Osinbajo reverts FEC to 10am

THIS week’s meeting of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) has begun inside the Council Chambers of the Presidential Villa, Abuja with acting President Yemi Osinbajo presiding.

Osinbajo has also reverted the commencement time of the meeting to its usual time of 10am as against 11am to which it had been shifted recently.

The meeting had in recent weeks been moved to 11am whenever ailing President Muhammadu Buhari was billed to attend ostensibly to afford enough allowance to get himself ready for it.

Osinbajo kick started the meeting by nominating the Head of Service, Winifred Oyo-Eta and Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan Ali, to say the Christian and Muslim opening prayers, respectively before it went into its normal closed session.

Meanwhile, the new ministerial nominees, Stephen Ocheni and Suleiman Hassan, approved by the Senate, will have to wait a little longer to become members of the council as they were not scheduled to be sworn in on Wednesday.

It is not clear whether acting President Osinbajo will do that any time soon or they will have to wait till the return of President Buhari from his current medical leave.

The Senate had last week screened and confirmed the nominees as ministers, following their nominations by President Muhammadu Buhari in March.

Mr Ocheni, who is from Kogi State is to replace James Ocholi who died in an accident last year while Hassan from Gombe State, is to replace Amina Mohammed who has joined the United Nations (UN) as its Deputy Secretary General.