One would have thought that while the sizzling scandal over the “ghost”’ Presidential Foreign Investment Promotion Council [PFIPC], its “imposter” Director General Mathew Adeniyi Adeyemi [the proper arrangement of his names is still in dispute] and his “forged” presidential appointment letter has gripped the headlines in Nigeria for several weeks now, is subject to a [quiet] ICPC probe and a public hearing by a House of Representatives committee, the Presidency will by now have no further appetite for scandal.
But then, in short order, came this matter of “One agency, two heads” as one newspaper described it. More than a month ago, on June 26, the Presidency had announced the appointment of former House of Representatives spokesperson Abdulrazaq Namdas as Director General of the Border Communities Development Agency, BCDA. The Presidency’s statement, signed by Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy Bayo Onanuga, said “the appointment took immediate effect” and that Namdas was appointed “to replace Dr Dakorinama Alabo George, who resigned to contest for an elective post in his home state” of Rivers.
No surprise there, because the Presidency had given a deadline of March 31 for any public officer seeking to contest in 2027 elections to resign his position. Many did, most notably Foreign Affairs Minister Yusuf Tuggar, Minister of Power Adebayo Adelabu, Transportation Minister Sa’idu Alkali, Minister of State for Humanitarian Affairs Yusuf Tanko Sununu, Executive Secretary of Petroleum Technology Development Fund [PTDF] Ahmed Galadima, and George. Of these six, Galadima won the Adamawa APC’s governorship ticket, Sununu got a Kebbi APC senatorial ticket while the other four did not succeed. Neither Tuggar, nor Adelabu, nor Alkali tried to return to their vacated seats; Tuggar’s exalted post is already occupied by Mrs. Bianca Ojukwu while Joseph Olasunkanmi Tegbe now sits smugly in Adelabu’s [electric] chair.
Namdas was not the only person appointed on that day. Contained in the same statement was the appointment of Nigeria’s top wordsmith, Patrick Obahiagbon of Edo, as Executive Director, Strategy & Commercial of the Niger Delta Power Holding Company [NDPHC]. Also reappointed that day was Chukwuma Umeoji as Executive Director, Corporate Services of NDPHC. One newspaper reported that when the three of them went to Secretary to the Government of the Federation [SGF] George Akume’s office to collect their appointment letters, Obahiagbon and Umeoji were invited in to collect their letters but Namdas was told to wait; that after two hours’ wait, he was told to “go away.”
Whatever happened? There had been no further statement from the Presidency saying his appointment was cancelled. However, things began to look murky because George, after losing his contest for Rivers APC ticket, resurfaced at BCDA and reoccupied his seat. Newspapers quoted some of the agency’s staff as saying that he never actually relinquished control of BCDA even after he submitted his resignation letter, but that he continued to govern it and issue directives.
Infact, well after the announcement of his successor, George began to carry out public duties as “Executive Secretary” of BCDA. According to Punch, “The latest instance occurred on Thursday July 9, when George met with the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, in Abuja to seek intervention for the release of funds for BCDA projects. A detailed account of the meeting in a statement accompanied by official photographs, was published on Facebook by ‘Port Harcourt Force’, a Rivers-based news platform, where George was repeatedly described as the “Executive Secretary” of the agency. During the meeting, George congratulated the minister on his appointment and appealed for timely release of budgetary allocations for ongoing infrastructure projects across Nigeria’s border communities.” George was also quoted as informing the minister that BCDA had facilitated a proposed $2bn Chinese investment for a livestock processing hub in Maigatari, Jigawa State, and “was collaborating with security agencies on plans to establish a Border Communities Intelligence Corps.”
Wonderful. How did this happen? Did the Presidency quietly cancel Namdas’ appointment, without informing the public that it had done so? Apparently not, because Punch quoted presidential spokesman Bayo Onanuga as telling its reporters that “As far as I know, the President has not changed his mind. Namdas remains the Executive Secretary of the agency. All these things they are talking about, they don’t know what they are talking about. The President has not changed his mind about the appointment of Namdas as the head of that border agency.” So why has he not resumed in his new office weeks after the appointment was announced? Onanuga told Punch that the issuance of the formal appointment letter falls within the responsibility of the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, and that “His appointment has been communicated to the Office of the SGF, so the SGF has to give him a letter.” Well, he didn’t. Are you Presidency guys aware of that?
Another news medium quoted some persons close to George as saying that he resumed in his former office because he in the end did not contest in the Rivers APC primary but was made to withdraw. But that is another matter entirely; what about the small matter of the resignation letter he submitted to the President? Is there any secret proviso in the Constitution, Public Service Rules or any other law that says that a public officer who resigns from his post can reclaim it anytime he wishes? Such a proviso, if it exists, must have been kept secret from the Nigerian public, otherwise thousands of former public servants would have scrambled back to their old posts by now. Whenever a public officer is departing, the official letter accepting his resignation invariably wishes him “well in your future endeavours.” Is that to say that if your future endeavours do not turn out as well as you wished, you could double back and reclaim the post, even after someone else had been lawfully appointed to occupy it?
Oga George, you left in order to seek to become Governor of Rivers State. Many people see BCDA job as juicy because we saw you asking the Finance Minister to release billions of naira budgeted for it. The fact that you willfully abandoned that post via a resignation letter, must be because you believe the Rivers Governor’s chair, now unsteadily occupied by Simi Fubara, is a lot juicier, so you ran after it. That was a risk you took, and as with every risk, it could go wrong and leave you in an even worse state. Now, the man appointed to occupy your former chair, Abdulrazaq Namdas, also resigned from his position as North East zonal representative on the board of the [lucrative] Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC. He went after the Adamawa APC governorship ticket and like you, he lost. When he lost, he did not double back to NDDC. Instead, he apparently pulled some political strings and got the BCDA job as compensation. You Oga George, instead of doing the same thing, you ran back to a job from which you willfully resigned, without getting the Presidency to reappoint you to it, on the grounds that you did not succeed in your governorship gambit. Do you even have an Adeniyi Adeyemi-style “forged appointment letter” to justify your return?
You see, handing in a resignation letter is not even necessary for one to vacate public office. If you are sitting on your desk, peacefully munching sandwich and you suddenly hear on the radio that the President has appointed someone else to occupy the same seat, will you say, “but I never handed in a resignation letter”? The 1999 Constitution, recklessly in my opinion, vested “all the executive powers of the Federation” in one person. If that person removes you from a post, whether or not he made a mistake, whether or not you are the best qualified for it, whether or not he was misadvised, whether or not he had good reasons and whether or not he had ill motives, the removal stands until he himself reverses it. Which, understandably, he will be reluctant to do, because it will convey the impression of indecisiveness.
Which brings us to the final issue in this saga, the non-issuance of an appointment letter from the SGF’s office. Oga SGF, State House announced that the President appointed a man to a position. It never said he reversed it. Its spokesman actually said the approval was conveyed to your office. Several appointees came to collect their appointment letters, you gave out to others but mysteriously withheld one. You even created room for the opposition ADC to say that the President has lost control of his Administration. Is there anyone lurking somewhere who is powerful enough to override presidential orders? If so, kindly let us know who that person is.
Only yesterday, Sunday, President Tinubu appointed Wasiu Olanrewaju-Smart as Special Adviser on National Assembly Matters, House of Representatives. Will you also withhold his appointment letter?
