Nigeria to Dissolve Boards of Federal Agencies, Parastatals

Acting under pressure from supporters pushing for political relevance, Nigeria’s federal government may have decided to dissolve the boards of federal agencies and parastatals, THISDAY has learnt.
However, because some of the positions are tenured, it is not certain how far it would be implemented, but there are strong indications that the Presidency may have given the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), the go-ahead to dissolve and reconstitute the managements and boards of the agencies and parastatals.
The green light to dissolve the boards of parastatals has already alerted political lobbyists who are gearing up to be appointed in the event of the dissolution of the boards of the federal parastatals.

However, when contacted on Saturday on the issue, the Director Information OSGF, Willie Bassey, said he was unaware of such presidential approval.
There are about 42 agencies and parastatals directly under the supervision of the OSGF, that directly help the government in the daily running of varying and specific, oversight and administrative functions.
The dissolution of the boards is expected to help President Bola Tinubu to shape the agenda of his own administration.
Some senior civil servants who spoke to THISDAY Saturday night, said that it would not be out of place for Tinubu to dissolve the boards of federal parastatals inherited from former President Muhammadu Buhari.
They noted that his predecessor also carried out a similar cleansing exercise in 2015 when he aproved the dissolution of the governing boards of federal parastatals, agencies and institutions.

Under Buhari’s instruction, the chief executive officers of the affected parastatals, agencies and institutions were directed to refer all matters requiring the attention of their boards to the president, through the Permanent Secretaries of their supervising ministries.
Similarly, Buhari had also constituted the boards of the six aviation agencies less than 24 hours to the end of his administration after the agencies operated without boards for close to a decade, despite that their Acts make the constitution of boards mandatory.

The agencies were the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA), the Nigerian College of Aviation Technology (NCAT), the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet) and the recently created Nigerian Safety Investigation Bureau (NSIB).
However, the appointments were not confirmed as the ninth Senate could not ratify them before its dissolution and the subsequent inauguration of a new government on May 29.

Olawale Ajimotokan in Abuja

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