By Rotimi Fasan
IBE Kachikwu, the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources and Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, does not come  across as a politician. Even as a long time player in the oil industry his resume proclaims him more of an intellectual or a  technocrat rather than an oil merchant and, even less, a power monger. Perhaps but for his appointment as minister, he would have been content to remain in relative obscurity as one of the more knowledgeable persons in an industry with more than its full complement of hacks and fraudsters.

But following his appointment as minister, there was no way he could avoid the scrutiny of the public. Yet, he appeared to have slipped into his new role of minister with much ease. He speaks fast, if soft spoken; seems in a hurry to achieve results and comes across as very business-like. All of these are qualities that should lead one to expect more from him by way of conduct than one would a typical politician of the Nigerian variety.

Kachikwu

Which is also not the same thing as saying that Mr. Kachikwu could completely dispense with the restrain that public office imposes on people. In other words, even a technocrat in a political office who finds himself/herself on the spot and has to take a stand must learn to do so in as agreeable a manner as possible. The trite saying that one could disagree without being disagreeable still has some merit to it after all. But this is one lesson that obviously eluded Mr. Kachikwu when he spoke with journalists after a meeting at the presidential lodge in Abuja last week. The minister had been questioned as to why after all government efforts long queues of motorists and others waiting for many hours at fuel stations still remained. His response could only have come from a potentate, one assured of his importance as any other person could surely be who didn’t consider himself answerable to the public.

Mr. Kachikwu’s was a bizarre response, a frustrated outburst that might have revealed more about what he himself thinks both of his input and place in the present administration than he cares to admit. He appears overwhelmed by his ministerial duties or so his utterances appear to say. Asked when he thought the long queues might end, Mr. Kachikwu said Nigerians could expect no respite earlier than the end of May. It would have been okay if he had stopped at that. But this otherwise amiable man with apparently an elephant-size ego said he had not been trained to be a magician and that Nigerians ought to be thankful for the amount of fuel he had made available in his short spell as minister. Going by Nigerian standard, at least the standard put in place by public officers who demand special recognition for responsibilities they freely promised to execute, Ibe Kachikwu’s comment is by no means unprecedented. It’s indeed very much in character. Except that once in a while one expects much more from some Nigerians given their training and general comportment than others. In spite of his recent blunder one would still want to see Mr. Kachkwu in this light.

When however they pretend to be so-called servant-leaders as one former governor liked to be seen, leaders serving the people who put them in office, Nigerian politicians often expect to be praised for their execution of the most routine responsibilities. It was with such eye for public recognition that Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, President Goodluck Jonathan’s Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, once reported that most of them serving the former president were hypertensive. Much worse than they met it, is it any wonder that the Nigerian state is today like a hypertensive derelict?

No, one doesn’t need to be a trained magician to know that Mr. Kachikwu couldn’t have been having a ball all this while as minister of a volatile sector like petroleum resources. He has been kept hard on his toes by the unceasing scarcity of fuel and allied problems in the energy sector for most of the months he’s been in office. His honest effort to ‘unbundle’ NNPC in what he thought would be the right solution to some of the challenges of the oil industry led to a shut-down of the sector by oil workers just weeks ago. He hardly needs to make a roof-top proclamation of his efforts before Nigerians know he has not been sleeping. But he is not a novice to this sector and must be aware of what he was letting himself into when he accepted the offer of ministerial appointment. He therefore can’t afford to be offhanded and arrogant in his response to honest questions from Nigerians who have borne the brunt of the ugly energy crisis that has bedevilled the country for many months now.

He may be a so-called junior minister, responsible to Muhammadu Buhari who as president also doubles as the substantive minister of Petroleum Resources- Kachikwu it may be argued is subordinate to Buhari (as are other ministers, let’s not forget), but he is ultimately in charge of the Petroleum Resources Ministry. Even when Nigerians have continually called Ministers of State ‘junior ministers’, this administration from the beginning made it clear that no such thing exists in its own thinking- a minister is a minister whether they are ‘of state’ or not.

Buhari’s designation is only symbolic, just a way to say that he has his eyes on what goes on in that all-important sector and can intervene at anytime. It is an ambiguous status that may make people demand with justice that he and not Kachikwu should answer for whatever lapses exist in that sector. But beyond the symbolism of Buhari’s position, Kachikwu actually runs the Ministry of Petroleum Resources. He is the expert on ground and should without quibbling provide answers to the questions being asked by Nigerians. Except he can show how Buhari’s position has hobbled his own efforts in which case he would have no business remaining a minister. It’s only in this sense can he choose to pass questions Nigerians genuinely demand answers to.

Public office must be frustrating for anyone with the desire to truly serve, much more so in a country like Nigeria where the conditions are rifest that make the best performer look truly mediocre. But no matter how frustrated a minister may be, Nigerians have been far more frustrated and longsuffering than they get credited for. The least a public servant -which one hopes Mr. Kachikwu still considers himself to be- can do is to ask for understanding not talk down at people as if they are nothing. Public office is not ‘by force’ and Mr. Kachikwu can show candour without being rude.