Welcome Home, Mr. Joseph Attah By Anthony Ogande
On May 6th the ancient town of Doma in Nasarawa State will play host to cream de la cream of Nigeria by Alago Nation at a reception to welcome home one of its most celebrated, finest and illustrious sons, Mr. Joseph Attah who retires from Nigeria Customs Service after years of meritorious service to his fatherland.
Interestingly, Attah’s success story did not just happen as the proverb: “born with a silver spoon” indicated. He achieved success through dint of hard work, sacrifice and perseverance.
Born in the early 60s to a peasant farmer, received early training as Mass Server under a white Reverend Father at St. Aloysius Catholic Church Doma who partly sponsored his early education.
In the late 80s he joined the Nigeria Custom Service as an Officer, rose through the ranks to become the Public Relations Officer and later Comptroller of Kebi State Command and to his eventual retirement, a journey that spanned three decades.
The reason why he will be honoured with a civic reception by friends, former colleagues, associates and the entire Traditional Council of Alago Nation.
This reception is expedient for two reasons.
Firstly, as a worthy ambassador of Alago Nation who committed himself to his official responsibility and excelled in all fronts. Secondly, as the Public Relations Officer of the Nigerian Customs Service who had repositioned the service credo to meet the requirement of international best practices acceptable in the entire globe.
Unarguably, some of the reforms he carried out as an image promoter in the Customs, personified his positive traits as one of the renowned persons of note in public relations practice in the Nigeria Customs Service.
For purposes of record, as the PRO of the Nigerian Customs, he was saddled with the responsibility of presenting, defending, and promoting her image.
This was an enormous task considering the fact that Custom at the time was in dearth need of reforms as pressure arising from the adoption of the information super high way in all sectors of the economy set in. He dreamed and nurtured the Nigerian Customs that fitted into the expectations of the 21st century within few years on the saddle.
Through his impact factor strategic applications of a three-prone approach to reposition the Service for an effective delivery system, a lot of successes were made. The first was the Custom Open House approach targeting key stakeholders like journalists, civil societies and politicians.
Through this approach journalists and civil societies were invited into the affairs of the Customs to see things for themselves and reports to the public. Legislative relations were encouraged between the Service and the National Assembly. This drastically reduced incidences of misinformation and misrepresentation.
The outcome as expected was improved reputation building which had drastically reduced pressures from the National Assembly.
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The second approach was Say-it-Yourself-and-Laud. Nigeria Customs is always in the eyes of the storm when ever trans-border crimes are in the center of an issue. He initiated the establishment of Custom Radio to keep the activities of his paramilitary organisation in the public domain by telling their own story and being responsive to the public yearning.
This approach through the radio airwave of the Customs is not only serving the PR information needs but also the public news component as one of its credible sources for information dissemination. This was a milestone in the history of the Nigerian Customs Service that a radio station was added to refocus, reengineer and to reposition the Customs for greater service delivery.
The third was the Spokesman approach. The importance of the asset of public goodwill to the Service cannot be overemphasized.
Therefore, his style of spokesperson’s approach took a different aura and dimension. He utilised the spokesperson’s style with robust media relations technique where media channels were converted into tools of telling stories of the Nigerian Customs through the ‘horse’s mouth.’
He did this to ensure that no loose ends were left opened in safeguarding the reputation of the Service.
These approaches were evident in Service documentaries, guest appearances and media talk-shows during his time on the saddle.
The style was also juxtaposed in conferences and workshops organised under his watch through which the Customs was presented to the Nigerian public and indeed to the entire world.
Factual, objective and full disclosures of information were the credo of his many reforms in the Customs to build trust and confidence in the Service.
Looking back, Joseph Attah has left a robust working relationship in the Service, exploited partnership with the sister organizations and established a strong image for the Customs through these initiatives.
Moreover, he has a way of documenting his thoughts. He did it in “the plights of a distant husband” Flipping through some pages of his narratives, I was awe stroked in his treatment of the storyline, the plots, the language and indeed the entire structure of the novel.
One thing stood out clearly, he is an husband man, caught in between the line of duty and his responsibility to his beloved family. I can testify on his behalf that he has fulfilled the demand of both to the glory of God almighty.
While at the Service of the Nigeria Customs doing his best to meeting the demand of his office, he set a template of good representativeness both to the Service and to his Alago people of Doma, Keana and Obi Local Government Areas in terms of available but scarce opportunities. It is therefore, not for nothing that he was bestowed with one of the most respected chieftaincy titles of his ancestors as Barayan Doma.
Though, retired but not tired, Attah is already putting finishing touches to his project to empower the less privileged as part of efforts to give back to the society and to provide life line to the teaming unemployed youths. He feels very strongly that the vulnerability of youths in Alago land is still a cause for concern.
This forthcoming reception is an honour well deserved. Welcome Home Comptroller Joseph Attah.
Anthony Ogande is a communication schola
