the merit principle and its apllicability in zambia
...rnment has been committed in principle to the merit system as a culture for recruitment and promotion to the public offices. Both political pronouncements and policy terms (general orders No.29, new edition) have alluded to the merit principle. This commitment has been further strengthened by the statutory instrument no.91 of 1987 referred to as “the public service commission (Amendment) regulation 1987” which interalia, stipulates that “appointments and promotions in the public service, take into account the relevant qualifications, competence, merit”, etc (section 2,6)! Despite this spirit of commitment there have been a lot of complaints from general public as well as from the electronic and print media that most appointments and promotions in the public service are done mostly on patronage rather than on merit principle. Indeed one of the reasons that brought MMD into power was the campaign against the appointment and promotions of people in the public service by the UNIP government on non –merit considerations. The MMD manifesto as well as political pronouncements throughout MMD campaign period clearly showed commitment in principle to merit system in terms of appointments and promotions, yet still, opposition parties are complaining against the MMD government for appointing people in the public service on non merit considerations. The current state of merit systems in public service therefore, reflects the variety of concerns by a lot of Zambians. Though the system in public service today are characterized by commitment to merit values in principle, in practice, the systems often fail to measure up to merit standards. The study therefore, poses the following questions: What are the restraining forces militating against the application of merit principle in public service: In other words what are the major constraints affecting the application of the merit principle in Zambia public service? Is the poor performance of public service in Zambia a function of non-merit considerations in terms of promotions, appointments and transfers? How do traditional attitudes and institutions, political expediency, harsh economic realities, religious affiliations, age, education, lack of exposure etc affect the merit principle in Zambia’s reforming public service? These and other related questions form the premise upon which this study is based. 1.4 BACKGROUND The Zambian government policy committed to reforming the public service in order to make it professional and ensure that career system and entry in the civil service is based on the knowledge of the candidate generally as indicated by academic credentials, dates back as far as the 1970's under the United National Independence Party (UNIP). In the late 1970s, UNIP government felt the burden of supporting a bloated ineffective and inefficient public service more than ever. Besides, the growth in numbers, the civil servants, did not translate in improved performance of the civil service in providing the needed goods and services to the citizens. Indicators of poor performance of the civil service include delays in the processing of documents, poor observance of work hours and frequent absence from office. In 1975, the UNIP government came up with an idea of reforming the civil service through a Presidential directive to reduce the bloated civil service by 50% and institute the merit principle in both recruitments and promotions largely because political considerations outweigh rational decisions; the presidential directive was not implemented. In 1979, a Commission was appointed to come up with the recommendations on how best to improve the performance of the public service. One of the major recommendations made by the Commission was the merit-based system in appointment methods, promotions, discipline, transfers and dismissals. Again this could not be implemented for political reasons. In 1986, another Commission was appointed which again recommended the merit principle and the reduction in the size of the civil service. It also recommended the improvement in the retirement package to encourage early retirement for civil servants so that in the long run the size and shape of the civil service would be reduced to manageable levels. Despite UNIP Government's policy commitment to reform the civil service and to make it a professional and meritorious system, UNIP leadership lacked the political will to implement the above reform efforts. In 1991, The Movement for Multi-party Democracy (MMD) replaced the UNIP government in General Elections. One of the top priorities of the MMD government was to make the civil service" small, meritorious, professional, cost effective, efficient and well motivated and responsive to the needs of the Zambian citizens."(Public Service Reform Programme Bulletin, Vol.1. No.1 January 1993) 1.5 LITERITURE REVIEW The term merit comes from Latin word “merit” which means, “to earn.” Or “to deserve” (Lungu 1983:22). The merit justification normally includes the idea that jobs are filled on the basic objective of standards relating to the ability to perform the job. Merit also assumes tenure as long as performance is acceptable and that promotions are based on fitness and performance (schick, 1976:7). In other words this entails that employees are liked on the basis of competence i.e. they are qualified, competent with relevant skills and experience. Progression is also based on the criteria mentioned above. Furthermore it should be free from partisan politics i.e. it should be neutral. There should also be fair representation of sections of society irrespective of sex, gender, tribe, race and the like. It assumes that there is equality of opportunities in social-economic sectors. That people differ in their abilities, personality and so on is indisputable (kanungo, 1986:13). 1.5.1 MERIT PRINCPLE IN THE CIVIL SERVICE According to Nnandongo (2001:25) the merit principle in the civil service entails the appointment of the best person for any given job made, through recruitment or promotion based on explicit merit rules that are publicly understood and can be challenged if a breach is suspected." Merit appointments seem to improve bureaucratic capability (Palmer 1993:11) because a merit-based system is in direct contrast to one based on patronage. Merit systems can be broadly divided into career systems and position based systems. In career systems, the objective is to ensure that initial entry to the civil service is based on the knowledge of the candidate generally indicated by a relevant university degree or academic credentials while in position-based systems the emphasis is placed on selecting the best-suited candidate for each position to be filled, whether by external recruitment or via internal promotion or mobility (Popoola and Blunt: 1989:52) The essence of merit criteria is that they are specified and contestable. Failure to appoint a candidate can be appealed and reviewed against explicit specifications for the position. 1.5.2 DIFFERENCES IN PEOPLE'S INTELLECTUAL POTENTIALS Job distribution should be compatible with human nature. A careful study of politics, theory of Plato (Mwaipaya: 1980:) reveals the utmost importance of this theory in relation to merit principle especially where the full development of African continent is concerned. Plato ‘s massage reminds us that the distribution of social responsibility should be based upon and should take into account the intellectual capabilities of the individual member of society. “It should seriously consider the talents of the individual for a certain social responsibility so that social and economic chaos can be avoided."(Mwaipaya 1980:6). Actually, Plato believed that when wrong people take over social responsibilities, it is difficult both to avoid chaos and confusion, and to bring about meaningful development. This is why he stressed the importance of merit in job distribution, proclaiming that it is impossible to make geomancy out mediocre intellectual abilities. He stressed the fact that complex social tasks such as policymaking and policy implementation should be the sole responsibility of properly trained individuals those whom he classifies as the guardians of a society. This seems also to have suggested to him the following social class divisions: the guardians class,( rulers) the auxiliaries(army and police) and producers (farmers and industrialists). The main reason behind these social class divisions is that in Plato’s view, men do not have equal intellectual and physical potentials and so he proposed that they should shoulder responsibilities according to their potentials. "Indeed nature is not as generous as some people pre suppose it to be; that nature has not and may never be able to distribute human inner potentials equally among the peoples of the world and that some people will always (unless nature changes its manner of operations) be endorsed with more intellectual potentials than others."(Mwaipaya, ibid: 16) In short plato stressed the differences of potentials from one person to another and eventually proclaiming that," those who are suited for the life of business or for the life of soldering should never be permitted to abandon their appropriate social tasks for glamorous positions,"(Mwaipaya: ibid: 19) because when they are allowed to do so, society will not operate properly. It is in view of this that he declared that society cannot avoid poverty, chaos and collapse when the wrong people attempt the right jobs; when men of mediocre capabilities are allowed to take charge of more complicated social tasks. For Plato when the wrong people attempt the right jobs, when the wrong parts of the state are forced to carry out tasks of other appropriate parts, the state becomes incapable of bringing about meaningful economic development. Mwaipaya (1980) pointed out lack of intellectual sophistication among African leaders has been responsible for various types of unrealistic development plans hence poverty experienced in most African countries. “Mediocre leadership cannot really and never have been able to facilitate national development, apart from it being a detrimental factor to the full development of national and human resources”(Mwaipaya 1980:36). Talking about managers in the public sector Prof. G.F. Lungu (1986) had this to say, “the future of the development of the SADCC region depends largely on the quality of public managers selected to the key positions”(p.64-65). He proposed that a qualification like professional manager (P.MGR) or “certified public administration”(CERT.P.ADM) could be awarded. Certification controls entry into the profession and also guards standards of practice. In this manner, he believed, the age old addition to amateurism in the field of public administration could be systematically tackled.” He further went on to say, “misallocation and under-employment of trained managers is a common practice in the countries of this region. This is promoted by politically motivated managers without due considerations of their training. (P.63). 1.5.3 SUCCESS OF WESTERN BUREAUCRACIES The efficiency of American, West Germany, British, and French and the Asian tigers bureaucracies has been as a result of application of merit principle. Indeed Kanungo (1990) argues that the Japanese economic miracle has in addition to good management style, been as a result of strict adherence to merit in both recruitment and promotions. 1.5.4 LIMITATIONS TO MERIT PRINCIPLE In a pure merit system all public appointments, from top to bottom would be made following a competition based on merit system. However some writers (Chrisomalis.S 1997), Fish 1999), John Mc Whorter (2001) have argued that no administration operates on a pure merit system. Typical exceptions are elected officials, political appointments, affirmative action, and the principle of seniority. This bulk of literature shows the importance of merit principle in the civil service. It further shows the limitations of the merit. The literature also cites examples where the merit principle has produced economic miracles. 1.6 OBJECIVE OF THE STUDY This study is aimed at investigating the constraints affecting the application of merit principle in the reforming Zambia civil service and whether or not the non-application of the merit principle has adversely affected the performance of the civil service. And to suggest remedial measures. 1.7 RESEARCH QUESTIONS 1.What are the constraints affecting the application of the merit principle in the civil service in general and MFNP in particular? 2 .Is the merit principle affected by political patronage and tribalism? 3. How do religious affiliations, gender, lack of exposure affect the merit principle? 4. Is African Managerial behavior an obstacle to the application of the Merit principle? 5. Do our top leadership really value the application of the merit principle as a basis of enhanced performance? 6. Is the merit principle the answer to the poor civil service performance? 1.8 HYPOTHESIS Null hypothesis: It apparent that the merit principle in the civil service has been constrained by political patronage, tribalism, religious affiliation, region, gender, lack of exposure, poor education background and lack of premium for merit by top management. Alternative hypothesis: That cultural variables are not the only constraints to the application of the merit principle in the civil service. 1.9 DEFINITION OF CONCEPTS In this research, the major concepts used mean the following: 1.“Merit principle”, in this merit principle means to earn, desire i.e. appointment and promotion should be based on qualification, competence and relevant experience. 2.Bureaucracy – bureau means rules. Hence bureaucracy is the system of administration, which is governed by the use of rules and regulations...