depth of knowledge is arresting. He is a man who understands Nigeria’s condition as much as the president does. His last assignment as Senate president gave him the edge and he has represented the South East very well in the government.”
Anyim is already acting like an elder statesman even at his relatively young age. He effectively coordinated Nigeria’s recent centenary celebration preaching in supersonic patriotism: “Nigeria did not become one by accident”. He vehemently absolves the government of influencing or teleguiding the work of the recent national conference which his office effectively supervised.
While in the Senate, he demonstrated wisdom, steering the NASS away from needless confrontations with then President Olusegun Obasanjo.
Obviously, Anyim who turned 54 last February 19, seems, by all calculations, to have accelerated so fast in the lane of leadership and statesmanship. Perhaps luck or destiny, but more a bit of prudence has preserved him this long on the miry surface of Nigerian politics.
