The Nation Newspaper

Tag: President Jonathan

  • How flammable is Nigeria?

    How flammable is Nigeria?

    Nobody wants to leave Nigeria for as long as the oil continues to flow, regardless of predictions from prophets inside and scientists outside the country.

    In the last two days, leading politicians in our country have been reacting to predictions that Nigeria stands the chance of internal combustion. In 2013 (a few weeks ago), the United States’ Army College suggested that nothing in recent times has changed the prediction in 2003 by the US Intelligence community that Nigeria might break by 2015. Local geopolitical forecasters have also been worrying that Boko Haram also has the capacity to accelerate Nigeria’s disintegration. But in response to the end of Ramadan celebration (Eid-el Fitr), President Jonathan and one of the founding leaders of All Progressives Congress (APC), have taken their time to reassure Nigerians that there is no cause for alarm, despite the country’s appearance of flammability.

    In his own message to the country’s Muslims, President Jonathan reassures citizens of the country’s stability and ‘unbreakability’: “We are not even exploiting our diversity because of the myopic views about situations. Christians and Muslims are brothers and sisters and we must live together. Those who are predicting that this country will separate based on our fault-lines as at the time of amalgamation by 2015, they will know that these predictions will not be true.” Correspondingly, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu called for prayers to ensure that “the predictions of doom, hardship, political instability and religious intolerance will not come to fruition,” adding: “Nigeria is not a broken case. It is redeemable and only the people can make this change happen by voting right and wisely.” Nigerians must feel encouraged that two of the country’s leading politicians are not cowed by predictions about the country’s break-up.

    A recent book by John-Andrew McNeish and Owen Logan, titled Flammable Societies: Studies on the socio-economics of Oil and Gas includes an essay by Femi Folorunso: “A country without a State?: Governmentality, Knowledge and Labour in Nigeria.” Flammable is used in the book to refer to the socio-economics of oil and gas. But Folorunso in his own essay uses flammable in two senses: metonymic and metaphoric. He addresses the metonymic dimension by underscoring the impact of exploitation of oil and gas on the life of the average Nigerian. He also uses ‘flammable’ connotatively when he addresses the theme of a country without a state, a political space that appears bound to failure because of bad governance.

    Predictions cannot break a country. It is the action or inaction of those charged to govern a country that can cause its disintegration. Nigerians have no reason to be afraid of predictions coming from home or abroad about the future of the country. Several soothsayers and prophets in Nigeria have predicted doom for too long, without any of their predictions coming to pass, particularly predictions by religious prophets who are wont to laying claims to prescience and clairvoyance. Nigerians have gotten used to local Cassandras whose forecasts of doom for politicians and the polity have generally come to naught.

    What Nigerians have not gotten used to are predictions from outside the country by professional analysts who attempt to bring the predictive power of science on their forecasts. The prediction in 2003 from the U.S. Intelligence community and the latest one from the U.S. Army College must have gotten the attention of Nigeria’s leaders. When the 2003 prediction first came out, General Olusegun Obasanjo dismissed it as nothing for anyone to worry about. Again, the recent one from the U.S. Army College seems to have gotten to our leaders. This explains why two of the country’s most important politicians, Jonathan and Tinubu, have chosen to use this year’s end of Ramadan festivities to reassure citizens not to panic and to remain as optimistic about the territorial integrity of their country as they have always been since 1960.

    Citizens ought to know by now that Nigeria cannot disintegrate, despite the recurrence of political, social, and economic storms the country experiences intermittently. The reasons are not far to fathom. oil and gas, natural causes of combustion, serve as lubricants to oil and grease the creaky joints of the Nigerian State-nation. There are two sides to the coin of greasing of the engine of the Nigerian State. On the one hand, members of the ruling class derive too much benefit from oil and proceeds of oil for them to want to push the country into the sea. Those from various parts of the country who own oil blocks and have acquired property in prime lands in different parts of the country from oil and gas know better than they show when they threaten fire and brimstone. The saying that Nigeria knows how to avoid disaster and disintegration is not an exaggeration. Most of the country’s political and cultural leaders know where their bread is buttered. Many of them will even be afraid to want to rule a Nigeria without petroleum.

    On the other hand, the average Nigerian is able to live on just one dollar per day, not because of efforts by the government, but as a result of the existence of oil and gas in the country! Without oil and with the kind of government the country has been saddled with since the 1970s, it would not have been possible for any Nigerian to eat on a daily basis a loaf of bread or a plate of rice without any form of protein. The little that trickles down from the class that perceives itself as the owner of Nigeria is another thing that has prevented disintegration. It is not surprising when scholars raise the issue of Resource Curse in relation to Nigeria’s petroleum and mismanagement of the country that both leaders and followers retort with: “Thank God there is oil.” Nobody wants to leave Nigeria for as long as the oil continues to flow, regardless of predictions from prophets inside and scientists outside the country. And no matter how hard the polity is heated or security is challenged by Boko Haram, Niger Delta militants, and even the country’s Kidnappers Incorporated, nothing untoward is likely to happen to our republic of petroleum. Nigerians have reasons to believe their president when he says there is no cause for alarm. They should know that it is a waste of intellectual and emotional energy to think or write that Nigeria is on the brink, on account of its many crises of bad governance and under-development.

    The country’s political rulers and their cultural counterparts know that it does not matter what they do or not do, the country has come to stay, for as long as oil flows from the wombs of the land and its adjoining sea. Our leaders know that they do not need to respond to what Femi Folorunso characterises as the impact of governance on sovereignty, citizenship, and development in a country troubled by resource curse. Even citizens themselves have been numbed or dumbed down by the manna from petroleum and gas. It appears that nobody needs to worry about anything, for as long as Nigeria is able to sell enough oil to lubricate the engine of its continuity as a state-nation. The country’s (taken for granted) territorial integrity will be further guaranteed by free and fair election in 2015, if only to give citizens unfettered choice to choose those to govern them.

  • Jonathan visits Fashola over father’s death

    Jonathan visits Fashola over father’s death

    President Goodluck Jonathan on Wednesday visited Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Fashola, at his Marina residence to condole with him over the death of his father.

    The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the president was accompanied by key members of his cabinet, among whom were the Minister of Petroleum, Mrs. Diezani Allison-Madueke and the Attorney-General of the Federation, Mr. Mohammed Adoke.

    The Minister of Information, Mr. Labaran Maku; Minister of Sports, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi; Special Adviser to the President on Inter-party Affairs, Sen. Ben Obi; as well as the Chief Imam of Abuja, Alh. Musa Mohammed, were also on the entourage.

    The governor and his wife, Abimbola, his sisters – Mrs. Arinola Fuwa and Miss Olayinka Fashola — their children and some members of the state executive council, were on hand to receive the President and his entourage.

    In his remark, Jonathan described the death of Fashola`s father as saddening ,noting that the late patriarch left at a time when he was most needed to offer counsel that would assist to further develop the nation.

    He, however, said the deceased lived a fulfilled life, and left enduring legacies behind.

    “When we hear about the death of the father of the governor, I was very sad because we know this is a period that we need our parents most, especially parents that would assist us in handling a number of responsibilities.

    “Mr. Governor, it is a sad thing for you to have lost your father at this time, but one must also thank God for the life he has lived. For those of us who are Christians, the Bible tells us we are supposed to live three scores plus ten,” he said.

     

  • The public face of President Jonathan

    The public face of President Jonathan

    Political subterfuge, which has often made President Jonathan less vulnerable, is a unique asset that sets him apart from his political foes. He cannot be easily ambushed. This came in very handy as deputy governor to the convicted but now pardoned money launderer, Alamieseigha whom he replaced as governor of Bayelsa. He was an unobtrusive vice president who played deaf to all the madness around him when Yar’Adua’s kitchen cabinet hijacked the presidency during his stay in a Saudi hospital. Others fought the war to make him acting president and finally president. After the battle and victory, just as he was been prodded on by ex-President Obasanjo, his god father, who often wants to play god, to denounce the provisions of the PDP constitution and run for the presidency, a reticent self-effacing Jonathan publicly stated he did not want to be distracted from achieving the goal he had set for himself- completing Yar’Adua’s agenda and conducting a credible election where every vote would count. He equally kept those who had argued vigorously that he would be the man to beat in 2015 if he rejected the bait guessing.

    He has again in the last three months maintained a dignified silence even as sycophants led by men of all seasons like Ebenezer Babatope, Iwuanyawu and Jerry Gana, gathered in Abuja to canonize him as ‘the God-ordained’, the ‘best that has ever happened to Nigeria’, the ‘leader that embodies all the virtues of our past heroes,’ a selfless leader without whom there would be no Nigeria, the liberator of Ijaw nation,; etc.

    Even as members of Rivers House of Assembly converted the mace to weapon for breaking heads, as visiting northern governors were ambushed and stoned by thugs claiming to work for the president, as oil theft reached the highest height after multi-billion dollar contract to militants who now swear there would be no Nigeria except he runs in 2015, President Jonathan has continued to maintain his peace.

    But Jonathan’s weakest link is those who constituted his public face. They have failed to complement his greatest asset. Instead of adding value to his presidency, they have made him more vulnerable. The current face off between the president and Governor Amaechi of Rivers seems to have unmasked the president either as a result of sabotage, the hall mark of PDP or share incompetence as demonstrated by Nyesom Wike, Dr Doyin Okupe, Dr..Ahmed Gulak, and even a supposedly seasoned bureaucrat like the Inspector General of police. It is curious why they all chose to deploy obsolete weapons to fight modern warfare over peoples’ minds.

    Leading the league of those who claim to be fighting the president’s yet to be declared 2015 battle is the Nyesom Wike, the minister of state (education). By strange coincidence, the academic staffs of our polytechnics and the universities are on strike with millions of our youths roaming the streets due to the failure of government to honour an agreement it signed back in 2009. What has now emerged is that the minister in charge of the critical sector had in fact been mobilizing, kitting, and training youths, militants, and five members of the Rivers State House of Assembly to replicate a strategy deployed by a few federal government backed enemies of democracy in the western house of assembly in 1962, a misadventure that marked the beginning of the end of that republic. The only innovation is the ambush of visiting northern governors, who were pelted with stones.

    Here is a former local council chairman, appointed chief of staff by Amaechi who later nominated him for a ministerial position. Now he is at war with Amaechi allegedly because he wants to be the next governor of Rivers. Even if the war is being surreptitiously fought to retain the presidency within South-south zone, as claimed by Austin Opara and some Rivers State federal legislators loyal to the president, there is surely a more creative way to win the support of the people of Rivers other than turning the state into a theatre of war. Then how does the stoning of four northern governors by hoodlums wearing the minister of education T-shirts promote the cause of the president re-election? If he secures the PDP ticket for a second term, can the votes from Rivers or even the whole of South-south zone secure the presidency for Jonathan? Or has the bungling President Jonathan foot soldiers foreclosed the possibility of his having to campaign in those four northern states whose governors were viciously attacked by hoodlums at the Port Harcourt airport?

    The outing of Okupe whose appointment, critics claimed undermined the president battle against corruption, was no less disastrous. Since no man ever wins a woman’s war, we will be expecting too much to prevail on the president to curtail the alleged excesses of his wife. Neither Babangida, Yar Adua, nor a brasher Obasanjo in power was able to manage his wife. But Okupe, paid through the public purse to shield the president by balancing his narrow interest and that of his wife against the nation’s overall interest let down the president in his hours of need. As if bereft of new ideas, Okupe, adopting an obsolete strategy of repeating lies to make them appear as truth, assaulted the public with his claim about the president non involvement in the Rivers’ crisis in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. The president’s wife admission that she indeed has an axe to grind with Amaechi over his treatment of her Okrika people has only confirmed critics who from onset predicted Okupe would be a liability to Jonathan’s presidency.

    I have no doubt that Okupe knew a better strategy to shield the president would have been to descend heavily on the five legislators that behaved like thugs, distance the president from their crudity and violence, proclaim loudly that irrespective of the president’s political differences with his brother, the governor of Rivers, he would not subscribe to attempt by misguided thugs to derail our democracy. He could have boomed that the president is too decent to get involved in such an amateurish and lumbering attempt at impeaching a speaker. He could have threatened that the full weight of the law would be brought to bear on all those who caused mayhem in the Rivers House of Assembly. That could have bought Jonathan government of subterfuge time to plan for a renewed assault on Amaechi, their sworn foe and threat to 2015 president’s ambition. That would have been less offensive than grandstanding ‘President Jonathan is bigger than Amaechi’.

    In the league of those who have failed to protect the president in the current Rivers crisis is the Inspector General of Police. The only thing that resonates from all the IG has said on the crisis is ‘he had not received official complaints against Joseph Mbu from River State. That was a Freudian slip. This was a man quoted on pages of newspapers and seen on television calling the governor names, boasting he was not inferior to the governor, dropping the name of the NSA. A resourceful crisis manger without prejudice to his own politics would have known the game was up the moment Mbu started to see himself as alternative governor of Rivers; he should have been summoned to Abuja, publicly scolded and reposted to Borno State where services of such commissioners of police are needed. If the objective of the IG was to sacrifice the nations’ democracy in order to protect the interest of the president, he could still have achieved the same less ennobling objective by quietly reposting a more intelligent, less abrasive but equally spiteful Abuja loyalist to keep Amaechi under surveillance in Port Harcourt

  • Governors visit Amaechi, urge him to meet President

    Governors visit Amaechi, urge him to meet President

    A delegation of eight governors has advised, Gov. Chibuike Amaechi of Rivers, to personally visit President Goodluck Jonathan and brief him of the poor security situation of state.

    They gave the advice when they paid a solidarity visit to Amaechi in Port Harcourt on Thursday.

    The governors are: Kayode Fayemi, Ekiti; Babatunde Fashola, Lagos State; Ibukunle Amosu, Ogun; Rauf Aregbesola, Osun; and Abiola Ajumobi, Oyo State.

    The governors of Imo, Nassarawa State and Zamfara, represented their governors.

    They met with Amaechi in a close-door, while their spokesman, Fayemi, told newsmen that their mission was to stress the importance of their concern for the security of Rivers.

    Fayemi said that the issue of security in the country was “far more of a major concern’’ to Nigerians.

    According to him, we have met with our brother and chairman of our forum in an extensive discussion and he has briefed us on the situation on ground here.

    “We do feel strongly, having listened to him that it is quite important for him to actually go and brief Mr President, who is our leader and the chief security officer of the country on the very challenging security situation here in Rivers.

    “We believe that our chairman and brother will give serious consideration to that particular concern we have expressed to him.

    “It is important, as the chief security officer of Rivers, to take the opportunity to go and brief Mr President on the security situation in the state.

    “In our discussion with our brother, we talked on the importance for the hierarchy of our police authority, the Inspector General of Police, to help in restoring the confidence of the people of Rivers in police.

    “For us, we believe that this is a matter that requires the moral authority of Mr President as well; it is about saving the democracy; it is about ensuring that peace reigns in Rivers.

    Fayemi said that nobody should use any means to create tension in any place in the country.

    He added: “the tension in Rivers is avoidable and we want all parties to sheathe their sword and to help restore the peace and security of the state.’’

    The Zamfara Deputy Governor, Alhaji Mukhtar Anka, believed that Amaechi briefing Jonathan would help find a lasting solution to the crises.

  • Jonathan to student: emulate Onwuliri

    President Goodluck Jonathan has urged university students to emulate the virtues that characterised the life of the former Vice-Chancellor of Federal University of Technology Owerri, FUTO Prof Celestine Onwuliri.

    Onwuliri, an accomplished academic, was one of those who died in the Dana plane crash at Iju Ishaga in Lagos last year.

    Speaking during the inauguration of an ultra-modern laboratory built by the management of Gregory University Uturu in Onwuliri’s honour, President Jonathan lauded his rich academic history.

    The President, who was represented by the Minister of Education, Prof Ruqayyatu Ahmed Rufa’i, praised the scholarly industry of the late university don who earned his admission into the famed Academy of Science with a research project conducted locally in a Nigerian university.

    He also commended the Chancellor of Gregory University Uturu, Dr Greg Ibe for initiating the project. He enjoined other universities in Nigeria to emulate the gesture, stressing that the late don deserves the honour done to him.

    In his speech the Governor Theodore Orji, who was represented by the Abia State Head of Service, Adiele, urged people to strive to leave lasting legacies for which they will remembered, like the late Onwuliri has done.

    Responding, the wife of the deceased, Prof Viola Onwuliri, who is also the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, pledged that the Onwuliri family would continue to partner with Gregory University to sustain her late husband’s ideals.

     

  • Jonathan bags sub-regional insurance award

    Jonathan bags sub-regional insurance award

    The President of Sierra-Leone, Dr. Bai Koroma, on Wednesday in Abuja, conferred the honour of the Grand Patron of the West Africa Insurance Institute (WAII), on President Goodluck Jonathan.

    Koroma said the honour was in recognition of the leading role Nigeria had played in the affairs of West Africa, particularly the support for the establishment and functioning of the WAII.

    “Today is a special moment for me, being given the responsibility to give honour to Nigeria and my brother President Goodluck Jonathan.

    “I want to say thank you to Nigeria and to my colleague, friends and brother for making me what I am today.

    “The fact that I am succeeding in providing leadership in Sierra-Leone is as a result of the training I acquired from the institute and the experience that I have also acquired from what has been happening in Nigeria.

    “The West Africa Insurance Institute was established some years back. We must also thank the founding fathers of the institute and incidentally a good number of them are Nigerians.

    “At the establishment of the institute, support was provided by Nigeria, most of the funding and expertise that were required were provided by Nigeria.

    “Today, we are here to say thank you to Nigeria and to the President for the leadership he has continued to show,’’ the News Agency of Nigeria quoted the Sierra Leonean president as saying at the forum.

    Koroma specially thanked Jonathan for the leadership he provided for ECOWAS and Africa at large.

  • Brigands in the temple of law

    Brigands in the temple of law

    What did the five errant lawmakers in Rivers State want Tuesday morning? Not to enforce the rule of law, or to dignify the ethos of democracy. They wanted to enshrine brigandage in the temple of law.

    So, they had painted a scenario of morbid potential before Tuesday morning. First, they wanted to lop off the head of the state House of Assembly, that is the speaker. They did not have the number. They amounted to five, and the mainstream had 27 men. Following the law portended suicide. So they took the law in their own hands, and they made a dawn arrival in the chambers and decided to effect the unlawful.

    According to the scenario, they would cut off the leader, who was the speaker. That completed, they would proceed to the main agenda: bully the governor out of his position with a hurried impeachment proceeding. It would not have mattered what the law demanded before an impeachment proceeding. Once they enacted a fait accompli, and Governor Rotimi Amaechi ousted from the throne, Abuja would move in with the armed forces and the spartan temerity of power and the new imposed speaker would take over as governor.

    Where would that have left Governor Amaechi? He would resort to the court, battling from outside, from the position of weakness. The court would fall under the spell of dalliance, the court sessions postponed indefinitely just like the battle over the leadership of the PDP in Rivers State today.

    The intervention of Governor Amaechi’s forces routed the renegades in what looked like a civilian equivalent of a military counterattack. The renegades lost out ignominiously as the 27-man House not only convoked a meeting but passed into a law the budget proposals of the governor.

    Since the state crisis unfurls as a President Jonathan versus Governor Amaechi war, the Presidency suffered a severe and unmitigated disaster, just like Hitler’s misadventure in the Second World War in the operation Barbarossa in Russia. Not only the president, but also the long line of “democratic coup plotters” and in the lead was Nyesom Wike.

    We have seen this before. During the Obasanjo era, we witnessed the impeachment of Governor Joshua Dariye by a comic set of six turncoats who represented a fraction of the quorum. That reckless move enjoyed official anointing, and Dariye fought a fruitless battle of restoration till the end. Also, with irony, the other one occurred in Bayelsa State, and the travesty was not just numbers but geography. The Governor, Dieprye Alamieyesiegha, lost his reign to impeachment – and President Jonathan was deputy governor – not in the environ of Bayelsa State but in far-flung Lagos. President Goodluck Jonathan benefited from the travesty and that began his storied rise to a presidency of bumbling. Also for irony, President Jonathan has ensconced him in his inner circle. Before all these, Governor Ngige fell out of power when President Obasanjo cradled the nation’s top office and we all watched as the governor was spirited out of sight in a gangster-like kidnap and impeached.

    Yesterday lifts the Jonathan era to the ignoble height of democratic torpedoes of the Obasanjo era. The difference: the Obsanjo men succeeded in quite a few: Plateau, Ekiti, Anambra and Bayelsa states. President Jonathan won in Bayelsa by rallying all the armed forces to oust a governor in a fear of the lofty rules of democracy. He wants to replicate in Rivers State the pill he administered in the primitive ouster of former Governor Timipre Sylva. Now again, they failed. They have done many things in infamy. They have devised methods like sending a militant to organise a rally, stopped his plane from flying, implanted a toady as commissioner of police, barred traditional rulers from visiting the governor, barred him from saying hello to the President, tried to oust him as chairman of the Governors’ Forum, and so on. The question is, what is next?

     

  • I’m not dumping PDP – Tambuwal

    I’m not dumping PDP – Tambuwal

    … Assures Nigerians on budget

    The Speaker of the Federal House of Representatives, Honorable Aminu Tambuwal, on Friday dispelled rumors that he was on the verge of joining an opposition party.

    Apparently reacting to President Jonathan Goodluck Jonathan’s warning to elected political office holders under the platform of the party Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) that he would not hesitate to wield the big stick if they are found wanting, the Speaker said he is a member of the party.

    President Jonathan, according to reports warned that the “new PDP” would not condone indiscipline among its members, after accusing some of the leading lights of openly fraternizing with the opposition.

    “In a situation where somebody is in a particular party but his faith is in another political party. For those who are not holding political offices, yes, you can excuse. But if you are holding an elective office, you won’t be in that party and be working for another party, otherwise, why are you there? “the president asked rhetorically.

    Tambuwal, who was reacting to questions from journalists at the Benin Airport about rumors of his perceived anti- party activities following his alliance with members of the Action Congress of Nigeria, said he is still a member of the PDP and would remain one. “I’ m a member of the PDP, I am a PDP man. I’m hearing that rumours from you,” he said amidst laughter.

    The speaker also said that the rift between the National Assembly and the Executive over the 2013 appropriation act was in the interest of the generality of Nigerians

    Tambuwal, who was in Benin as a guest of the state Deputy Governor, Dr. Pius Odubu, on his birthday and weeding anniversary told reporters at the Benin Airport that consultations were ongoing and at the appropriate time Nigerians will benefit from the budget.

    “Well, you know it is all about consultation and we will keep talking to ourselves and ensure that Nigerians get the best out of it. But I assure you that what National Assembly is doing is to ensure that Nigerians get the best out of the situation. We are not there to undermine the interest of Nigerians; we will be the last people to ever do that,” the number four citizen added.

     

  • Students plead with Jonathan to end ASUU strike

    Students plead with Jonathan to end ASUU strike

    Some students of Ebonyi State University (EBSU), Abakaliki, on Thursday appealed to President Goodluck Jonathan to intervene and stop the ongoing strike by university lecturers.

    The students told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in an interview that the ongoing strike in its fourth day was not in the interest of university education and commended lecturers in EBSU for not participating in the strike.

    The students, who spoke include Miss Rebecca Okoro, a 200 level student of the Department of Biotechnology as well as Enyinnaya Oko and Stephen Onwe both first year students of the Department of Mass Communication.

    They said timely intervention by President Jonathan would salvage the situation and appealed to him to act fast to save the university system from collapse.

    The students expressed regret that their colleagues affected by the strike had remained at home.

    “We commend the wisdom and decision of the local ASUU chapter for not participating in the ongoing industrial action.

    “You know we just resumed on May 12 for academic activities after six weeks closure of the institution by the authorities in the wake of violent protests by students over fee hike.

    “Joining the strike now will have serious consequences on the students of the university.

    “We, however, feel for our colleagues in these affected universities who are now wasting in their respective homes,’’ Okoro said.

    The students said that their first semester examination had just started before the commencement of the ASUU strike.

    They said the industrial action embarked upon by the union could distort the smooth running of the academic calendar if nothing was done to end it soon.

     

  • FEC scraps BPE, NAPEP, NEIC, 217 other agencies

    FEC scraps BPE, NAPEP, NEIC, 217 other agencies

    …Approves merger of EFCC, ICPC

    The Federal Executive Council (FEC) has agreed to scrap the Bureau of Public Enterprises and 219 other parastatals and agencies.

    Also, in spite of the controversy, the government has accepted the recommendation to merge the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC).

    But the government has accepted the recommendation to conduct a “proper investigation into the allegations made by the National Boundaries Commission against the Office of the Surveyor-General of the Federation (OSGOF) over the funding of two non-existent boundary demarcations.

    The OSGOF will also be probed for alleged illegal extension of Nigeria’s maritime boundary from 200 nautical miles to 350 nautical miles at the cost of US$12 million without consulting.

    These are the highlights of the outcome of a review of the White Paper on the report of the Presidential Committee on the Rationalization and Restructuring of Federal Government Parastatals, Commissions, which was headed by ex-Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Mr. Steve Oronsaye.

    The Federal Executive Council (FEC) had spent the last three weeks to review the report and concluded the exercise on June 26.

    The Federal Government FG had in 2011 inaugurated the Oronsaye panel to restructure and rationalize Parastatals, Commissions and Agencies of the government as part of measures to reduce the rising budget profile.

    After the submission of the report, a White Paper Committee was set up to look at the recommendations of the Presidential Committee.

    The FEC, however, finally debated and ratified the recommendations of the White paper Committee.

    According to a document obtained by our correspondent, some of the agencies to be scrapped are the BPE; National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP); Fiscal Responsibility Commission(FRC); Public Complaints Commission(PCC); Nigerian Export Promotion Council; Public Complaints Commission (PCC); National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission (NSIWC); Federal Highways Department; Utilities Charges Commission; and National Economic Intelligence Committee among others.