How Kyari facilitated Geoffrey Onyeama’s ministerial nomination

Up untill Tuesday, October 13, 2015, not too many people knew or had even heard of Mr. Geoffrey Jideofor Onyeama.His name which was included in the second ministerial nominees list read out on the floor of the Senate by Senate President Bukola Saraki among others did not immediately ring a bell.In fact, many people from Enugu State, his home state were already agitating that the state was excluded in the ministerial list showing that he is not very well known in the state much more Nigeria. Even the Deputy Senate President, Chief Ike Ekweremadu while contributing to a motion on the exclusion of FCT in the ministerial list also said that he was doubtful if Enugu State, his home state was represented in the list.But TheCitizen was reliably informed that his name made the coveted list because he is a friend to President Muhammadu Buhari’s Chief of Staff Abba Kyari who made a strong recommendation for him.It was gathered that both attended Cambridge University in the 1980s and have been close friends ever since then.Before the final list was read out on the floor of the Senate yesterday, most observers predicted that Osita Okechukwu, an All Progressives Congress (APC) stalwart in Enugu State, and an indigene of Eke like Onyeama, would be the nominee from the state. While some dropped the name of Prof Bat Nnaji, the former Minister of Power as
a possible nominee.Onyeama is the fourth son of Charles Dadi Onyeama, who was Nigeria’s first ever judge at the International Court of Justice at the Hague, and younger brother of author Dilibe. The nominee also read law at Cambridge after a degree in Political Science from Columbia University and has worked with the World Intellectual Property Organisation since the 1980s.