President Muhammadu Buhari
explained, yesterday, that he was yet to appoint his ministers because his
predecessor’s transition committee submitted its report on the previous
administration to him late.
Buhari, who spoke to newsmen at
the Summit of the African Union in Johannesburg, South Africa, said he was
being careful in order not to make mistakes in appointing individuals
especially to key positions such as in the finance and petroleum ministries.
His words: “I don’t know why
people are so anxious about ministers. But eventually we will have (them). But
the main reason is that I have an interim committee which I agreed with the
former President Jonathan that the ministers of the outgoing government should
hand over their notes or their documents to this interim committee so that a
position can be prepared for the new government to start from with clear
records from ministers.
“But the ministers knew that
they were going while the technocrats, the permanent secretaries and directors
and so on, would remain. If anything goes wrong they would be invited to
explain, but unfortunately the outgoing government did not cooperate.
“So, what the committee did was
to divide itself into about five sub-committees and got a resource person that
was willing to come and bring the document, and so they prepared and I got the
report I think three days ago.
I’m not in a hurry to get
ministers
“I was waiting for this report
because I would like to know the position of things in the government
especially in terms of finance and petroleum industry. So, I am not in a hurry
to get ministers.
“I want to get ministers after
at least I have seen the report because I don’t have to appoint a minister
today and sack him the next week because this report would give me what
actually happened in terms of security, and economy of the country.
“And since I have to have
ministers from politicians and technocrats, I wouldn’t (like to) make the
mistake of getting somebody, who has been involved on account of
accountability.“
Buhari added that he, Jonathan
and former Head of State, Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar, had agreed to let the
former ministers hand over their notes to the interim committee he had formed.
He said that the planned
examination of the hand-over notes had to be suspended when the outgoing ruling
party accused his then incoming administration of forming a parallel
government.
Buhari said he actually wanted
to get a platform from the former ministers on which to start from following
the problem of accountability in the administration.
The President, who recalled
that during his time as Minister of Petroleum during the Chief Olusegun
Obasanjo military regime, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)
had only three accounts, said that during the immediate past administration,
the NNPC and the Ministry of Finance did not know how many accounts they had.
He described the development as improper
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