Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and
Publicity, Malam Garba Shehu, has disclosed exclusively to Daily
Trust that the presidency is “cleaning up” the list of board
appointments in order to be satisfied that the appointees met the
requirements of the Acts establishing agencies and parastatals.
The presidential spokesman said that this was the reason many of
the 209 board chairmen and 1,258 members on the list of appointments
released late last December had not been inaugurated.
He said further that the clean-up exercise was being anchored by
the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Mr Boss
Mustapha.
Shehu said the exercise became necessary in lieu of the outrage
that trailed the inclusion of dead persons on the list of appointments.
According to the President’s spokeperson, the list in 11
ministries, departments and agencies, including those in the Office of
the Vice President and the Office of the SGF has been cleaned up and is
ready for inauguration.
Shehu said the SGF would by Saturday (yesterday) clean up the list in the remaining ministries “and forward to them (the ministries) to inaugurate at their own time.”
The presidential aide noted that some ministries, particularly that
of the Federal Capital Territory, have started inaugurating their board
appointees.
Shehu also said that ministries, departments and agencies which
were not captured in the initial list would equally be “fixed” and be
ready before the end of this month.
He said, “So far, they have cleaned up the list of 11
ministries, departments and parastatals of government, including those
under the Office of the Vice President and the Office of the SGF.
Between today (Friday) and tomorrow (Saturday), the SGF will clean up
the remaining.
“Once this list is cleaned—because some (appointees) are
dead—once the SGF is satisfied that the requirements of the laws
establishing those agencies are met by the appointees, who have been put
forward, they (SGF Office) will release to the ministries to go and
inaugurate.
“There are some ministries that are not covered by the earlier
release. Those ones will also be completed. The SGF is working to ensure
that the entire board processes are completed by the end of this
month.”
When asked to give an insight into the details of the cleaning up
exercise, Shehu added, “When the list was released, there was an
outrage.
“The list will be vetted to make sure that the requirement of
the law is met, because the law would say appoint so, so and so person
of this kind of background, representation of so, so and so number of
women, civil society so that the requirement of the law is met as far as
the Acts establishing those agencies are concerned.”