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Tag: ministers

  • I’ll assign portfolio to ministers at inauguration – Buhari

    I’ll assign portfolio to ministers at inauguration – Buhari

    President Muhammadu Buhari, yesterday, disclosed that he will assign portfolio to members of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) who have been confirmed by the Senate at the point of inauguration.

    The President, however, did not mention any particular date for the inauguration of the new ministers.

    Buhari, in a statement by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, commended the Senate for its diligence and prompt confirmation of his ministerial nominees.

    He said: “Specific portfolios shall be assigned with the inauguration of the cabinet.”

    Buhari also expressed satisfaction in the process which he described as swift and efficient.

    According to the President, the people of Nigeria want results, and with this list of ministers, we are confident they shall be delivered.

    “This is a fine, capable and committed group of individuals. Working together, they shall help achieve what we all want and labour toward: a secure, prosperous, corruption-free nation in which nobody is left behind, and talents can flourish.

    “The executive approaches this 9th National Assembly with a renewed spirit of openness and enthusiasm. Where once we sometimes found impasse, we welcome collaboration; where once suspicion took hold, together, we shall demonstrate mutual trust.

    “Scrutiny should never mean deadlock but proper governance. And with a new swathe of national legislators and ministers, we are confident the executive and the legislature can – in partnership – unleash the change Nigerians deserve,” he added.

  • BREAKING: Senate confirms Buhari’s 43 ministerial nominees

    Nigerian Senate on Tuesday confirmed all the 43 ministerial nominees presented to it for approval by President Muhammadu Buhari.
    See the full list of ministers confirmed by the Senate on Tuesday:
    1.Dr. Ikechukwu Ogah (Abia State)
    2. Mohammed Musa Bello (Adamawa State) reappointed
    3. Godswill Akpabio (Akwa Ibom State)
    4. Chris Ngige (Anambra State) reappointment
    5. Sharon Ikeazor (Anambra State)
    6.Adamu Adamu (Bauchi State) reappointment
    7.Ambassador Maryam Katagun (Bauchi State)
    8. Timipre Sylva (Bayelsa State)
    9.George Akume (Benue State)
    10.Mustapha Baba Shehuri (Borno State) reappointment
    11. Goddy Jedy Agba (Cross River State)
    12.Festus Keyamo (Delta State)
    13. Ogbonnaya Onu (Ebonyi State)reappointment
    14. Osagie Ehanire (Edo State) reappointment
    15.Clement Ike (Edo State)
    16. Richard Adeniyi Adebayo (Ekiti State)
    17. Geoffrey Onyeama (Enugu State) reappointment
    18.Ali Isa Pantami (Gombe State)
    19. Emeka Nwajiuba (Imo State)
    20. Suleiman Adamu (Jigawa State)
    21. Zainab Ahmed (Kaduna State) reappointment
    22.Muhammad Mahmood (Kaduna State)
    23.Sabo Nanono (Kano State)
    24.Major General Bashir Salihi Magashi (Kano State)
    25.Hadi Sirika (Katsina State) reappointment
    26.Abubakar Malami (Kebbi State) reappointment
    27.Ramatu Tijjani (Kogi State)
    28. Lai Mohammed (Kwara State)
    29.Gbemisola Saraki (Kwara State)
    30.Babatunde Fashola (Lagos State) reappointment
    31.Adeleke Mamora (Lagos State)
    32. Mohammed H. Abdullahi (Nasarawa State)
    33. Zubair Dada (Niger State)
    34. Olamilekan Adegbite (Ogun State)
    35. Tayo Alasoadura (Ondo State)
    36. Rauf Aregbesola (Osun State)
    37. Sunday Dare (Oyo State)
    38.Paulen Talen (Plateau State)
    39. Rotimi Amaechi (Rivers State)
    40. Maigarai Dingyadi (Sokoto State)
    41. Sale Mamman (Taraba State)
    42. Abubakar D. Aliyu (Yobe State)
    43. Sadiya Umar Faruk (Zamfara State)

  • 19 ministers left to be screened, 24 through Senate grill

    Twenty four of the 43 ministerial nominees of President Muhammadu Buhari have now been screened, on the second day of the exercise.
    There has been no rejection yet.
    All the nominees that have passed through the senate grill have all had an easy touch, with only Sunday Dare, from Oyo, arguably the only one that went through screening in the proper sense of the word.
    He was bombarded with a host of questions about the telecom industry, about broadband, drop calls, and how to make the industry serve Nigerians better.
    He spoke about how registered SIMS can be used to track kidnappers and what NCC has been doing to collaborate with the security agencies.
    Dare, who is at present executive commissioner with the Nigerian Communications Commission confidently and brilliantly answered the questions and delivered a most stellar performance so far.
    On Wednesday, the senators screened 10 of the nominees. They were:
    Uchechukwu Ogah, Ogbonnaya Onu, former science and technology minister, Olamilekan Adegbite, a former works commissioner in Ogun, Adamu Adamu, former education minister, Rotimi Amaechi, a former Speaker of the Rivers State House of Assembly, former governor and former transport minister; former senators George Akume, Godswill Akpabio, Adeleke Olorunnimbe Mamora, Emeka Nwajiuba, a member of the House of Representatives.
    Also screened was Sharon Ikeazor, a lawyer, who now heads the Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate(PTAD).
    Ogah was grilled on the state of the nation’s oil sector, diversification of the economy and the nation’s fiscal policies.
    All the Nominees who have previously served in the upper and lower legislative chambers of the National Assembly as well as in a State House of Assembly were not questioned by senators.They were simply asked to ‘take a bow’ and leave after they were introduced.
    The trend continued on Thursday with Senator Tayo Alasodura, a former Senator representing Ondo Central. He was also asked to take a bow.
    Other nominees screened on Thursday apart from Sunday Dare were: Mustafa Baba Shehuri, a former minister of state from Borno, Abubakar Aliyu, an engineer and former deputy governor of Yobe state, Major General Bashir Salihi Magashi, a former ECOMOG commander from Kano, Timipre Sylva, former governor of Bayelsa, Ramatu Tijjani Aliyu, from Kogi, Niyi Adebayo, former governor of Ekiti state.
    Others are Zubair Dada from Niger, Chris Ngige, former governor of Anambra and former minister of Labour, Abdullahi Hassan the youngest nominee from Nasarawa State, Mohammed Bello, former FCT minister from Adamawa state, Sadiya Farouq from Zamfara State.
    Sadiya cracked the joke that her political career started in the Fourth Senate with her office ‘upstairs.’
    Senate president Ahmad Lawan said that the screening will continue on Friday, with eight more nominees.
    Lawan said those scheduled for Friday included- Goody Jeddy-Agba (Cross River), Dr Osagie Ehanire (Edo), Suleiman Adamu (Jigawa), Hadi Sirika (Kaduna), Abubakar Malami (Kebbi), Gbemisola Saraki (Kwara), Mrs Paulen Talen (Plateau) and Muhammdu Dingyadi (Sokoto).

  • Fashola, Aregbesola, Amaechi , Akpabio in Buhari’s ministerial list

    Fashola, Aregbesola, Amaechi , Akpabio in Buhari’s ministerial list

    Former ministers Babatunde Fashola, Rotimi Amaechi, Ogbonnaya Onu, Chris Ngige are on the list of ministerial nominees sent by President Muhammadu Buhari to the Senate for confirmation.
    The list of nominees was read by Senate President, Ahmed Lawan today.
    There are 43 nominees in all, with former Osun Governor, Rauf Aregbesola, former Benue Governor George Akume and former Bayelsa State Governor Timipre Sylva and former minority leader Senator Godswill Akpabio, making the list.
    Former governor of Ekiti, Adeniyi Adebayo and senior lawyer and spokesman of the Buhari campaign, Festus Keyamo are also on the list.
    More to follow

  • Buhari orders ministers to submit performance reports as first term nears completion

    As the first term of the President Muhammadu Buhari administration winds down, he has asked for a comprehensive “status reports on policies, programmes and projects” from cabinet members from their respective ministries, departments and agencies.

    These reports have, Wednesday, April 24 as the deadline for submission.

    They are to be handed over to the Presidential Audit Committee in the office of the Vice President, a statement by his spokesperson, Garba Shehu, said.

    A circular to this effect issued by Boss Mustapha, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), also requested members of the Federal Executive Council to “ensure that all outstanding memoranda they intend to present to the Federal Executive Council are submitted to the Cabinet Affairs Office, Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, not later than Tuesday, 30th April, 2019.”

    The circular also informed members that the “9th and 10th meetings of the Council had been rescheduled to Thursday, 25th April and Thursday, 2nd May 2019 respectively” given the Easter break and May Day celebrations.

  • Buhari’s ministers yet to reply our strike letters – ASUU

    The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has said that the letters of notification of strike action, which it wrote to the Ministries of Education and Labour and Employment, have not been replied by either ministry since Monday, November 5, when it resumed its strike.

    The ASUU President, Prof. Biodun Ogunyemi, disclosed this while speaking with our correspondent on Monday, saying the union believed that while the Federal Government “was still warming up as usual,” the ruling class did not want quality education for the children of the poor.

    This is just as operatives of the Department of State Services invited and interrogated the ASUU Chairman of Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, Dr Adamu Babayo, on Sunday over the strike action.

    Ogunyemi, who confirmed the interrogation of Babayo, said the union would not be intimidated by what he described as the activities of overzealous security officials

    He said, “We wrote to inform the two ministries that we had resumed our strike. We also told them we suspended the strike initially in September 2017 and we decided to resumed it because the Federal Government failed to implement the key areas in the Memorandum of Action that we both signed.

    “We wrote to the ministries of education and labour and employment. They signed the copies we gave them, but they have not written to say that they saw our letters.

    “The logic is clear to us in ASUU. The political class in Nigeria has strangled primary and secondary education in Nigeria. For example, as many as 24 states have failed to access the Universal Basic Education Commission funds for 2018. That has left UBEC with over N60bn that states failed to access.

    “In the last two years, the government has been giving seven per cent to education in the budget. Suddenly this year, they woke up and said they would declare a state of emergency in the education sector and give 15 per cent. Who are they deceiving? This is an election season and anybody can promise anything.

    “So what our union has concluded is that the ruling class in Nigeria – not only about this government but consistently over the years – they don’t care about the education of the poor.”

  • Buhari's ex-ministers; Adeosun, Fayemi, Alhassan still listed as cabinet members on state house website

    Routine checks by TNG on Tuesday on the website of the Federal Government of Nigeria (state house) http://statehouse.gov.ng/people/ showed that former Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, former Minister of Women Affairs, Aisha Alhassan and former minister of Mines and Steel, Kayode Fayemi (now Governor of Ekiti State) are all still cabinet members of the President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration despite tendering their respective resignation letters some few months ago.

    Recall that the former Minister of Finance, Adeosun resigned her appointment as finance minister on September 14, 2018; when it became public that she presented a forged National Youth Service Corps exemption certificate upon which she was appointed into public office.

    Following her resignation, she fled the country the following day to London, the United Kingdom through a British Airways aircraft.

    The British Airways aircraft that she flew to London according to sources at the airport left the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport at exactly 8:05 am on September 15.

    She was the last passenger that boarded the flight before it departed the shores of Nigeria.

    Her name is still listed just immediately after the Minister of Federal Capital Territory, Mohammed Bello, and before the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama.

    Apart from Adeosun, the immediate past Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dr Kayode Fayemi, is still listed as a cabinet member.

    Fayemi, who is now the Governor of Ekiti State, resigned as minister on May 30, this year to enable him to contest for the governorship position which he eventually won and has since been sworn in.

    Also, the immediate past Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development, Aisha Alhassan, is still listed as a cabinet member about a month after her resignation.

    Alhassan had resigned her appointment as a minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria as well as her membership of the governing All Progressives Congress.

    She left President Muhammadu Buhari’s cabinet and the APC after she was screened out of the APC governorship primary by the Adams Oshiomhole-led National Working Committee of the APC ahead of the contest.

    She tried unsuccessfully to become the standard bearer of the APC for the 2019 Taraba State governorship election.

  • Buhari, APC governors, ministers, others storm Ekiti on Tuesday for Fayemi’s inauguration

    …as inauguration committee rolls out one week long programme
    President Muhammadu Buhari will lead other eminent Nigerians to the inauguration of Ekiti State Governor-elect, Dr. Kayode Fayemi, on Tuesday.
    Fayemi will be sworn in alongside the Deputy Governor-elect, Otunba Bisi Egbeyemi, by the state Chief Judge, Justice Ayodeji Daramola, at the Ekiti Parapo Pavilion.
    Buhari, who had promised to attend Fayemi’s inauguration shortly after the latter won the All Progresse Congress (APC) primary, will be the Special Guest of Honour.
    The Chairman of the Media and Publicity Committee of the Inauguration Ceremonies, Mr. Olayinka Oyebode, disclosed this on Wednesday at a news conference to herald to mark week long activities to usher Fayemi into office.
    Oyebode revealed that others expected at the inauguration include governors, ministers, military and paramilitary top brass, traditional rulers, diplomats, clergymen, party leaders, civil society groups, artisans, market women and general public.
    Speaking on the significance of Buhari’s personal attendance of Fayemi’s inauguration, Oyebode described the President as a “lover of Ekiti and father of the nation.”
    He added that Fayemi served under Buhari as Minister and supervised the Ministry of Mines and Steel Development, a sector that was dear to the heart of the President.
    The Chairman of the Security Committee, Brig. -Gen. Ebenezer Ogundana (retd), said the military will be part of the security arrangements adding that security operatives will be drafted from neighbouring states.
    Events to make the milestone, according to Oyebode, commence on October 15 Inauguration Lecture to be delivered by eminent poet and literary icon, Prof. Niyi Osundare and Book Presentation, Photo Exhibition and presentation of prizes to Essay Competition winners.
    Besides the swearing-in ceremony on October 16, reception will take place at the same venue, Ekiti Parapo Pavilion.
    Fayemi, after being inaugurated, will hold a Town Hall meeting at Ekiti North senatorial district at Odo Udo Primary School, Ido Ekiti in the morning of October 17 while that of Ekiti South will hold at Ereja Park, Ikere Ekiti in the afternoon.
    On October 18, an interfaith thanksgiving service holds in Ado Ekiti in the morning to be followed by Ekiti Central town hall meeting at Aramoko Motor Park, Aramoko-Ekiti.
    A Thanksgiving Jumat Service holds at Ado-Ekiti Central Mosque on October 19 while on October 20, Ekiti Arts, Culture and Talent Fair at Ekiti Parapo Pavilion.
    Inauguration activities will be rounded off on October 21 with a Thanksgiving service at St. Patrick’s Catholic Cathedral, Old Garage.
    On the same day, a reception will hold at Fayemi’s personal residence, Eyiyato Lodge, Isan-Ekiti.
    Oyebode added: “It would be a new dawn on October 16 as Dr. Fayemi will be back on track to take the government back to the people again for accountable government that will also make Ekiti people active participants in the way they are governed.
    “This knack for institutionalisation of participatory governance by Fayemi has reflected in the stakeholders forum commissioned by him where Ekiti people spoke I’m conference on their expectations from the government.
    “Now, the journey for the actualisation of Ekiti dreams starts on October 16, 2018; the date fate has chosen for Ekiti State to recover her destiny and turn around her fortune.
    “Suffice to say that this kind of historic and historical occasion held to celebrate the freedom of a people cannot go without pomp and drums with dignitaries in attendance to join the celebration.”
     

  • Buhari, Osinbajo, ministers, ruling Nigeria in confusion – R-APC

    The Reformed All Progressives Congress (R-APC) on Friday accused the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), President Muhammadu Buhari, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, Ministers and other top government functionaries of lacking the required coordination to rule the country.

    The National Publicity Secretary of the RAPC, Mr. Kassim Afegbua, who cited the issue of restructuring as an example, said President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo held different opinions on the subject, even though the APC promised it to Nigerians before the 2015 elections.

    Afegbua said the APC was not the party its founding fathers envisaged when they came together in 2014.

    He said, “As we speak, the APC has jettisoned its own manifesto. Where is the restructuring we promised Nigerians? They hurriedly came up with a committee headed by Governor (Nasir) el-Rufai; where has that landed us?

    “The Vice-President is a supporter of restructuring. The President of the country is not a supporter of restructuring in the same government. There is no synergy. There is no coordination on any issue.

    “You have about three or four opinions from the same government; that is not the way to lead.

    “When the Fulani herdsmen issue came up in Benue State, the Inspector General of Police came up with a different position; the Minister of Defence gave a different position; and the Presidency is giving a different position.”

    Recall that the New Peoples Democratic Party (nPDP) bloc in the APC and other aggrieved members of the ruling party, had on Wednesday announced the formation of the R-APC.

    R-APC, at a press conference attended by the leader of the nPDP, Alhaji Kawu Baraje, announced Alhaji Buba Galadima, a former ally of Buhari, as its national chairman.

    However, the National Chairman of the APC, Adams Oshiomhole, had in an interview with journalists on Thursday dismissed the R-APC.

    Reacting to Oshiomhole’s claims that the R-APC members were mercenaries hired to destabilise the APC, Afegbua said they were genuine members of the party interested in retrieving the party from usurpers.

    Afegbua, said, “Adams Oshiomhole needs to take a look at our past. We do not possess the characteristics of hirelings or mercenaries.

    “We are bona fide members of the APC. When it is convenient for people, they dress you in very elegant robes but when they are losing the battle, they call you names, but we will not call them names, we will continue to insist that we are going to rescue the APC and reposition it for optimum performance.

    “We cannot be preaching to be progressives when we are law-breakers. We cannot be preaching that we are progressives when we are a party that has performed abysmally low in all sectors of the economy.”

     

  • Nigerian ministers did not shun US investment forum, FG clarifies

    Sequel to Emir Sanusi’s claims that some Nigerian ministers who were invited to attend an investment forum in the United States on April 19, the Federal Government on Monday said nothing of such of happened.

    The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, in a statement issued on Monday, said most of the Ministers who were slated to attend the event were not invited and were not in Washington at the time.

    Mohammed said no Minister shunned the Summit held at the Embassy of Nigeria in Washington.

    He also denied that some ministers collected estacodes without attending the forum.

    He explained that the Ministers of Agriculture; Power Works and Housing and that of Budget and National Planning did not get any invitation from the organisers, even though they were listed among those expected to attend.

    Mohammed said the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, who was invited, was with the president at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in London at the time of the summit.

    He added that the Minister of Finance, who was in Washington DC at the time, was there purposely to attend the 2018 Spring Meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

    The minister explained said though he was invited to the forum, he wrote back to inform the organisers that he would not be able to make the trip due to conflicting schedules.

    The Emir of Kano, Mohammed Sanusi II, who attended the forum, had in an interview with journalists, criticised the non-participation of Nigerian ministers at the event.