The many new appointments are not dignifying
The last few weeks of the President Goodluck Jonathan administration have gathered a roaring energy that has confounded many. Barely a month to the handover to the incoming administration of Major General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd), the government has fired the Inspector General of Police, the heads of the National Health Insurance Scheme and the Nigerian Ports Authority. But if many seem surprised by these actions in the twilight of the administration, others are uneasy with the rash of new appointments, obviously to compensate and reward loyalty, while filling outstanding political offices before the expiration of the administration on May 29.
In the last three weeks, the president has appointed a new Inspector General of Police, made his Minister of State for Agriculture the Executive Secretary, Petroleum Equalisation Fund, while also appointing a new chairman for the Security and Exchange Commission, (SEC). The president has also approved the composition and appointment of the chairmen and members of the governing councils for the 12 new universities, the National Institute of Construction Technology and three federal polytechnics. The board of each of the newly created universities has five members while the boards of the institute and the polytechnics have a six-member governing council.
Undoubtedly, President Jonathan has the power to fire and hire till the last day of the administration. As his spokesman, Dr. Reuben Abati, said in his response to the concerns generated by the new appointments, Jonathan is in power till May 29 and that the appointments were made in good faith. Abati is right that Jonathan still has the powers to make such appointments but few will agree with him that they were done in good faith.
Many Nigerians are in fact angered by these last-minute appointments, seen more-or- less as politically indecent, apparently done with intent on mischief and some designed as booby traps for the incoming administration. Indeed, many view the latter day appointments as the squandering of some of the goodwill the president garnered from home and abroad by his statesman-like disposition at the end of the presidential poll last March.
Not surprisingly, the All Progressives Congress (APC) has accused the government of indulging in “last minute dubious activities.” In a scathing statement, the APC said “President Jonathan has been engaged in a rash of feverish last-minute appointments that though may not have breached any known law, are patently in bad faith, morally repugnant and indecorous. They say they are in office until May 29, but are appointments the only function of a government? Are there no problems crying for attention, such as the intractable fuel scarcity and the worsening power situation?”
Professor Itse Sagay, SAN also spoke with the same vehemence while condemning the rash of last-minute appointments as immoral and politically immature. “Personally I think it is an improper behaviour” said Sagay “because he is saddling the new administration with decisions and appointments which he should have allowed them (Buhari’s government) to make in accordance with their own priorities and preferences.”
We feel strongly that many of these appointments coming at the tail end the administration are unnecessary and provocative even though they are legitimate. Why did the government have to wait till the dying days of the administration to suffuse the system, bleeding as it is, with new political appointees? And why must the government wait till the last day to reward people who have been loyal and supportive?
We believe the outgoing administration did not have to indulge in these controversial appointments which do little to its image. But we know, and those making the appointments must also do, that it would take just one statement on May 29 to reverse all these questionable appointments
