Many sins of Sally Mbanefo, DG , NTDC !
I will not join the multitude in deliberately committing
evil neither will I be part of the
minority which shy away from speaking the truth , the whole truth
nothing but the truth .
Hence , this article which I am writing with the fear of God and commitment to the ethical dictate
of the pen profession .
Mrs Sally Mbanefo has been a subject of vitriolic media
attack right from the very first day her name was announced by the federal
government as a replacement for Otunba
Olusegun Runsewe .
Not that Mrs Mbanefo is not competent , nay , going through
her resume and investigating her precedent at working posts , she is not only
fit but an asset to the nation rather it was the manner and ridiculous way which Otunba Runsewe ‘s
appointment was terminated while on
active assignment of the Federal Government in far away Dubai .
This writer was in fact an arrow head of people who led a heavy voice of criticism against the
act of the Federal Government not because of the personality of Sally Mbanefo ,
but the undignified manner with which
Otunba Olusegun Runsewe and another Yoruba man who was the Director of Nigerian
Broadcasting Commission , NBC , were removed before the end of their tenure . As for Otunba Runsewe , he had almost 8
months more into the end of his 2nd term tenure of 4 years each ,
having spent 7 years and 4 months out of
8 years .
Making the announcement a painful one then was the fact that
Otunba Runsewe had led a large
delegation of NTDC staff including ,drivers , office assistants and some of the tourism writers including the
writer and journalists to attend the
Arabian Travel Market , taking place in
Dubai where some of the investors who
visited Nigerian stand raised the fear of assignment instability of Nigerian’s tourism administrator .
And we have not left the market when the fears of the
investors were not only confirmed but that the man who had allayed their fear
was removed with ignominy on the second day by the Federal Government !
And the man that was removed is not only an accomplished
journalist / publisher but a wonderful
personality who is not only a philanthropist
to journalist and journalism but gave his
best according to his own vision by creation of huge awareness about tourism in term of publicity .
Definitely , only a fool will expect someone like Otunba
Runsewe with his looming image which was even larger than tourism himself to be
removed without rumbles .
Even , if there were no natural rumbles , as human too , one does not expect Otunba
Runsewe or his followers not to be
throwing stones .
Particularly with the background of personality discord between the former occupier’ of
the Ministry of Tourism , Adetokunbo Kayode who had made futile
effort of getting rid of Otunba Runsewe and
the brazen enmity between the present occupier Chief Edem Duke who finally
succeeded in removing him and appoint a " supposedly stooge " in person of Sally
So the first sin of Sally Mbanefo is the fact that the
Federal Government was unkind enough by appointing her to replace a huge
personality who spend over 7 years as a
DG and whose fame , good deeds and large
heartedness have cultivated to him large troop of followers , admirers ,
loyalists and praise singers who enjoyed tremendous patronage and support and survival from him within the NTDC as a
corporation and within the travel tourism
journalists some of us who so much
depended on his largesse to live, buy car , build houses , junket over the world and social support on etc ,
etc .
Expectedly this group
of people will not be happy and will forever curse the day Otunba Runsewe was
removed and unless the person who is stepping into the post is ready to carry
on with business as usual and wear the
behavioural garb of Otunba Runsewe’s , there is no way things will be smooth for
the occupier .
To many of the journalists and Otunba’s admirers . Sally was the fellow who pushed
Otunba Runsewe out as if she has the authority to appoint herself and as if
Sally has taken the life of out of Otunba’s world , hence they have to pull this lady down at cost with
frivolous and wicked accusations and allegation of fraud which are figment of imagination. .
And thus lies the second sins of Sally Mbanefo who came
brandishing a new concept and approach to tourism , believing that Nigeria must
first of all develop domestic tourism by promoting the local festivals and
developing them instead of expending the
fund of the corporation gallivanting all over the world marketing what is not
on ground .
She announced that there would be a sharp drop in Nigeria attendance
at international fairs and tourism exhibitions which have not substantially
added any value to Nigeria tourism growth because the local tourism products
are not on ground and there has not been any conscious efforts at developing
the domestic tourisms by her predecessor other than on the pages of newspapers .
To her , tourism
business should be conducted as serious business not only on the pages of
newspaper or by employing highfalutin sloganeering but strictly for its economic impact behaving as if she is in a private sector
where every step must lead to profitable result .
Of course , this did
not go down well with staff who usually benefits from such trips via estacode
, and the travel journalists who are
always sponsored by NTDC to such events .
Compounding the case was the drastic short fall in the
nation’s revenue and the dwindling
allocation to Ministry , Departments and Parastatals which reduced the scope and activities of the Corporation
.
The third sin of Sally lies in the fact , since her
appointed , she has been able to block some of the holes where the NTDC funds
were siphoned and wasted particularly the tradition of attending fairs and markets with large number
of staff and in most cases with those
who are not relevant in the scheme of international marketing .
She was quoted “ I believe our international engagement or
fair attendance should not only be dictated by need , achievable goal , purposeful , with a mission and vision. It should be dominated by members of
the private sector with a sizeable and function members of staff .Trade fairs
and exhibitions are not for the sake of paparazzi or personal aggrandizement
but to further the growth of domestic tourism “
Thus she incurred the
wrath and antagonism of a sizeable number of those who should have benefited
from what she called unproductive travels and more particularly some of these
journalists who have not been opportune to travel out of this country since
Otunba Runsewe left .
Another sin of Sally was her “extreme prudence “ particularly
when it comes to building Nigerian stand at international fair and event
“Imagine Sally Mbanefo constructing one of the best stand
for Nigeria in South Africa at the cost of 2 .5 million naira which her
predecessor used 25 million naira to build ! “
Definitely , such a stingy fellow is not supposed to be the
DG of NTDC
Another sin of Sally is her failure to honour and pay shadow contractors who were verbally awarded
contract without proper contract procedure of offer , availability ,
consideration and acceptance .
Also , Sally has sinned against some of these journalists
who alleged her of being stingy “she
does not operate like Runsewe “forgetting
and not susceptible to blackmail . Thus these set are ready to be used by
whoever wants a pound off Sally’s flesh .
Another sin of Sally is the fact she has remained unperturbed
despite all the attempted to stain her reputation and someone is of the fear
that she is writing her name better in the tourism book of Nigeria .
They could not understand why she has to travel and visit
tourism sites in 25 states of the
Federation and visiting traditional
rulers spreading domestic tourism and
encouraging stakeholders and promoters of culture and tourism .
They could not see why she is identifying with traditional rulers , the custodian of cultures
in the six geo- political zone of the country an act they could not do or ever envisaged
she could achieved within the first 12 months as DG, NTDC.
They are not happy that she has been able to secure a
cultural exchange training programme for NTDC staff in Gambia which was the
first time of such a scheme in 7 years .
These and other reasons have led to the renew fabrication of
falsehood of wasting several millions while the fact is that the Lady inherited
a bag of several millions of debt left by her predecessor.
