On Wednesday, President Muhammadu Buhari did the unthinkable. He sacked two of his ministers! He relieved the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Alhaji Mohammed Sabo Nanono and the Minister of Power, Engineer Saleh Mamman of their duties. The action was like a spectacular misnomer, a never-seen-before kind of thing. The Yoruba refer to that as ‘àrà mériri’. When such happens where the Igbo dominate, they’d say ‘my eyes have seen my ears’. Some bad-mouthed Nigerian critics said the sacking of the ministers as one in a long chain of actions tailored towards assuaging Nigerians as they till the ground for 2023 elections that’s now in the horizon.
Why did president Buhari sack two of his ministers? Why should this ordinarily routine government action attract such opprobrium? Why has the minor cabinet reshuffle been causing the raising of eyebrows across the land? The answers to these questions are blowing in the wind. For me, it’s as a result of the traditional, legendary lethargy of the administration of President Buhari. He has carried on in the last six years as though others don’t exist. Over the length of his administration, we have seen a disturbing but now a common pattern when issues come to the killings in the country. For instance, we have come to see that the pattern of response to the violence and killings in the country differs. The last was that response to the killings in Jos, Plateau State. Plateau killings are like different strokes for different folks…
Some other pocket critics too are not impressed. These critics are equally wary of the sacking of the two ministers. They are simply not swayed by the mellifluous construction of the language through which their firing was announced. They just will not take it that the action was as a result of some truly altruistic tendencies. This segment of the wary public thinks President Buhari wants us to entwine some seriousness to his government. It is the contention in this school of thought that after over six years of eight-year tenure, and loads of complaints after, he wants us to suddenly believe that he has transformed to a competent president?
Well, those are some of the views expressed by some Nigerians regarding the recent cabinet reshuffle by President Buhari. These views could be parochial. They may be unsubstantiated. They may be unfounded and might have no basis. The contentions could be of no consequence whatsoever. They are still views held by some Nigerians. We may throw opinion just the same way we might throw away a suggestion but we cannot throw away the owner of opinion or suggestion. Such lack of trust in whatever the government does is as a result of sustained failure and dishonesty Nigerians have come to attach to this administration.
Some of the things said about the minor cabinet reshuffle by President Buhari are very scathing jokes. They all point to the frustration Nigerians feel about the government and its activities. Perhaps, the only people that do not feel the way Nigerians feel about this government are those inside of it. They may be deaf to their own matter or they have just chosen to ignore whatever you throw at them. They must be obeying the unwritten commandment which says “It is not good table manners to speak while eating.” That rule is Nigerian, and it is used for our men in the corridors of power, in spite of the fact that the word ‘minister’ originally means ‘servant’. We don’t see those in government as our servants simply because they are not. They are our masters – from after election or appointment to another election.
The government said the ministers were relieved of their duties not because of incompetence, but because an evaluation they carried out showed gaps which must not be left unfilled. Nanono and Mamman became ministers about three months after President Buhari took the oath for his second term. They were sworn-in on August 21, 2019. In a statement through which they were shown the door, President Buhari said “two years and some months into the second term, the tradition of subjecting our projects and programmes implementation to independent and critical self-review has taken firm roots through sector reporting during cabinet meetings and retreats.” The president went on: “These significant review steps have helped to identify and strengthen weak areas, close gaps, build cohesion and synergy in governance, manage the economy and improve the delivery of public good to Nigerians.”
The government’s action has not been explained other than to tell that the review steps they took had helped to “identify and strengthen weak areas, close gaps, build cohesion in governance.” So, why were the ministers sacked? Could the former Minister of Agriculture have been doing anything outside these tenets? What are these things? Nigerians deserve to know. On June 28, 2021, Dr Lasisi Olagunju wrote an article entitled “The pandemic of hunger” in which he lampooned the ministry and the former minister. “My interest in discussing that ministry, however, is not the bigness of the babanriga sweeping its floor and its purse. I am interested in how, between those two gentlemen, the agric ministry became ministry of religious affairs. The ministry of agriculture under them recently built a N30 million mosque for a community in Borno State and they justified it as being “appropriate in all ramifications.” They said they built the mosque for livestock farmers displaced by Boko Haram. So, how about farmers displaced by bandits in Benue, Niger, Zamfara, and those sacked by herdsmen in Oyo? If you are as troublesome as I am, you are likely to ask more questions.”
The ministry’s core mandate is “to ensure food security in crop, livestock and fisheries, stimulate agricultural employment and services, promote the production and supply of raw materials to agro industries, provide markets for the products of the industrial sector, generate foreign exchange and aid rural socio-economic development.” Are the remarkable failures in this ministry and generally in that sector of our economy among the reasons for giving Nanono the boot? What rankles the brain is the inability of the ministry to tell Nigerians its effect on the polity in the area of fulfilling its mandate on food security in crop and livestock. It is a shame that we have a Ministry of Agriculture that cannot live up to its name.
There is nothing to talk about the Ministry of Power. Everything about that ministry is the recurring announcement of collapse of the power grid.
The president has promised that the changes in his cabinet will now be more frequent. Should we then assume that our ministers would be on their toes to deliver on the mandate of this government, whatever that is? The confusing aspect of the whole cabinet shake-up thing is a contention that the action is a step towards relaxing the grip of the oligarchy on power. That would be a window to see the room of the power brokers and allow a peep-in. It is a way to worm the sly power brokers into the heart of the nosy, noisy southerners and confuse them again as 2023 approaches. We will soon have a lot in our hands to deal with.
YOU SHOULD NOT MISS THESE HEADLINES FROM NIGERIAN TRIBUNE
We Have Not Had Water Supply In Months ― Abeokuta Residents
In spite of the huge investment in the water sector by the government and international organisations, water scarcity has grown to become a perennial nightmare for residents of Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital. This report x-rays the lives and experiences of residents in getting clean, potable and affordable water amidst the surge of COVID-19 cases in the state…
Selfies, video calls and Chinese documentaries: The things you’ll meet onboard Lagos-Ibadan train
The Lagos-Ibadan railway was inaugurated recently for a full paid operation by the Nigerian Railway Corporation after about a year of free test-run. Our reporter joined the train to and fro Lagos from Ibadan and tells his experience in this report…
and then