President
Muhammadu Buhari yesterday defended the appointment of the Secretary to the
Government of the Federation (SGF), Babachir David Lawal and five others.
The appointments,
announced on Thursday, had sparked reactions, with reports of complaints in
some quarters that they tilted in favour of the North.
Appointed
alongside Lawal were Alhaji Abba Kyari, Chief of Staff to the President; Col.
Hameed Ibrahim Ali (rtd), Comptroller-General of the Nigerian Customs Service
(NCS); Mr. Kure Martins Abeshi, Comptroller-General of the Nigerian Immigration
Service; Senator Ita Enang, Senior Special Assistant (SSA) to the President on
National Assembly Matters (Senate) and Hon. Suleiman Kawu, SSA to the President
on National Assembly Matters (House of Representatives).
The Special
Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, yesterday
assured Nigerians that President Muhammadu Buhari’s political appointments will
balance out soon.
Adesina spoke on
a radio programme, Political Platform, on RayPower 100.5FM, monitored by our
correspondent in Lagos.
Adesina said the
President was aware of federal character and expressed the belief that there
will be balance by the time he makes more appointments in September.
While admitting
that appointments are Buhari’s prerogative, the presidential spokesman also
said that nobody can fault the fact that those that have been named so far
?were appointed on merits.
He also said it
would not be fair to blame the President for positions that were filled as a
result of elections, like those of the National Assembly and appointments made
on the basis of next in command, like those of the acting Chairman of the
Independent Electoral Commission and Chief Justice of Nigeria.
He assured all
stakeholders that the President would keep to his promise of appointing the
remaining aides and ministers ?in September.
Adesina said:
“Nobody can fault the fact that the persons appointed were appointed on merits.
“In terms of the
spread, the President has prerogative to appoint and he knows there is federal
character. I am sure that there will be balance in the future.
“These are still
early days. At the end of the day, we will have a balance.
“By the time more
appointments are made, it will balance out. The President is trying to get the
very best of Nigerians. The issue of key positions and no key positions should
not be the issue.
“He gave a
deadline of September for the appointment of ministers, ?and he will keep to
it.”
The President’s
Senior Special Assistant Media and Publicity, Mallam Garba Shehu, also issued a
statement yesterday urging critics of the President’s appointments to be
patient with the administration over political appointments, adding that the
appointments made so far constitute less than five per cent of the total that
would be made.
Besides, he said,
the people so far appointed by the President are mostly people acting as his
staff or unofficial advisers, many of whom had been working with him in official
capacities.
The statement
reads: “Our brothers and sisters and fellow countrymen should bear with the new
administration as it takes its measured steps towards an effective take-off.
“These
appointments are just beginning. The ones down so far, apart from the security
services, are mostly of people acting as unofficial advisers or staff of the
President.
“They are mostly
men and women who have been doing things for the President and the positions
are being formalised.
“Statistically,
the appointments don’t amount to five per cent of what is to come. There will
be ministers, heads of government departments, federal boards and ambassadors.
“At the end of
the exercise, no part of the country will be left feeling left out.”
Reacting to the
appointments, a faction of the Movement for the Actualization of Sovereign
State of Biafra (MASSOB) had described them as an insult to the Igbo race whose
members he said were not appointed into any top office.
The group, in a
statement signed by its Director of Information, Uchenna Madu, said the actions
of the president since he assumed office had shown that he is not a lover of
Igbo people.
“The latest
appointments and previous ones since Buhari’s administration should be an eye
opener to Ndigbo that Buhari is not seeing Ndigbo as part of Nigeria.
“These
appointments have further confirmed the fact that the present administration is
against Ndigbo, despite the massive support some Igbo leaders like Gov. Rochas
Okorocha, Chief Ogbonnaya Onu, Senator Chris Ngige and Rotimi Amaechi, among
others, gave to Buhari and the APC during the last general election. This is an
insult to our people.”
In the same vein,
the Ohaneze Youth Council (OYC) expressed concern over the President’s latest
appointments, saying it was regrettable that no south easterner was included in
the appointments.
In a statement
signed by the organisation’s President and National Public Relations Officer,
Mazi Okechukwu Isiguzoro and Hon. Obinna Adibe respectively, the group said the
appointments were totally unacceptable to Ndigbo, adding that they violated the
principle of federal character enshrined in the Nigerian constitution.
OYC said: “We
stand to condemn the continuous exclusion of Ndigbo by the administration of
President Muhammadu Buhari. Before this time, he had appointed Service Chiefs
without looking the way of the South East. To make matters worse, the position
of the SGF, which was originally zoned to the Ndigbo, has been denied the
region.
“We are indeed
shocked by this turn of events, which are totally at variance with Mr.
President’s earlier stand that he was for everybody and for nobody.”
However, another
Igbo group, Ndigbo Unity Forum (NUF), voiced its support for President Buhari.
The Chairman of
the group, Mr. Augustine Chukwudum, who is also president of the Southern
Nigeria Peoples Mandate, called on the Igbo, in an interview with our
correspondent, to support the President for him to achieve his aim of
transforming the country.
NUF said: “We
have been watching all that have been happening in the past few weeks, all the
talks about the president marginalising Ndigbo.
“We want to use
this opportunity to inform them, if they are not aware or not enlightened
enough, that the President has not appointed his cabinet. I don’t see where the
marginalization of Ndigbo has come in.
“Some Igbo
leaders are just making noise for nothing. After all, those people who are
condemning Buhari should be ashamed of themselves.
“We want Ndigbo
to have a rethink of what is happening now. He has not done anything wrong to
them.
“As president of
Ndigbo Unity Forum, I still maintain that Buhari has not done anything wrong to
my people. Let Ndigbo count their teeth with their tongue.”
Commenting on the
appointments in a media briefing at the end of the 55th National Conference of
the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) yesterday, its president, Austin Alegeh, said
he was convinced President Buhari was committed to the country’s growth.
He said:
“Probably, these are key technical positions that are being filled by the most
competent available persons. But, you can always compensate when you are making
other ministerial appointments. I think we should all adopt attitude of
patience, and should always have trust and confidence in the people we have
elected.
“We must know
that the president won this election with many people contributing to the
election. So, let us look at the appointments he has made along those lines.
“I have listened
to the President speak and I can see his conviction in a greater and better
Nigeria.
“I am not a party
man, and I am not his personal friend, but from what I have seen, I have no
doubt in my mind that he means the best for Nigeria, that he will not do
anything to infringe the Nigerian Constitution.
“But let us wait
for all the appointments to be in before we start talking of federal
character.”
Lagos-based
lawyer, Festus Keyamo also issued a statement yesterday, saying that “the
so-called ‘uproar’ over the perceived ‘lopsided’ appointments made so far by
President Buhari is nothing but an orchestrated frustration of a few jobless
politicians who depend only on government appointments as their means of
livelihood and, of course, the noise of the latest opposition party in town.”
He said majority
of Nigerians only want to see good governance and care less about the ethnic
origin of those appointed into positions.
“My worry is that
the decade-long general division of government positions into ‘juicy’ and
‘non-juicy’, and the mentality that these few ‘juicy’ positions must be shared
equally amongst the major ethnic groups was nothing but a contraption of the
old order from which we have just liberated ourselves,” he said.
“To my mind, all
government appointments pose an equal challenge to those appointed as a call to
higher service of fatherland.
“All public
positions come with an equal responsibility to be honest, forthright and
dedicated. To go further to classify them as ‘juicy’ or ‘non-juicy’ is just a
euphemism for positions that have enough money from which to steal and those
that are ‘dry’.
“Therefore, any
agitation from a section of the country to get ‘juicy’ positions is only an
agitation for their kinsmen to be appointed to steal enough from which they
would benefit.
“I therefore
unreservedly condemn, in the strongest of terms, the so-called ‘uproar’ about
‘juicy positions’ going only to a certain section of this country. All sections
of this country should be happy and content with whatever positions the
President deems fit, at the end of the day, to give to their kinsmen.
“After all, the
President still has a long way to go with appointments. He has not even filled
up to five per cent of available positions. Please, let the President be.”
