Nigeria, Dec. 16 -- One critical question that I had contended with for sometime as a public service institutional reformer is, why it has been so very difficult to institute performance-oriented values and systems (PMS) to alter the inherited 'I am directed' traditional public administration tradition in the civil service in Nigeria. Indeed, implementation of PMS has been largely rhetorical, entailing moving in circles since the Jerome Udoji Public Service Reform Commission reforms first attempt in 1974. Why is this so? One, civil servants generally take on their job as career, largely because of job security. They therefore would generally resist any reform that threatens their jobs, even if such reforms are in the public interest. This...