By Mikky Attah
Earlier in the week, the Senate concluded its exercise of screening the persons nominated by Nigeria’s President as Ministers of the Federal Republic.
President Bola Tinubu had transmitted the names of his nominees to the red camber in 2 trances; the first list which had 28 names was sent on Friday the twenty seventh of July 2023. The following Wednesday, a supplementary list of 19 names was transmitted by the president. 2 days later, on Friday, one of the nominees , Maryam Shetty from Kano State was dropped and the names of 2 more persons were added. Fests Keyamo, an immediate past Minister and Marya Mahmood, were the two persons added, to bring the total to forty eight.
All but three of the forty eight have been given the green light by the Senate, with the remaining three said to be awaiting security clearance.
In the meantime, the manner in which the red chamber carried out the screening exercise is currently generating a lot of conversation; some of complaints, and some others of justification.
Nevertheless, all would accept the fact that President Tinubu spared Nigerians a constitutional breach by meeting the sixty day deadline for presentation of list of proposed ministers.
However recently, the hard- knock comment by the leading broadcaster and television presenter , Rfai Oseni on the screening of ministerial hopefuls trended on social media. Oseni of Arise TV tweeted, “Over 5m people are with a nominee, take a bow. Here we go again. Our screening is a bloody daylight joke. Our ministerial screening looks like a scene from Baba Sala!, probably a scene from Baba kwete oni le goolu. “No depth in our senators questions. Nigeria sha, the standards are low”.
Read Also: Military, police foil attempt to take over Nigerian embassy in Niger
A lot of people are with Oseni in knocking the process, still; there are others like me who just might see things a little differently.
Now, I greatly admire and respect Oseni, however I am not a fan of the screening exercise and I will explain why.
For one thing though, all would accept the fact that President Tinubu spared Nigerians a constitutional breach by meeting the sixty day deadline for presentation of list of Ministers.
The list sent to the Senate by a President is traditionally without attached portfolios. This, to my mind, immediately lends itself to the sheer conventionality of the exercise.
At any rate, it is only the person who appears before the Senate with two breasts on her chest that would be assigned the Ministry of Women Affairs! ( Even at that, where there is more than one woman appearing, how would the Senators know which of them to ask questions about handling the Women Affairs Ministry?
For all the rest on the list made up of at least one from each state , then it is mere speculation on the part of the Distinguished Senators to call in the forty eight persons over a lengthy period of time to ask them entirely speculative and theoretical questions as to how they would handle various possible ministries. Another thing would be that, with the record number of ministers- designate in this Tinubu administration, then it would be believed that new ministries will be created in the coming weeks. In which case then, it wll serve no real purpose grilling nominees on unexplored territory
We must bear in mind that it is the prerogative of the President to choose his ministers. It is entirely up to him also to assign them their various portfolios, for policy interpretation and for implementation.
Currently, there is a need to start acrion, since after inauguration of May 29th.
I for one honestly even consider it out of place for or Distinguished Senators to ask rigorous questions of the nominees for two reasons.
I have dwelt on the matter of portfolios being unknown. The second reason is the fact that, the nominees would have already been proposed, been put under scrutiny for their merit and finally have been accepted by a small clique ( the so- called kitchen cabinet) – long before their appearance at the hallowed chambers of the NationAssembly.
The appearance of those listed before the upper legislative chamber is purely the observation of convention, it is, or should be an act of courtesy; it is done in deference to the legislative arm of government.
The appearance of ministerial nominees at the Senate
is not a time for the exhibition of intimidating CV’s and the grand display of high intelligence. It is not a period of cross examination or near interrogation unless in very special circumstances at the discretion of the President of the Senate.
Those persons in the main are already known to the one who had carried out consultations before choosing them . It is the President who will work closely with them as members of his cabinet, and so if he has already made his choice, then it should be urgent upon the Distinguished Senators to hasten the nominees into their places of assignment . There is also the glorious provision for Cabinet reshuffling, for reassignment of portfolios and even the dissolution of an entire cabinet, in a situation where a president deems it necessary to do so. In practice, cabinet Ministers are dropped, replaced or retained at the behest of the sitting President.
I would even think that, long before elections, a serious minded presidential candidate should have had some men and women pencilled down as those who would be part of his cabinet if he gets elected as president.
And therefore, asking ministerial nominees to appear before the Senate should be carried out as the observance of etiquette,; asking the nominees to take a bow is doing what Jesus Christ referred to as- Fulfilling All Righteousness.
•Mikky Attah is a Newscaster and writer. She was nominated by the NMMAfor Columnist of the Year 2019 for her Column in The Nation, The Princess Files Imikanattah@gmail.com