National Reputation and Corporate Governance (II)
By PRINCE AJAYI MEMAIYETAN JP, FNIPR
No one here pretends to be unable to recall what the mind summed up, after the eyes saw and the ears heard during primaries. The certificate forgery and bribery scandals and, gold fatherism, the faking of the National Youth’s Service Corps (NYSC) particulars to get jobs;, exhortations by the university lecturers and administrators; fraud, arson and embezzlements in banks and other financial institutions; the police, customs and excise as well as the Immigration “Kola” Syndrome; even government contract awards with “kickbacks”, the press brown envelops etc; are cankerworms, draining the values of Corporate Governance and National Reputation. How then do we arrive at a working solution - seeking process without getting the government entangled?
Bases of hypothetical reasoning
Our discussion so far has been predicated on the following basic hypothetical reasoning’s.
a. That there is very strong belief that Corporate Governance and National Reputation as concept, as have guided our discussion are nationally indispensable;
b. Proper Corporate Governance and positive National Reputation will led Nigeria forward developmentally.
c. Today’s failure of Corporate Governance and National Reputation, is as a result of the negative influence generated, propagated and disseminated partly by the powers that be, at the tope echelon or tower of administration, beginning from Aso Rock;
d. That because the core of Aso Rock has so far not formulated workable policies and principles to check negative influence unqualified board appointments within the core and the peripherals of the nation, Corporate Governance and National Reputation, have failed spirally from taking their proper shapes in contributing to national development;
e. Ardent believers in public relations practice exist enough in Nigeria, whom the government can use to ensure successful Corporate Governance and attractive reputation management. There, the Government and even the private sector continue to sideline, yet this crème of experts constitute the indigenous domestic professional basics;
f. Government can take appropriate steps to check corruption in all its ramifications, constitute a good information and communication model to reactivate the decision-lines of Corporate Governance and National Reputation (by appointing professional reputation managers domestically rather than going for image laundering externally. By so doing, National Reputation experts can check or monitor the excesses of Chief Executives, Chairmen, Managing Directors of Banks, and Companies Boards. ICPC and EFCC need well-trained reputation managers to guide its activities for a good result.
Sidelining the indigenous domestic professional basics
Whenever reputation or images problem rears it head, it is perhaps often forgotten by governments, board members, directors parastatals etc. federal government’s actions on consolidation saw the unilateral closures of banks giving its reasons as “Bad Board - Room politics and Management crises”, according to government:
“Most board members and directors busied themselves acquiring loans for their personal business interest seeking contracts in banks they were presiding, seeking foreign exchange for their friends and relations, and as a result were not able to exercise control over the management of the banks. Board members supported Managing Directors and Chief-Executive Officers (MD/CEO5) to single handedly approve fantastic loans provided their personal interests as board members were taken care of “(Nigerian Economists, Vol. 3 No 21, July 1990 11-21-22).
A quick reaction is, were there no public relations managers in these financial institutions and couldn’t they have been part of management to advise on top decisions taken? Why is the Association of Corporate Affairs Managers of Bank (ACAMB) that conferred honours on its member on May 11,2006. The Abacha regime of yester years as well as the Babangida, junta, suffered National Reputation problems. Abacha, went with his External Affairs Minister-Chief Tom lkimi to England to hire the services of a P. R. Consultant. The cost exceeded 60 million US dollars. The firm in 1998, not just rejected the contract, but defined Nigeria’s image problem as being too bad for laundering. August, 2003, the Obasanjo administrative model was reported to be gunning for such external contract to get it awarded. But we first ask, is there any such nation that can get the bad deeds of Nigeria glamorized, without us doing it ourselves in a very proper and professional way? The so called “ home breed” PR men are better at solving their own problems.
Boards, companies, banks and governments have ignored the right calibre of public relations men, who can deliver the goods at the right time with the right message in the right media to the right people. When they do, appointees are non-P.R. executives. Those who handle the federal Information Ministerial portfolios and at states level also, commissioners of information are mere politicians given appointments. Can these able men be relied upon to handle reputation management matters even at the levels of Executive Council meetings? The answer is no, giving way to communication problems even at the level of Corporate Governance.
Theoretical consideration towards a remedy
Laws and decrees are not special remedies to the confrontation posed to Corporate Governance and National Reputation. Reputation managers abound and have well versed skills of communication practices, like what lawyer, doctors and engineers do in their vineyards. Let us strike a balance between the two opposing concepts, taking the Nigerian situation under consideration. Let us use the theory of communication and mutual understanding in the model below:
The convergence model of communication and mutual understanding.
The convergence model is, as Kincaid (1919, P. 34) points out that it is based on some of the fundamental principle of information and articulated in a manager which should make them easier to apply for professionals who use communication in their work.
The model implies that what happens during communication and information dissemination in a meeting of minds, a mutual interaction in a situation where various meanings and points of view are possible. The assumptions in this model are that the common goal of communicators in mutual understanding: that communication is a process which two or more individuals or groups share information in order to reach a mutual understanding of each other and of the world in which they live; and that the process of convergence towards mutual.
A successful PR can be measured by its ability to convert negative state to positive ones. The transfer process may be representec by the following model.
Situation Achievement
Apathy Interest
Hostility Sympathy
Prejudice Acceptance
Ignorance Knowledge
I will recall the hostility towards the product of Nigerian Breweries by some senators calling on the public to boycott the products of the company over the issue of third term project and which has become a good case study of ineffective communication or bad public relations. The satanic verses of NB former chief Executive, Festus Odumegwu threw his company into a spin and made both the owners - Heinneken B. V. of Holland, and the Board headed by Felix Ohiwerei very uncomfortable. It has led to the compulsory retirement of Chief Odumegwu from NB.
Recommendation
(A) Corporate Governance according to veterans of management and political science, is a new concept in Africa and in the Nigerian scheme of things. To nurture it to grow, government must create an enabling environment and conducive climate to afford it the cultural background necessary to sustain it. Right and qualified persons must be appointed to man boards of companies, banks, Institutions etc.
(B) Cleansing the Augean stable of corruption in all its ramifications in the nation’s polity, will change people’s orientations towards community service and public good. Government itself must live above board.
(C) National Reputation is the aggregate of the overall sanctity and prudence of any system. To have access to it, reputations managers exist domestically. Both government and the private sectors should rely on them for reputation management.
• (D) Image laundering as far as Nigeria is concerned, should be decided internally. No need to glamorized bad deeds of the nation by sweeping them under the carpet. Avoid using foreign P. R. image launders.
Conclusion
The difficulties associated with the treatment of a topic of this nature in Nigeria, are always thought provoking. Being part of the system compels one to try to proffer remedies to societal ills. What is true of Corporate Governance and National Reputation is like the exposure of the nations wrongs of the worst magnitude. Not that the existence of ills in the Nigerian polity is unexpected. What forms the base of worries is that, society must not allow itself to degenerate uncontrollably. The appropriate authorities should therefore put the right machinery in place in order to ensure a justifiable Corporate Governance that is supportive of reputation. Every contribution from any angle of Corporate governance should be known to have effect on the essence of National Reputation.