Hello and welcome. My name is Shannon Kemp and I'm the Chief Digital Manager of Data Diversity. We hope everyone is staying safe and well out there, and we would like to thank you for joining the current installment of the Monthly Data Diversity Webinar Series, Real World Data Governance with Bob Siner. Today Bob will be joined by guest speaker Anthony Augman to discuss data architecture and data governance. Since a couple of points to get us started, due to the large number of people that attend these sessions, you will be muted during the webinar. I'd like to chat with us with each other. We certainly encourage you to use those. Just click the chat icon on the bottom right hand corner of your screen for that feature. And for questions, it will be collected by the Q&A in the bottom right hand corner of your screen. Or if you'd like to think, we encourage you to share highlights of questions by Twitter using hashtag RWDG. And as always, we will send a follow-up email within the next two business days, containing links to the slides, the recording of the session, and additional information requested throughout the webinar. Now let me introduce to you our speaker for the series, Bob Siner and his guest, Anthony Augman. Anthony is the founder and CEO of Augman Data Leadership, a company helping business and technology leaders transform their future with data. But decades of experience in business and hands-on technology roles, Anthony brings better data management to organizations of all kinds. He has led data change initiatives in many industries, serving as project manager, data architect, and chief data officer. Bob is the president and principal of KI Kankofoping and Educational Services and the publisher of the data administration newsletter, tdan.com. Bob has been a recipient of the Damer Professional Award for significant and demonstrable contributions to the data management industries. Bob specializes in non-invasive data governance, data stewardship, and metadata management solutions. And with that, I will give a forward to Bob to get today's webinar started. Hello and welcome. Wow, so Shannon, you're going to want to get through today's webinar. And you know what, when you called the name of this session, this webinar of the real-world data governance series, as data architecture is data governance, I think for the point of this meeting, especially because I have Anthony as my guest today on the webinar, how it is, we can name it, data architecture is data governance. Or we could say with a question mark at the end of it, data architecture is data governance? I mean, are they really the same thing? And there is nobody better to kick the idea of data governance and data architecture around with than my friend Anthony. So I will let Anthony say hello in just one minute. If that's okay with him, what I want to do is here we go. Go to the next slide. I just wanted to share with you just a little bit of information that I always share before we get started on the webinars. And there is lots of information to share. So this webinar series is on third Thursday of every month. And next month we will be talking about building data governance through data stewardship. I talk a lot about non-invasive data governance. So there is information there where you can go to learn more about non-invasive data governance. The book and other information is also available through Dataversity. So I will talk about that in a second. I will be speaking at a couple upcoming events through Dataversity. Oh, I noticed I have enterprise data governance online. That was a couple weeks ago. So I hope you were able to attend that. I will be doing some live online training in March. I will be speaking at Enterprise Data World in April as well. A couple of the different plans, learning plans that I have available through Dataversity are one on non-invasive data governance, my favorite topic. And then I also wanted to talk about non-invasive metadata governance as well. The most recent set of classes is the one on business glossaries, data dictionaries, and data catalogs, which we all know are big tools of data governance programs. Shannon mentioned the data administration newsletter. And so that's out there all the time, free and available to anybody who is interested and KIK Consulting. If you get a chance to go out and visit the KIK Consulting website, it is all a new, at least over the last several months. So please go out and visit us there. And with that, I want to give Anthony some time to say a word or two. Yeah, I've been uncharacteristically quiet so far. So now you can say hi and talk about what you're doing. Yeah, Bob. Thank you, Bob and Shannon. It's great to be here with you. If you like this webinar, you will like the podcast called Data Leadership Lessons because oftentimes it's Bob and me talking as well. Like the most recent episode, we were also joined by Lynn Silverston. We had a lot of fun. And we talk about a variety of different data and leadership types of topics. I think it's a good place to kind of have some of those more casual conversations that you might find having at some of these events that we're not having today. So hopefully check that out. That's a lot of fun. We try to get new episodes out every two or three weeks. I have those also are on YouTube, so we actually do record live video for those podcast episodes. My book on data leadership is available at dataleadershipbook.com and I do a lot of training with Data Diversity. Several different online training courses. Looking forward to hopefully helping some of you get started in the data management space. I know the Data Education Month is coming up very soon, so that'll be very great as well. And then, yeah, and so that's pretty much me. I kind of do this for fun now because I no longer do active consulting. So I kind of just show up to these things to enjoy the conversation. So let's do that some more today. And it's always great to have you as a guest. So thank you again for joining me. It's great to have conversations with you. And I think this is a very pertinent one for today and pertinent for the audience that is the university's audience, which is around data architecture. We all understand how important data architecture is. We all understand how important data governance is. And the question is, are they really the same thing? And so I know that several years ago, I wrote an article on TDAN. It's still one of the most read articles on TDAN that data modeling is data governance. And I had so many people yell at me and tell me, no, no, data modeling is not data governance. But again, my point in that article was that data modeling is disciplined around the definition of data. And I talk a lot about definition, production, and use of data. So there's lots of information out there. So please go check out the stuff from Anthony. And we've got lots to talk about today when it comes to data architecture being data governance. So we'll kind of tear that apart and we're looking to any questions that you may have as well. So please submit them as Shannon talked about. Before we get started, we're just going to spend a couple of minutes talking about what do we mean by data, about two things being the same side or being the two sides of the same coin. So I'll give you some examples. And it's really interesting how in industry, a lot of these things are really opposite. So when we're saying they're two sides of the same coin, are we saying that they are the same thing? Are we saying that they're different? We'll talk about that. We'll talk about similarities between these two disciplines. We'll talk about differences between these two disciplines. We'll talk about how to use one to sell the other. So if your company is very focused on data governance, how can we really make a point that data architecture is part of what we're trying to achieve, like governing data, and the other way around as well. And then we'll make a final decision. And I'm sure all of you will be very interested to know whether we've decided at the end of today whether they are in fact the same thing. So with that, like I said, the first thing that we want to talk about, and then I've got a page of questions for Anthony to talk about. So when we talk about things being two sides of the same coin, typically it means they're very closely related. But in this case, they certainly seem different. So the question is how closely related are these things? And that's what the first set of questions are going to be about Anthony. So you're ready with something to share, some wisdom to share with us. But I also wanted to share some two sides analogies. So when you go and you look up things online and say, I want to see where they are using the expression two sides of a coin, they talk about risk and opportunity. And those as being two sides of the same coin and love and pain and good and bad and good and evil and needing to hang and all of these things. So that's kind of the context that I want to lay here. Are we really talking about things? Are we meaning to say that they're opposite? Are we meaning to say that they're the same thing? So here we go, Anthony. Here's the questions for you. So first of all, is there any truth to the statement that data architecture and data governance are the same thing? And what danger are we going to run into by even saying that? Let's start with that to start the conversation. Yeah, I mean, I guess there's probably a nugget of truth in saying that data architecture and data governance are the same thing. They're certainly related. The more I think about this analogy, because Bob, we've been talking about this for a while now. And I was thinking about this in preparation for today's webinar. And I don't like, I think I don't like the two sides of the same coin analogy anymore. I think the way I'd rather look at it is as two facets on the same diamond. And the reason I like that is that diamond facets don't really exist how you want them unless you make them so. Whereas like coins, yeah, you got a coin and there's two sides and all that. And it almost overly simplifies it. Whereas I think with data architecture and data governance, I think what makes them so similar is that we're in control of our own destinies to a great extent. And that we have to decide, okay, how is this diamond really supposed to be cut so that it sparkles the most? And so if the data assets in our organizations are these diamonds in the rough as in their native form where we know there's value in their data, but we just don't know how to extract it. Well, let's take the analogy one step further and we're going to create a diamond and it's going to sparkle and that's going to represent the value in these data assets. And I can argue that data architecture and data governance, you can argue that maybe they're assets of that diamond or they're steps on a continuum and we'll talk about some of the things with what they mean, what these terms actually are. But I think that really instead of saying they're the same thing because if anyone likes to make oversimplifications for effect, that's me. But I feel like if we're better off, you know, other than just trying to rile people up with that kind of bold statement, I think the real truth is that, you know, they're not the same thing, but they're certainly not going to be successful independently of one another. And let's understand better how they relate and why they're so intertwined. And I think that's really what we want to get at today. Okay. And so I'd like that. I mean, well, we say data architecture is data governance for effect, right? We want people, hopefully some of you on the webinar, those of you listening to the webinar, you understand that. And so we want to make that comparison between the two. But, you know, so we say that kind of ingest as kind of clickbait to get you to come to the webinar to see what the heck we're going to talk about and how we're going to say that data architecture is data governance. Is there any truth to any danger actually is what I wanted to focus on to saying, to talking about how closely related they are and what's the benefit of entering them both into the same conversation? Well, I think the danger may be that either one by itself in isolation is can be a daunting task alone. And I think if we start to combine them and kind of increase that overall pool of what we're referring to, it makes it that much more unwieldy for folks to start doing them and being successful with them and makes it even harder to try to get going with it. It seems just too much. And so I think that's the biggest danger versus, you know, them simply being... I don't think there's a lot of danger in the academic discussion and evaluation of whether or not they are the same thing. I think that the problem is that either one is a challenge enough by itself. And you know, I think the next thing that we're going to look at is the definitions of what is even the definition of data architecture, what are some definitions of architecture, what are some definitions of data governance. And to be honest with you, it took a little while to find data architecture definitions that didn't have the word govern in it, because ungoverned data architecture is missing something, right? The data will not architect itself. I always say the data will not govern itself. The metadata will not govern itself. Well, the data will not architect itself either. So along with that comes accountability for it. And you know, if you think about data architecture as being one slice of the demo wheel of those knowledge areas, just as an example, that they understand that governance touches on that. I think that's the reason why governance is smack in the middle of the wheel, because in order for any of these disciplines to be successful, they need to govern what it is they care about. And so I think it makes sense to bring these things together. Would you agree with me that most people's first reaction will be they're not the same thing? Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's my reaction. That's why you're here today. That's because of that. But yeah, they're not. So we've kind of come to that conclusion. So thank you for coming. No, I'm kidding. We've got lots more to talk about. We'll talk about specifics of what these things are to start with. And so I went to, which is a place that is a great source to get information, and that is data diversity. In fact, Anthony's done a series on what is, and there's a lot of different things that he has, he's talked about what that is on data diversity. I also went to Dama and, you know, I went to their definition. So Dama defines data architecture. It basically just says that it includes anything that we've put in place that describes what we're presently doing. It defines requirements. It guides moving to the future basically it moves towards moving towards an integrated data platform and controlling data assets, and it even alludes to a data strategy. So I think that that's a, that's a good definition to just to let you know that there are so many pieces, facets to data architecture that need to be governed along the way. At data diversity, it's stated very clearly that data architecture brings business strategy and technical, bridges business strategy and technical execution. So you can see that that's, that's what data governance is about all of those things as well. I define data governance as being the execution and enforcement of authority over the management of data. And data diversity talks about it as being that collection of practices and processes. So let's look at the definitions that are out there and Dama and data diversity. And I threw one in from me for a good measure. What does that really have to do with whether these are the same or can we share some of the languages of those things. So here again, is a set of questions for you. So first of all, do you see governance in our definition of data architecture? Do you see architecture in data governance? Do they need to be? What are your thoughts on that? Yeah, so data architecture is never going to do the right thing without data governance and data governance is never going to achieve a whole lot without data architecture. I think of it like, you know, Bob, I've always been a fan of your definition of data governance. Succinct, it's clear, and it's got a little bit of a tooth to it. You've got to enforce the authority. Well, how are you going to do that with data governance? You're going to create, you know, some work docs and put them on SharePoint and expect that to enforce your authority on what you want to do with data and hope people just listen. Nobody listens. Nobody's going to just do it. And so data architecture helped provide the guardrails in actually achieving what you need to do with data governance. And this is where I really get passionate, and I'm passionate about a lot of stuff, but I especially get passionate when it comes to data governance and its relative ineffectiveness in most of our organizations. And I believe that it's because the people determining data governance policies and standards have very little to do with building the data platforms where all the data stuff happens. And so for me, data architecture is that bridge. It is that connection point. It starts to put us towards the how versus the data governance is what. And to get the whole story, you need the what, you need the how, and you need a bunch more stuff to actually achieve the goals that we have with data in that organization. That's why I come back to that notion of like the diamond. These are two facets, but two facets on a diamond does not make the thing sparkle. There's a lot more work to be done, but today we're focusing on these two aspects of it. I think it also highlights we love to break down data and data governance and all the different aspects of like the Dama wheel and, you know, just go pick anybody talking about data. They have their framework of whatever. We love to think about the details because they make it feel more actionable. But what we have to really solve for is the system. We have to solve for the system throughput of how data goes from being whatever this thing is from wherever our operational system created it into something that actually drives the business improvement. And that tap that dance of all these different functions. That's the thing that we really need to be focused on is how do we orchestrate that dance. It's choreography type of question, not just a how do we do data governance the best darn way we can that by itself. One facet does not make a sparkly diamond. Okay, I mean, to me, that makes sense and I typically want to disagree with you just for our in the webinar, but I can't do it this time. So I'll keep looking for additional chances in the future, but architecture being the what in the how. And I actually think that the governance is the through part of that. Well, because even execution and enforcement of authority all has to do with people's behavior associated with the data. So, but people also need to behave when it comes to pulling together the artifacts that are necessary to have data architecture. Actually, it's not the questions not on this page here, but maybe you can talk about how do these things fit into data strategy. This data strategy then include architecture and governance. Oh, yeah, I mean, I think it absolutely has to and I actually think that's a good place to start thinking about it because data strategy is also not the place to start. It's actually business strategy and then he starts saying, well, how can we use data to execute a business strategy and now you can get into data strategy, right. So but at least it's relatively contained but still broad enough to have all of those facets in your sphere of thought. Right, so I think that is a good way of thinking about it because when it when you start thinking about the data strategy, now you're starting to think about how do these different functions relate to one another versus how do we do this one thing. I think, you know, what I've seen with a lot of data governance, you know, efforts that get started is that they get started by having a meeting and they talk about data for a while and then they're like, let's create some rules for folks. And that sounds like a good idea but the problem is that you don't really know what you're trying to achieve with those rules you just are trying to do things that you think makes sense. And so if you if you are oriented first towards business strategy that changes the dynamic quite substantially because now you're thinking about okay, how does data help our business. And what are the things that we're struggling with in using that data to help our business. And then that starts to form the basis for what you are trying to do with data governance. Because you're saying hey, let's remove some of these impediments or some of these challenges that are caused by people trying hard but they're not very coordinated and they're not really knowledgeable on how they should or shouldn't do certain things let's help them out. Now we start to create this path towards improving our businesses with the data versus simply saying, well that data certainly got a lot of risk we better govern that so we don't expose all that risk which is a noble intent but it limits its effectiveness. So what can we do that what can people that are engaged in organizations around the country around the world do is there a place they can go it seems like what I'd like to investigate a little further here is the whole concept of the business strategy. So is there typically a because you would think that a business strategy does for the business what a data strategy would do for the data right and it would interrelate those pieces and talk about how they work together. Do organizations have business strategies that that are documented that are shared that we again I'm trying to look to you say you talked about orchestrating a dance or or something like that. Who who orchestrates the dance. I mean, is it the business strategy mentioned is first, and then there's data strategy to address the things that are detailed in the business strategy. Does it start it does the orchestration of this exist at the data strategy level. I like how you're or each of the groups are they meant to be independent. So I like how you're trying to paint me in a corner but the secret is I'm putting carpeting in this room so no pain is going to block me in but the. So, so let's let's break this. So first off, your organization should better have a business strategy, hopefully an articulated one hopefully documented and synthesized one. If it doesn't you've got big problems but if you do and it wasn't advised or the data folks the data strategy people that the people that are going to create that data strategy. If they weren't involved in that business strategy process. You got a new kind of problem and that is your business strategy has no idea what's practical from a data perspective especially so you don't know what's even in the realm of possible and so this is where the deflect has to come from is that really. Our data experts should be involved in the creation of that business strategy so that the business strategy is not insane and then we can then figure out the execution plan in the data strategy tied to all of that. Once the business has said hey these are our priorities. These are what we want to achieve and the data people can talk to where we get our hands on the business strategy. Well I mean your executives are going to have your business strategy but that should be something that's more widely shared like everybody in your business is and I hope that they are involved in making the business successful. You should at least have an idea on what that business is and what that that success definition should be for your business because that's just a fundamental leadership thing. You see a lot of mission statements. You see a lot of vision statements but they don't necessarily have the breadth of the strategy that you were talking about. Well yeah you need to break those down into an action plan right so it's and this is the thing like we have to recognize that data governance and even just data itself is fundamentally a change agent for organization. That's why data like is useful is to help us do things better and they could help us manage risk better, could help us make more money, it could help us save costs, it could help us be more efficient. All those things are good things but the fact is that data only helps when you do something different and that to me is why like the business strategy is all about doing something different. Well couldn't you do the business part of their business better if you're informing it with data? And so it's all an intertwined system and the more breakdowns there are because I think Bob you're raising some very good arguments here. And that is most businesses don't actually do this very well and it's and it's there's all these breakdowns and there's all these oh they're going to be over in this place developing a business strategy and we're going to be over here and they're going to be over there. Like that's the problem right like that's why data governance is so hard is because we're trying to string together all these disparate groups who don't talk to each other very well under good circumstances let alone when you're like hey let's do this really hard work around data that nobody quite understands. Like that's a really big ask even in isolation of just the data governance question data architecture now takes it to another level because there's probably an implied resource commitment to doing data architecture means you're building something creating some sort of probably technology driven mechanism to further the changes driven by data in your organization aligned with your business or data strategies. And so all of these things are so interconnected that when you see big gaps between the people that should be working really closely you know there's probably something there that you want to start to address there's a bottleneck there there's something there's a disconnect that should be resolved and I think that's where you're coming back to one of your earlier questions is that when you think about you know what is it that you really want to do in your organization to be successful and what are the things standing in your way. None of those are fundamentally about data data as an influencer it's an attribute but it's not the fundamental purpose of your business under most circumstances and so you have to think about how can we accelerate I like to think of it. As an as an amplifier like if and I love the audio quality and I like to think about this it can often be this this tricky solution. Right but if you if you're amplifying something and there's a lot of static and there's a lot of feedback you're going to make that loud version of it bad it's not going to be very pleasant to listen to but if you have a very clean source and a very good amplification quality. You're going to have a much louder much richer sound projection and that's really with data the same kind of scenarios that if we start to add all of this noise into our data processes and into how people are working with it or these gaps. You have all of this noise in the amplifier of technology and that's that's what's really problematic and that's how it manifests for when businesses struggle using data it's because there's too much noise amidst where there's there's real value inside of it. You know what we could we could talk about this easily for the next half hour we got other questions. I'm going to fundamentally disagree with something you said and it's that you said that it well maybe I just kind of read something into what you said you might have to leave an opening for that potential to take place but you talked about data not being the fundamental purpose for an organization so you know I work with banks I work with biotech companies I work with government agencies I work with manufacturers anybody who is looking to put governance into place and metadata management into place. And it seems as though the data is it has it may not be the fundamental purpose but even though a company might not be what would be recognized as being a data company they all are right and they all. So we need because you just talked about connections making connections with between these things and getting you know basically getting the almighty light bulb to go off above somebody's head to say okay we understand that these are connected fundamentally and that we need to address this. Finding that person in the organization that's going to take that and move that forward. You know maybe what we're talking about here with data architecture and data governance is really very far down the food chain when it comes to. You know where these things should be positioned within the organization so I'm going to go on to the next set of questions but. Let me address that for one minute though because I think it's an important point and you're not wrong but I want to articulate a little bit more clearly what I meant by that and that is data is the closest thing we have to truth in our organization. And that's a really important part of helping our organizations be successful. The thing is is that it's a means to an end it is not the end itself it is an important cog in the machine and the machine doesn't function without that cog. But it is not the fundamental purpose for that machine to exist and so I think about it as as yes you need data you need to leverage that data to achieve your business goals but simply acquiring data for most organizations is not the end. It is an important part of that journey but there's something else that's compelling you and if we mistake those two things and treat them as exactly the same we will lose our way because we lose that anchoring to what really matters to the business. We start treating data as important and an end into itself and that leads us down paths that are suboptimal compared to if we were orienting more clearly to what the business is really about. I've got a great analogy for this. It's like it's a diamond facet. Yes, well done, well done. It makes perfect sense to me now that it is truly not the end all and be all but it is a piece of what is going to make an organization better if they're looking for continuous improvement. Okay, so that's kind of it was kind of brought that full circle that whole discussion full circle, which is, you know, that is really a great analogy. I think I saw some people mentioned in the chat that that's that that makes sense as an analogy. But now let's kind of get back to the topic of hands here the data architecture and data governance. You know, can we for anybody who's thinking that data governance is as a data architecture is data governance. Can you explain very simply what you know how does data governance relate to data governance or how does data architecture relate to data governance and the other way around. And, you know, why is it important to make that distinction if it's important to make that distinction. Yeah. Well, I think data architecture is still one of these terms that has a wide variety of interpretations, even with the definitions that you put forth when we think about it in practical terms. Data architecture is hard to put in a box is data governance. I think data governance is something that, you know, in actual practice can mean a lot of different things. And so I feel when I think about data governance and going back to your definition of enforcing authority and help clarifying things around what our data assets are. I think that's, you know, a good high level directional mandate. Right. And I see this as being the driving principle. It's like the mission statement. It's like, okay, we got to do these things. And it can break into more detail and governance really gets involved with that stuff. But at some point you have to decide, okay, you know, here's the rules that in front of us. How do you go play the game? And to me data architecture is like building the field on which the game is played. Like the data governance is going to tell you the rules and it's going to cover the game that's about to be played on that field. But the data architecture is interpreting those rules and putting together a framework in which those rules can be implemented in the most effective manner possible. So I'll go with a baseball analogy because that's pictures and catchers and I'm so done with snow here in Chicago that I need to think of spring. And so baseball I think is a fair analogy for this. And if data governance is the rules of baseball and data architecture say, okay, here's the field, here are the balls, here are the baths, and here are the players. Like how do the players get onto the field or how do they do it? Like that all gets involved with the architecture, but it's not the same thing as having those players play the game. And I think that they're intertwined. Neither one really does a whole lot by itself without the other, but they each have functional responsibilities. That's where I think they fork and separate. That's where they deviate from one another. Is that the data architecture responsibilities are about building the structures and framework in which data governance can be achieved. Data governance is about helping data architecture build the right thing for the right game. Like instead of, you know, if you don't have data governance, you're going to go out to that field and you're going to say, let's put some lines on that field. That sounds good.  And that may be a fun game, but it's not very extensible to people who haven't played it before or were involved in the invention of that crazy game that, you know, the children are playing. And so I think that may be, and again, I run a big danger when I start doing analogies on the fly, but I think there was some truth in that one. So I think I think there is. And it's a very timely, I guess, pictures and catchers reported yesterday or something like that. The pirates have pictures and catchers that'll be a good for this year. We're not sure that they even have them yet. So it's almost as though data governance is kind of the protocol and that data architecture is the execution of that protocol. Or, you know, it's because people that can relate to being a data architect are not necessarily, they play a role in governance, but they're not, they're not stew, they're stew. I say they may be technical stewards of the data, but they're not business necessarily business stewards of the data. Is there a clear, is it a necessary distinction to make between these two so that companies can articulate this that you can't have one without the other? Well, I think there is. And I think the data architects still have to do a lot of interpretation of the broader rules set forth by data governance. And they exist. Data architects really exist at a metadata type layer. They're creating structures that data flows through. I think of it sometimes as pipes that the data flows through, right? And oftentimes the folks that are building out those structures from a functional and career perspective, they are not the ones that should be developing the rules for data in the organization. Like, I would identify more as a data architect than a data governance practitioner by trade. And I would say I really want to have more insight coming directly from the business and I coach them into what we need as data architects to help us build the right thing. But I really want somebody who's deep in understanding what that business strategy is, deep in understanding how we execute our operations of our business, and where are the struggles that we encounter with data? What are those reports that are just unreliable? What are those things that have caused us to make bad investments? All those stories of where data has not achieved its potential, those are the things as a data architect I want to understand. So I can build out structures and lead development teams so that we're creating the right kinds of technologies and artifacts that folks that are putting data to use get the most benefit from. Otherwise, I'm just flying, I'm guessing too much, and I still have to interpret because I have a whole function that I have to do that the data governance folks aren't going to necessarily do. But I need that help. I need that guidance or otherwise as a data architect, I'm just making too many assumptions and that increases the risk to the business as well. Though I mean well, it's not a guarantee that I'm going to build the right thing. Are organizations more sold on that they need data architecture than they need data governance? Oh, it depends on your context. I think that a lot of folks might say that that's the case. A lot of data architects are saying, hey, with all of these tools that come out, these in-memory data platforms that make it so that you don't need data modeling or data architecture anymore. I'm not a video, but I'm waving my arms wildly in hysterics right now because there's a constant pressure on businesses to buy that easy tool. Oh, this is going to solve all the problems. It's not. And there's still a need for data architecture even though technology is more capable now than it used to be. But there's more data to deal with than there used to be. And there's more confusion and complexities and what people are doing and how our businesses function in that data landscape and the technologies that are available to us. So yeah, I mean I think maybe some businesses are more aware of the need for data architecture, others are more aware of the need for data governance. The fact is that they're all important and they're important at varying degrees at varying times. It's not like you're going to say, okay, we're going to take $5 million and we're going to put one data governance, one data architecture, one data quality, one metadata management, blah, blah, blah. And just do that for the next 20 years. Really, we need to have influence. Okay, where are we weak? Where do we need to help? We've been doing it that way for so long. Where I mean organizations don't connect the dots as well as they need to connect the dots and to understand that to understand the relationship between these two disciplines. Because as you said, you can't have the field without the players and you can't have the players without the field you're not doing you're not getting anything done. And in fact, these things really, I would think that data architecture would end out that a good data architecture would result in data governance and that good data governance would result in the appropriate data architecture taking place. So these things are, that's why I asked the question of which one do people feel is more important to their organization. And can we use whichever one is more important based on the context of your organization to bring the other one along with it? You know, when I say so, we know that these are both data disciplines. We know that they both basically require people and process and technology. And we certainly understand that without having senior leadership support, sponsorship and understanding that any of these disciplines are going to be at risk. And so there's a common understanding between those things, then the kind of the question becomes, should we sell these things together? Should we even mention them together? Can you do one without the other? Which one really needs, is one of them dependent on the other one? Maybe you can address that for us. Yeah, well, and I think, I was just thinking that one of my favorite things to say at the conferences that we're not having right now, but like when I'd stand up in front of a room, I'd say, you know, this right now, this is the easiest part of my job. And this webinar, very similarly, very easy for me to sit back and tell you how I think things should be, right? And how, you know, data architecture and data governance are combined, and then we've got, you know, strategies and all of the stuff that we've been talking about. And that's great. But when we get to the real world, things get muddy really quickly. And there's failings of leadership and structures all over the place. I was just thinking about, like, you know, we think about the way we've been doing these resource allocations for so long, Bob, like you mentioned. It's like, who here has been in a business where come December, anybody who has money left in their budget starts spending it on just random junk that they don't really need services and tools and whatever, because they don't want to have their budget reduced next year. Oh, insane is that. Like, that's a normal thing. You should see my face when I got like aghast by that. I mean, we have to recognize that logically that is just insane. But that's how it goes because the alternative is much more work. And there's only so much effort we have to work with, right? And so I think that that's what it comes back to is to say, what is worth putting the work in? Where will an architecture argument versus a data governance argument land in your organization? How does your organization think? What is your senior leadership oriented towards? Are they already very data driven? Are they very interested in it? Are they motivated by some of the latest and greatest things? Like artificial intelligence and machine learning? Are they throwing those terms around? Like, figure out what is most important really to your business and then figure out how it resonates with what is most interesting to your leadership and see how you can bring those together in a harmonious way. I think that's key is to recognize what's important to your leadership. They're your leadership for a reason, whether you agree with them or not. You need to respect that they are in charge of certain areas that you want to influence and help. But you have to recognize that it's not better to be right but ineffective. You want to be effective no matter what. Even if you're right, sometimes meeting in the middle will accomplish more than simply saying, if we don't get this money for data architecture and data governance, we don't do it this way, then we're going to be wrong and everything's going to be broken. Well, you can be right and not make any difference. Or you can find a way to work with when all of that chaos and craziness around you and find a way to be effective and move that needle forward however you can. The terms here, the priorities here, all of it is useful knowledge to have as you go and break all the rules in real life because you have to make accommodations that I don't have to make when I'm talking in a webinar. You just hit it right on the nose. I mean, it's easy to talk about things theoretically, but as you mentioned, the things are not clean. And everything goes the way in the decision making is the way that you need it to be in your organization. And some of those things you can have an impact on and some of them you can't. And we as practitioners are spending a lot of time trying to match exactly what your data governance council or what your steering committee or what your board wants to know about this. And we're thinking that, you know, if we put the words a certain way that all of a sudden the light bulb is going to go off. But, and I think it is continuous education. You don't bombard them continuously with information, but you want to constantly be communicating about the importance of these things, getting the opportunity to present a case for why even a limited number of resources should be spent on either data architecture or data governance becomes really critical. But we all seem to be wrapped around that axis of, we have the word, in a way that needs to be a word, it's better that no, they'll see the picture. You know, they've got a lot of other things to think about. It's like the facets of the diamond. Again, they've got other facets that are being looked at that we don't even know about. And you know what? A lot of those could probably be tied to data too. So like I said, we could talk about this for another hour, but we're not. We're going to kind of wrap up. I do want to highlight. There was one thing you said in there and you went past it really quickly that I really want to highlight. And that is, you know, the question is, how much does your leadership really need to know or really need to care or understand about all of these nuances? And the key point, I think, is that's an important question and be very deliberate in how you scale up and down your granularity or abstraction of the conversation. And when you're talking to data architects or developers, it's going to be at one layer of granularity. When you're talking to senior executives, it's going to be at another. But just recognize the most important thing in any of those conversations is what is the recipient getting from this? What is in it for them? How will they benefit from this conversation or from this evaluation? And their need for detail varies considerably depending on their role and depending on what their decision framework is and what they are actively engaging in their own role. So be thoughtful about that. I think there's often not enough thinking deliberately about what layer of detail does this person really need. And you know what? The word I've been using a lot these days is the word resolute. I mean, there has to be a resolute effort. So there needs to be someone that has the time to put that thought into it and to get it in front of people so that they're understanding what it is that we're doing. So basically in this discussion so far today, we've basically decided that they're not the same thing. At least when we peel it down several layers to get to the pieces or the components of a data strategy of which data architecture would be one and that governance would be one as well, that when it gets to that level, they're not the same thing. They are different. They're related in a lot of different ways. You know, if we just added the term governing to the definition of data architecture where it says it's the form of governing the specifications that are used to describe the existing state, the data requirements and those types of things. And that's basically stealing from the definition that I used earlier, but just putting the governance aspect into that. So we know that they're related. We've kind of come to the conclusion that they're not the same thing, but we've also kind of come to the conclusion that doesn't really matter and how much does the executive level of the organization really need to know about that. So any final words on that, Anthony, as to that they're not the same, they are, they're closely related, and then we'll see if Shannon has received any questions for us. Yeah, I think you're right on, Bob, and I think that at the end of the day, the differences and the similarities are less important in comparing data architecture and data governance to knowing that these kinds of functions are very important to the overall story. And it's not just these two things, there's so many more of them. But I like this discussion and I think that that last point on this slide is an especially good one because it really helps connect the two versus the earlier definitions, which were a little bit more isolated and they are very intertwined. Okay, and so we'll just leave it at that and let people draw their own conclusions. You know, basically over the last 50 minutes we talked about the whole analogy of the two sides of the same coin and the diamond facets analogy that Anthony spoke about. And I think that really, really describes it perhaps better than saying that it's really two sides of the same coin. We talked about some of the similarities. We talked about their place in the overall strategy for the organization from a business strategy that has a data strategy that's involved in the, that's kind of connected directly to the business strategy. We talked about the similarities between these things. The difference is we talked about how to use them, how to try to use one to sell the other, or is that a good idea to do that? And we basically come to a quick conclusion that they're not the same things, but they are similar in so many ways. And they're all a facet on a diamond that can be used to improve the way that we are data centric and digitally focused as an organization. So with that, I am going to toss it back to Shannon to see if we get any questions from our discussion today. We did indeed lots of questions coming in here, and we'll get to as many as we can. If you have, if we can't get to it, of course, we'll get the questions over to Bob to include in the follow up along with links to the slides and the recordings, which we'll get to in Monday for this webinar. So diving in here, so where do they intersect? Where there are two key governance things that need to be considered when data is architected, data retention and data classification, personal info or confidential. If not architected properly, turn DG, they turn into DG issues. Any comments on that? Well, Anthony, I'll let you talk about it, but I would think that even the things that were just mentioned within that question are only two of the facets within data architecture itself because classification is very important and protection is extremely important, but there's the whole quality perspective of it. There's the consistency and the duplication and things that cause problems within the organization. So I don't know, Anthony, you've got a way to address that? Yeah, and I kind of agree with you, Bob. And I just know I won't do it justice in the short time, but I did an online trading course in data architecture for dataversity. And we explore a lot of that because I think that data architecture and though those two points are pieces of it, it's gotten much broader in its scope. And it's really taken on a lot of things that sound like enterprise architecture or sound like a technical development type of role. And so there's a lot of facets to this that aren't just purely data architecture isn't just about data anymore. And I think that it goes much bigger. But I do think at the end of the day it is interpreting and implementing the standards and policies of governance and connecting them to those technology amplifiers that you have in your business. And there's so many different aspects of it. It would justify its own online trading course, which I created for you. I know where people can find that. I love it. Are all artifacts of data architecture useful for data governance? Oh, yeah. I mean, I think that it gives... Well, I think that there's a give and take. And I think, and this is just a good rule of thumb, is anytime somebody is doing a lot of talking at the recipient and not doing much listening, there's an imbalance there that probably would benefit from being corrected. And so if you interpret data governance just sends it down the mountain to data architecture and data architecture has to deal with it, it's just like that relationship between data strategy and business strategy. And that if the business strategy isn't informed by what the data can actually do or what the data really is, then you're going to have this not coupled connection to reality. And similar with governance, if you can decide all you want, but if you don't have a way to actually anchor it to the assets that you have, then your data governance is just going to be floating out there without any real relevance to the data that you have in your business. So by all means, see these patterns. They exist at many different layers of granularity and abstraction. I think it's very interesting how these patterns exist in so many different places. The question was asked was, are all of the artifacts of data architecture, are they useful to data governance? And you talked about that some of them are really, really detailed and some of them are more high level. You know, I would answer the question that if the artifacts, if the information in the artifacts that are being developed by data architecture is going to move the organization, move the arrow the way that it needs to go. You know, that information, it becomes useful to data governance. If it helps to improve the literacy of the organization, if it helps people to know what data exists, where it exists, how to get to it, then it is something that is useful to the data governance. I don't know enough about data architecture and all of the things that a data architect does and keeps track of to know that everything that they keep track of is going to be a value to somebody. That's why, you know, when I talk about metadata governance, it requires because there's a lot of different types of metadata that can address a lot of different things. So there's not somebody who is somewhat selective and saying, we need to manage this specific information. And you know what, by chance that happens to fall in a data architecture artifact, that it's valuable enough to make that information available to somebody else. So, I mean, again, I think that it's, a lot of it will depend on the organization. But, you know, again, depending on that level of detail that the architects are managing, I would say probably most of it would add value to somebody if you can make the connection to that somebody. Well, and I want to add one thing in that your data governance should be creating orchestrations with leverage where you can extend far beyond like your data governance council. Like is your data governance council going to be looking at code that was involved with data architecture? Probably not most of the time. If, though, say you had an audit finding or a GDPR fine type of thing that all of a sudden you're staring down a, you know, seven or nine figure type of fee, you're going to get real detailed real quick. And so how do you extend the policies at the governance level where they're actionable out to architects and developers and the people that are entrusted to build those systems in compliance with governance. And then when issues arise or new circumstances warrant, you're going to want to be able to dive all the way very deeply, maybe with some help, certainly, but need to be able to get to that level of detail and make sure that our governance enforcement of authority managed to percolate out in an unfettered manner all the way to the most detailed granular aspects of the organization. So you're saying, yes, it's potential that every artifact is useful to governance. I think that potential has to be there. Otherwise, not really data architecture. All right. Well, we have less than two minutes. So if I can get your elevator page on this next one, what is data governance? What is data governance drive? Does data governance drive data strategy or does data strategy drive data governance? I say that data strategy, and I did a session on this recently, I think it was a recent data diversity event where data governance is a component, at least in my mind, it is a component of a data strategy. So there is the people aspect of governing data. There's the organizational aspect of it. There is the behavioral, the whole behavioral aspect of it. And there's the culture of the organization needing to become more data literate and being more data aware.  What do you think, Anthony? I'll let you have the final word. Yeah, I think that data governance, just like business strategy and data strategy, data strategy can inform the business strategy. I think good data governance should be probably more quantified than it often is. And I think that that can help drive what that data strategy prioritization set is. Where are we weak? Where are we strong? What are we struggling with from a data perspective and data governance's view? And that can inform what do we want to do about that? And I think that's where that feedback loop exists. But I think under most circumstances, the data strategy helps set the priorities for data governance, but then the data governance outcomes can influence what those priorities are. Oh, that was awesome. I know I gave you guys like a massive question to answer in a few minutes because you can be amazing. Well, thank you both so much for this great presentation. Thanks to our attendees for being so engaged and everything that is all the time we have for this session. Anthony, what's always nice to have you on and really appreciate you joining us. And just a reminder, I will send a follow-up email to everybody by end of day Monday with links to the slides and links to the recording of the session. Thank you both. Thanks, Shannon. Thanks, everybody. Have a great day, everybody.


Thanks for staying with us. Now, on Wednesday, the Tribunal upheld the victory of President Bola Ahmed Tinnabu. In the February 25th General Elections, the Tribunal led by Haruna Sami, or Samani, dismissed the petitions filed by Attico Abu Bakar of the People's Democratic Party, MP Taubi of the Labor Party, and allied People's Movement, APM, challenging Tinnabu's victory. This comes after the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, Aine Professor Mahmoud Yakubu, admitted that the commission experienced glitches in transmitting the election results through the IRF during the presidential election. He acknowledged this while giving a critique of the technological innovations deployed during the elections at a session with civil society organizations on the review of the 2023 General Elections. Now, the Ainec Chairman said, the accreditation of voters using the bimodal voter accreditation system, that's the beavers, and the uploading of the results of the Ainec, of the results of Ainec viewing portal, that's the IRF, were successful, but the commission experienced glitches in transmitting the results through the IRF during the presidential election. In lieu of the Tribunal's judgment, today we're analyzing the Ainecs, their job, right? They had just one job, right? Do you think that job, they had a plasma? How did they do? Now, please, let's hear what you have to say. Remember, you can join the conversation, send us an SMS or WhatsApp to do it. 1-803-4663. You can also treat that as the way you should act for women. So I have to bring in Kunlilawal in one minute, but I just want to hear your thoughts. Do you think, how well did Ainec do? Did they do well? I mean, based on what the Tribunal said that they were not mandated to transmit results? I'm kind of confused in this matter. I really don't have much to say. You just keep quiet and let the experts teach me. Yeah, I think I'm just going to lean towards Kunlilawal giving his expert view, because I mean, like you said, Ainec's job in electoral process is not just one. It's many things. So if we're to rate them, are we just rating them based on the results of the transmission or on all the other things? Exactly, but we'll just take things. So I think, yeah, that's there. All right, Kunlilawal is no stranger to ways he's an entrepreneur, idea generator, telex speaker and patriot. He has a keen eye for opportunities based on his experience in politics, working with non-governmental organizations and the federal government of Nigeria. He is passionate about Nigeria and he is what we can term a detribalized Nigeria. And he considers his boundaries to be limitless and is really focused on changing the Nigerian narrative in political participation and currently serves as the executive director of Electoral College Nigeria and is also the country lead for word chat. All right, so Kunlilawal, thank you so much for joining us this evening. This is an interesting conversation that, you know what, I told myself, I cannot give myself a headache when I have Kunlilawal in my corner. So in a lot of Nigerians, there's so many like talks here and there and I love you for one thing. Most times when you have a conversation, you do not attach emotions to it because truly, we don't need emotions. We need facts, we need figures, we need someone that will be able to tell us exactly, you know, bring them, bring a bit of clarity because we like to whip up emotions. We like to whip up sentiments and all of that when it comes to things like this. I for one, I mean, I had a conversation when last week I said I wasn't expecting anything to come up from that election in terms of the way Nigerians, you know, because the Nigerian expectation was that they would say, okay, yes, I was like literally what played out was what I expected to play out. But tell me, if we want to give a scorecard to first of all the tribunal, right, did they do a good job?  They were so much assurance and convictions and all of that, take your PVCs and go out. That you mean, I mean, I remember several times also having conversations around the exciting news around INEC, changing the policies and this real time transmission of results, all of those things, Kule. Tribunal cannot say they were not mandated to do it. Obiko, like I said before, I don't want to do emotions. Tell me, exactly what you think from the expert view and of course from the data that you're privy to that we are not privy to. Did they do a good job as a tribunal and also the INEC, I mean, what's INEC's scorecard on the 2023 elections? Okay, so I'd like to hinge this conversation first or beginning or we need staff to INEC. If we start to the tribunal, I miss so unnecessary things. So INEC, of course, as the appetite in elections in Nigeria, gathered by the electoral act, it is clear that INEC, only case of INEC has pre-election, election, post-election, three parameters in which INEC operates. Pre-election will, of course, involve political parties. Clearly, the mechanisms which allowed political parties function, whether their conventions went well as a point in the chairman or whatever, the electoral act stipulates that soft copies of party register and hard copies are submitted to INEC by 18 political parties. Did they meet this criteria? No, no party met this criteria. Do the people know? No. So before you start to ask about accountability of INEC, you actually should ask for an entire accountability of everyone. First, you cannot run a democracy in a politically illiterate country. It's going to be hard. We are so concerned about the product of our elections, nobody even cares about the process, which is a big problem. So you've been having flaws in the foundations from the beginning, and then you want a great outcome. We seem to forget, on the basis of morality, what everybody is accusing INEC of is the basis of morality, because INEC publicly came out with it's, with Veslo Sokwe, Speer, saying the results are going to be transmitted live, they are irate. But the law, the electoral act, and what gives INEC its power also grants INEC a clear determinant on how it relays the information our colleagues, the information has. INEC is independent to that level. So as much as people say INEC is not independent, INEC actually is independent to that level. That is why INEC can stand and the courts can come out and say, if INEC chose this as the mode of transmission, then fine it is. In another country, or in the same democracy, what would have happened is that the INEC chairman and the PR who were making statements, even making the statements internationally, because I remember a conference in Chatham House in which they engaged this conversation. So clearly, this they would have resigned because they had lied to the Nigerians. Yes. But by law, legally, INEC is empowered to transmit by any means necessary. That they choose? Yes, by law. So, how would I put it? It's a case of, like I said, morality, not illegality. So INEC did not at any point, shrunk any of Nigeria's rules. Now, heading up to the judgments. It is amazing. It's a 98-page judgment. People blame people that, you know, where at the judgment I'm falling asleep, I watch the judgments. I can't remember how many times I fell asleep. I was watching it. I fell asleep. I tried to look at it. I tried to look at the 98 pages. Come on. Somebody was reading. Let me put it properly. It's now working for me. So, but the key things to note, it is so amazing and I'm sorry to say that I think some senior advocates in Nigeria take a lot of money, do not look at the electorate and jump to ground persecution. And this happened on all legal sides for all respondents. There was the case of Pitao B by APC clearly stating the legal team of APC stating clearly that Pitao B didn't have the rights to run for election under the labor party, pre-election matter. You all know that you can't bring a pre-election matter to that vote. The Electoral Act is clear, I think, in 25B emotion. So I think it's 25B. And it's clear that as amended in 2022. Now, not people in the same party. Only people that participated in that primaries are capable to sue people over those positions in a pre-election matter. So, it's indirectly stays. It has for labor party in general. Patutomi was the one that ran against Pitao. If it wasn't Patutomi suing, according to the new laws, you cannot carry Pitao B to court over a primaries. The same goes to Shetima, the vice president. Yes, the vice president 002, Kashim Shetima. Of course, his excellency the vice president. Two was accused on a double nomination. Electoral Act 2022, 25B still protects that. You did not run. You are not one of those that ran against him. You are not under his party. No, it's not even under his party. The act is clear. If you are not in that, that's you do contest. For the primaries. You do not contest in that election. Contest against in that particular primaries. Yes, no. You don't carry. And that is to reduce the bulk and massive amount of cases we have. Because what you normally have preceding Nigeria is not going to court over cases that are not even in that party. That's why we started off. So to play that, let it be between if I run against Owa in this case. If I run against Owa in this case, it will not be like this in the party. No, within actually the position you run. Okay, the position of Owa is preceding. So even if, so for example, if let's say I'm in the APC and I have a discrepancy with a vice president, I cannot take him to court because I didn't run against him. But if I run against him, I can. Making it simpler and making it, but now the lawyers who handled this case, I mean, it's shocking. It's a safety review. Secondly, evidence placed before the court. It was shocking to read and shocking to realize that not one pulling unit sheet was brought as evidence. Evidence being brought, no offense to media stations, we're breaking news on stations and discussions like this where people say, is this that the election? You brought that evidence to court. Now it's shocking you. You should go through those 98 pages. You will be very, very... Well, I thought they said it brought out papers only and some of them were thrown out. Like literally, I don't know what you're saying. Now you're getting make up. There was no evidence. And it was clear that there was no evidence or take anything taken into evidence that resulted in a pulling unit sheet. One of the things the tribe now kept talking about was the fact that lawyers, the lawyers against the lawyers put in a case against the sitting president did not provide and they stated it. They said you have... He was not objected to it. Samani was very clear on it. And he said you have political parties have people in pulling units. You didn't bring me one pulling unit sheet that showed the discrepancy between this and this. You didn't. How do you want to push a case? But today I have... That's fair. No, you have. You have a pulling agent unit. You have a pulling agent unit. Is that not the property of INAIC? No, no, no. You sign off. So what happens is that everybody's... When you are going there, you know there was a problem. No, no. That's for the normal. I've been in the political party. I know what I'm telling you. I'm telling you that... You sign these things. This is for that one. They couldn't have been able to provide a lot of pulling units. No, no. For instance, the Labour Party did not have what's it called? Representatives at the presidential elections. Who's for that? I don't know. That one is not a conversation that we need to talk about. But you know what? Let's just go out and come back out. Let's just ask you the question. But you know, stay with us from the right path. All right, thanks for staying with us. And if you're just steering the... We're discussing this tribunal's judgment and we're analyzing INAIC's job delivery. Do you think they did a fantastic job? Please let's hear what you have to say. Remember, you can join the conversation. Send us an SMS or WhatsApp to bridge one. 803-4663. And we still have Kunle Lawaw with us. Okay, Keo, let me let Joella please comment. Because if I go to that conversation, we will not leave yesterday. Okay, so I think I asked the question and you were just about to respond before we went and break. I was saying that, I mean, the sheets, like you mentioned, is it possible for the parties to have access to that? It's not, I felt like it was the property of INAIC and as such, at the conclusion of any election in the polling unit, it becomes the property of INAIC. So I'm not even aware that the parties that are contested can actually have access to that and present it as evidence. Okay, so they have access to that. They have multiple copies of that thing. Okay, so. But where I was going with that is that because I went, so I did not just vote in my polling unit. I went around polling units and because I vote in Magudo, it's just a walking distance to different kinds of polling units. And I know that for the presidential election, Labour Party, I'm not talking about other parties for instance, Labour Party particularly, they will not have been able to provide those sheets because they did not have representatives in most of those polling units. And the conversation was, a lot of them had like, would I call them ghost workers that didn't show up at the election day, which is conversation for another day in terms of the political drama that happened. But you see, when the governorship happened, they had corrected that because the non-government and all of that come and be their reps. What's the name now? They were not polling agents at the presidential presale. It was people doing videos, taking pictures and all of those things, which is what you are saying that the Tribunal is throwing out. No, but I don't want, what's it called, admittable documents in the courts to question. Because the electoral act is clear. Every party, if you're not ready, and I'm going to say this, it's not nice and most people will say, I couldn't be supporting, I'm not supporting anybody. I'm following the law, I'm supporting the country. If you're not ready to run for president, don't. It's that simple. You have parties, I believe in French parties, I believe in, of course I believe in the whole system of democracy. But this is 9,000 to 8,000 square kilometers, over 107,000 polling units. And you're running for president. If in a case or in a virtuality, you are caught up in a situation like this, this is where these actions, you know, when politicians normally say structure, most people think they're talking about money or mammoth crowds at what they call it, those campaigns. No, that's not what they're talking about. Structure, they'll tell you down to the world level. They can have so Mr. A here, this one. And they know them by here. And they can get it across. That's what structure is in politics. If that is not guaranteed, it would be hard to prove your case in a situation like this. And it's coming back to bite the two parties, PDP and the other party because of this inaction. I don't want to mention APM, because those are, it's clearly, they probably didn't even have up to 100 polling units across Nigeria, 100 polling agents across Nigeria. But the law demands you should have polling agents and they're ready to sign them. And I remember as of the time they signed, according to on paper at the presidential, Labour Party had over 160,000. I think it's 160 or 150. I can't remember the number now, but about 150,000 were signed. So where did they go? Those were approved. Where were they? That's where you said that. But now that is an intraparty problem. Not the... That's not the tribunal's idea. The tribunal's idea. Because you are supposed to have matched that. That's not their business. It's you that, they didn't command me. So are you trying to say that in all of this number of days that they've been in that tribunal, they did not present this 160,000 signed papers? Is that what you're saying? Clearly, yes. Okay. But let's focus on INAG job delivery. Right?  And so I believe that for us, to be able to find a solution, we have to go back. Do you think in terms of job delivery, after the promises of all of these things? Because what I hear you say now is almost I cannot hold INAG. Because on one hand, the law allows them to do whatever it is that they want to do. If they choose to admit the reason to... Why would I correct something? You cannot hold INAG by the particular parameter you have to hold INAG for. But you can't hold INAG on the multiple lot of other things. Okay. That's what I'm saying. What are we holding them on? First, let's go back to the beginning. INAG presents the soft copies of every 18 political parties. The membership lists give us to the tits, everybody. If INAG cannot produce it, that means every convention that was held and every primaries were illegal. Let's start from the beginning. It's normal. So I'm surprised nobody went there. Nobody went there. They decided to stick on divas and... There are many things now. There are many things. Well, it was there a situation in this election where it is clear within the electoral act, I think 95 B, I can't remember. Skip a few numbers a bit. So it's clear within the electoral act that no instrument of the state can't support any political party. Did we not have a sitting minister serve as a campaign spokesman? It's an instrument of the state. That's already another infringement. So the critical question is... I don't know how to say this, man.  It's not even... It's the sand that I'm even asking now. All these things really talk... Is it not the work of a sand that's supposed to understand that these are where you can do punch polls? It's where you can put loop. Because it just seemed like the whole family did. It was just a waste of everybody's time.  Care. It's not even the fact... It's not the judgment in itself. It's the fact that every single thing that they brought, they just threw them out. So it means that you didn't even have one thing to hold on to say, okay, this one, okay, they infringed on this. It's impossible now because we saw some things that happened. People had... What's it called? There was pockets of violence everywhere. Genocide. So even if nothing, at least let's hope people have something that they say, okay, this one they admit to. This person was at fault. I don't see anything like that. Yes, yes, yes, yes, that's important. So let me give an example. Let's say Labour Party. Labour Party won Legos, right? They also won a Pooja. Most of the videos that came out with infringements were in Legos.  Are you thinking of that? I am thinking what you're thinking but I'm saying to you that it's still enough to still bring it off. You understand me? If you think it would change the world. Let me explain. If you... I don't need that right. But if you start to bring infringements and these are in the places you want, it doesn't really sound... It's like you are feeding the defence. Yeah. You are feeding the defence of the person. So I understand them choosing not to go that route. And what's the most paramount that we need to look at is that for us to hold INEC accountable, we are citizens to cannot mitigate our responsibilities. We are held accountable. The electro-artists come on information. Why isn't anybody saying anything? People used government cars to support candidates. Nobody said anything. Which is totally fervently against the law. Some TV stations supported some particular candidates. Totally against the law. Nobody spoke about that. You guys were all fine. So why are you fine when the N2 is not good? I don't understand how you want not to hold every part of the system accountable. But at the end, you want to have the correct answer. It doesn't work now. It doesn't work anywhere in the world. So if you want things to work and you want them to... You start from the beginning. Follow the process step by step and find how the process accountable. If you are holding... If you held INEC, let's say before the conventions, we held them and said, no, parties have not submitted this thing. And every media station in Nigeria was shouting. Everybody said, no, we're not going to elections except all parties submit the membership list. So we know who the delegates actually are. Game would have changed now. They would understand that some things would not be tolerated. And they understand that some people are within the electoral act. But when you tolerated that, you held their convention, you laughed, some put a crime at APC convention, you put a laughing. Primaries came, you were bragging about dollars. Media houses carried how interesting it was that they were not even spending an error against dollars. That's what people were focusing on. Then at the end, you don't want to accuse them. How could they work? Interesting. Interesting. Really interesting. With what you're saying now, Kunli, I'm really scared because it means that in the history of our country, we might never have a quality kind of electoral process. Because from what you're saying is this infringement or whatever, they've been, it's been happening even right from before the elections, right? So and because we are not aware of this, nobody's even questioning it. Nobody's even thinking of even questioning it. It means that forever and ever it will continue that way and nobody will question it and people just be doing the wrongs. You know, the wrong things. I think the real problem in Nigeria is that we've left what the constitution and the laws is. Then we've created a political culture totally different from all of this. And then we've started that narrative and we live within that culture and it has become the way of life. Let's be honest, we do not even follow the electoral act up to 20 percent because it has a stipulation on how much you can spend. Now this is funny. You tell you that the stipulation for let's say running for Senate, the benchmark is 200 million and yet you're selling for 50 million. Is that not already 25 percent of the amount? That's 25 percent of the limit which means Oga will steep a delegate to. That means most people before primaries have exceeded the total campaign limits of any political office from presidency down to, come on, in Lagos you are selling local government chairman form for two million and the limit on local government chairman is five million. You already abusing the system. Okay, so who do we hold accountable to enforce the electoral process? You, the citizens, because as long as you mortgage your own responsibilities or we do not know these laws, these things will continue to go on and politicians know you don't know the law. Let me tell you, the average Nigerian, once it's political time, they feel money flows. That's what we all think. We have consciously allowed ourselves a lot of this happen. So we can't now say we're absorbing ourselves from the situation we find ourselves in. You can't do that. So it's simple. We have chosen to act in a particular way and we deserve the results that come from acting in that particular period. This is it down now. I can say nice things. Do you see this is why I don't like Nigeria conversation? No, but I mean, they are not going to finish it. It's so saddening, saddening rather, because as it stands now, how many of, how many people will be privileged to hear, maybe analyze the thing and teach us, you know, and all that. But you see that, that's also, that goes back to this. We really must read it yourself. Read it directly. And see, we can't afford to keep saying that, oh, I don't know. I didn't know. No, you make it your business to know. You see, it's as simple as that. We don't like the hard stuff. We want it to, we want to wake up and suddenly see that Nigeria is good. It's not possible. Okay, I wanted you to call me. So, while I was sitting here, I'm just, a follow up to what you're saying. A lot of people think, okay, I always tell people, if you know what is going on on social media, who, which actor or as diverse is white, who has tape, who does not have tape, that's the greatest one. Yes. And... If I didn't know about the deal. So who has tape, who does not have tape, who, what is going on here and what is not going on here. If you know that, ignorance of the law can never be justified. Because this information is available. It's not, the electoral act is not hidden. It's not something that senators put in their hand and are walking around it. It's common information spread everywhere. And, and for me, I also blame a few CSOs and yeah, and it's hard to say it maybe because I'm in that space, but I always remind them that they should remember I'm part politician, I'm part CSO. And I'm, we've also sold some wrong ideas. We've pushed people vote, vote, vote, vote, vote and totally ignored them participating in the party system. As long as people do not participate in a party system, what you're going to end up having is a selection and not an election. Because you don't know how these candidates are picked for you. Do you know how somebody appeared? Somebody just come next thing, why you just say, ah, this candidate of APCO, this candidate of PDP, how they appear, you don't know. And you're not part of it. In any functional democracy, the citizens are so part of what is going on that by the time they are done with primaries, you can as well see 20% of people can vote. Anybody that enters is qualified enough to rule the country. And that's the way it's supposed to work. But we now turn the top on top of his head and start from the bottom, vote, vote, vote, vote for who now? Why? Do you, okay, so average, if I ask everybody in in a chosen now, where we are, and I say, okay, banking was running for office, why do you want to vote for banking? People will say, ah, he's a musician. I know him. He's fine. His wife is fine. Really? What does that, he's young? What of those, those parameters? He's supposed to go there and propose bills and work on things. Okay, you got in somebody, ah, level party, level party, level party won a TOSR, legislatively. Knock knock, knock knock, who's there? How many bills has that guy proposed? Zero. They already are back to square one. So the choices that we make politically are totally ignorant. Nigeria's policy level according to the electoral college we are pushing it at 4%. And somebody was saying, one of my friends was saying, only how can it be 84%. I said, it's from data, I say, it's how can it be 84% and I was really pushed back and I was like, look, we use data to, it's like, it's supposed to be 98%. I was like, okay, sorry. But it was. Yes, he's right. It's right because you don't know why you vote for House of Red. You say vote for somebody young. I'll tell you something. If I'm prior to 2023 elections and I'm very guilty, I'm not ashamed to admit it. Thank God for the people like Kule La Wada helped me to see differently. Prior to 2023 elections, if I'm voting Kule, it is the party that I vote in precedency that I will just go across or the other House of Senators. I literally am a kid, you know. And I think that voting pattern is what your guys said about 98% it is true because even for governorship, whichever party I'm voting in governor is the same party that just goes across and that's when you could see that it was a cheap win. Well, 2023 elections were quite different because people voted individuals, they voted people that they believed. So you could, you would use, you saw like literally when they were counting votes at different parties that I monitored. It was a completely different result. The person who was in precedence, the person who was in Senate, you know, it was different because I think there was a better awareness as to why it was important to not just vote across party lines. And that is why I give the 2023 elections a little high score. For the first time in Nigeria and history, we have eight parties in the National Assembly. We have five parties as governors. That has never happened in Nigeria's history. So it seems our politics is going somewhere. Now what we need to change is not the fact that these parties are now being voted for. All we need to change is the reason why you vote for the elections. Yes, you have a good election. Yes. Have we done... Now it's good that we're seeing the tilt that you now know you can't vote. I told you I spoke at an event sometime in 2002. No, 2020-2012 about the ending of 2021. And this was an elite crew in Etiusa. And the same thing you said, they didn't believe they could vote. They said, is the vote still counted if I vote APC here, PDP next? I was like, yes. They were like, no, no, no. They told them that. I said, who told you that? Unfortunately, whatever we're having for, we are always going to have to tell. But honestly, I believe that is better. And I'm just like literally if we had one thing to do with INEC, what would you suggest? What should we do? Unbundle it. How? INEC has too many responsibilities. We have to push for the National Assembly to unbundle it. INEC, there are too many responsibilities vested in the chairman. If you want to really make INEC independent, the first thing you need to do is separate its arms differently. So those that announce election results are totally different and work in a separate place from those that bear with pre-election matters or those that are handling election materials. If you do that and you demand accountability from all and every system demands accountability, we could have something that actually works. And then I also don't believe that Nigeria is ready for a whole election in one day. One day. Even the U.S., China, India, large democracies, they stagger their elections. We are 9,000 to 8,000. We have 400,000 policemen. Half of them are guarding VIP. Then we have 200,000 policemen, meaning one policeman to 1,000 people. But that's impossible. So I believe we should stagger our elections.  We have no volunteers to participate in INEC. Who have? And I... You don't have... Yeah, you even have more people. You don't have more, yeah. This is what I've pushed forward for. And I believe 223 elections, beyond reasonable doubts, has put that in my mind. And I would spend the next three years, at least, pushing for that particular party. I think it should happen like that, honestly, because imagine if we use the resources, even though let's not even say one state, let's even say Southwest. We just do elections around Southwest, bring in all the volunteers, do all the things, you understand? It's easier to monitor, it's easier to do a lot of things, then you move and deploy to another region, and I think it will be better. Because, honestly speaking, the burden is a lot. And Nigerians were not really fantastic document. We don't document things well. So, I mean, it's better we just target it, and I think we might find a solution. But thank you so much, Kunlila Waal. That was something to learn. Always a pleasure. I don't take your presence for granted. He's my brother, by the way, but, you know, I don't take... He's our brother. He's our brother. The way is I've claimed you. The way is I've claimed you. He's our brother. All right, thank you so much, Kale. Always a pleasure. Thank you, Deola. Now, before we go, I'm sure you follow us across all our social media, hand us that way. Sure, Africa, you can interact with us further. Drop a comment and more importantly, follow all our engagements on social media, like share and invite your families and friends to watch and follow the conversation. If you missed our quote for today, which I believe I did not read, here it is again. Before the elections, I called for third party verification of the INEC system so that we are sure that on election day, what is going to happen that they would not lead to a glitch. On election day, INEC said there was a glitch. Ah, this was from Osita Chidiokei, the former minister of aviation and the chieftain of the people's democratic party. We'll see you guys tomorrow. We have a couple of stories that are trending. Hope nothing hotter comes, but we have interesting stories for you people. We'll see you on our latest night. Ciao.