The Rise and Fall of our Institutions and their implications on our Development

Numerous individuals have debated Air Vanuatu’s case on social media over the past 5 years up until recently when the whole world turned upside down on the airline and its management. A particular aviation expert has sounded the alarm since 2019 on the plight of the organisation. Did anybody really pay attention or listen? Nope! Air Vanuatu’s case is a contemporary classic example of the demise of some of our agencies, thus the topic of this article – The Rise and Fall of our Institutions. For interested students, this is a perfect case study for USP’s Management and Public Administration courses (MG101 up to MG 300 level).

Time for honest Reforms

Unsettling and discomforting it may feel, we have to accept the need for reforms now, just as we did back in 1997 when our so-called ‘Long God Yumi Stanap’ country was dragged across the rough and rugged political terrain to the verge of a bottomless abyss, of national bankruptcy. It appears we’ve forgotten all about CRP! Who lead us to the verge of that fiasco? We did. ‘We’ meaning those in command at the top at that time. CRP was a bitter pill to swallow, but we had no other choice. Guess what, it is high time this country underwent another round of reforms – sweeping public sector reforms. We’ve been complacent for far too long.

To begin with, Vanuatu is one of the most expensive countries in the entire Pacific region. As such, we need to compensate for that setback and do better in other areas – one of which is to ensure we have professionally-managed institutions in place to deliver services required of them from clients and from the public at large – effectively and efficiently. I wrote an article in March 2019 on the subject ‘Institutions Matter’. Yes institutions do matter. When they crumble, we reap the distasteful consequences. Classic example – the unpalatable saga in our very midst concerning an almost-defunct and unprofitable airline.

A number of our institutions are plagued by careless, very weak, incompetent leadership, and poor management. As one commentator observed of the situation this week, ‘Air Vanuatu is sadly the reflection of what is indeed happening in so many departments, but it seems we often prefer to turn our head and pretend we are not seeing it’. I can confirm this to be true given my own particular experiences (an uphill battle, that is) in my former job trying to get certain initiatives through the system.

Our only solution has to be reform, reform, reform. Swift reforms. In 1997 we were forced to undergo a comprehensive reform program because we decided to wreck havoc with our finances through reckless spending. We swallowed the bitter pill back then. We need to swallow that pill again now, but this time a double dose of the pill. Why? Because of the following four novel challenges confronting us.

Four major challenges

We’re staring down the barrel of a gun right now with four major challenges confronting the country, (1) the severe aftermaths of the Covid-19 Pandemic, (2) Climate change, (3) graduation from LDC status thus our loss of trade perferential benefits from various development partners, and (4) escalating energy costs.

To deal with all these effectively, we have no choice but to undertake serious reforms of our institutions – a lot of which are stagnant, structually outdated and disfunctional as they were designed for an era that did not really factor the above four issues into their systems. So in effect we’re trying to drive a vehicle with four flat tyres. We appear to be moving, but in circles. The faster we drive, the behinder we get, trying to drive a vehicle at high speed in reverse mode. That’s why we need another CRP!

Not only do our institutions need those reforms. We need to undertake sweeping human resources reforms as well. We can have the best institutions in the world but if they are manned by inefficient, weak, incompetent DGs, Directors and officials, those institutions will still head nowhere. To begin with, we don’t have a proper agency set up to train and groom promising individuals to become leaders in organisations to the point where they really become ‘DG or Director material’. We keep readvertising those high positions and still can’t find them. But why? Answer is not rocket science. We don’t have those ready-trained people around. We think we have graduates, but these ain’t director material. We need to groom them and grooming and coaching take time. You’ve got to invest in it systematically. I’ve written on this subject before.

Irresponsible politics and management

Last but not the least, our beloved politics. When played responsibly, politics drives development rewardingly for the country. But when conducted very irresponsibly in many cases as we’ve observed over the past 42 years, politics sucks (to use the American informal way of saying ‘unpleasant’). It stiffles growth and development. It is anti-development. Over the years politics played a role in Air Vanuatu’s downfall – no question about that. Besides the airline’s unprofitability (thus the heavy regular cash injection to keep it afloat), bad politics and its entertainment by weak airline management have had their drastic toll on the flying machine.

You hear of these issues now from staff within the organisation itself. Fear of the consequences of speaking out? Those days are over. We have pilots talking, staff talking through the grapevine, and more. The new AV board has started on the right path. Hopefully these reforms will deepen and are sustained far into the foreseable future. Reforms are painful exercises. But using the analogy of a hospital, quite frankly Air Vanuatu has experienced a major accident and sustained very deep wounds and needs to attend serious medical attention and treatment.

The Rise and Fall of Institutions

In conclusion, and very briefly, as one writer sums it up perfectly, ‘If we wish to reform our democratic institutions, we should probably focus on structure rather than noise and raise up our eyes from the parts to the whole.’ In Vanuatu’s case ‘the whole’, is in a chaotic state right now. We need to address it speedily and squarly this New Year. Turning a blind eye on it will only keep hurting us and our development efforts.

The Distant Voice is a weekly column focusing on various aspects of life and development in Vanuatu.