The call for the President to re-evaluate and reconsider his appointments of two northerners as Chairman and Secretary of the Federal Character Commission is unfortunate and unnecessary.
The constitition has vested the president with the powers of nominating persons from every state of the country to the National Assembly for confirmations as members of the commission. This same constitution also vested the president with the sole power of selection among members from the ones confirmed as chairman of the commission.
The secretary of the commission is appointed also by the president, but not from within the members of the commission. This appointment is the sole responsibility of the president even though it is expected that it should also pass some transparency and integrity tests.
The president is not to be coarsed into making such appointments as it is not the intendment of the crafters of this constitution.
The chairman of the commission, Dr Muheeba Dankaka, and the secretary, agreed they are both from different zones of the north, but what the sponsors of this motion failed to investigate is whether the secretary was appointed at the same time with the chairman.
It is on record that the secretary of the commission was appointed on March 17, 2017 and have just finished his first tenure which he was adjudged to have performed creditably and this is a fact known almost to all.
The enabling act that created the commission also vested on the president the power to reconsider him for reappointment as secretary of the commission if he was convinced that the outgoing secretary has performed creditably to require in all good conscience a reappointment which the man has really achieved.
To people of good conscience, the question at stake is therefore: Merit or the Federal character application?
It is a right of the secretary to be reappointed as secretary after fulfilling just one basic requirement as stated in the enabling law and it is only the president that is expected to reconsider him for that reappointment after he deemed it fit that by good conscience, he has performed creditably well. This is a right the president exercised in making this appointment that is at the centre of protestation today.
Our president is known all over the world as a man of integrity and good judgements. The president has, during the inauguration of the members of the FCC in the presidential villa, stated that the chairman and other principals officers of the commission were picked on merit and based on other requirements such as professional competence, adherence to the principles of transparency and accountability. This was really the basic criteria used to execute the composition of the management structure of the commission today.
The fact is that in the formation of the principal officers of the commission which has elicited many criticisms from both the informed and uninformed segments of our nation, is legally correct and morally expedient. We should instead be praising the president for rewarding hard work and excellence in the case of the secretary’s reappointment and capacity and competence in the appointment of the chairman, Dr Muheeba Dankaka.
This president has kept faith with his promise of affirmative actions, this led to the deliberate appointment of a capable woman as the chairman today and she is doing extremely well.
Dr Muheeba Dankaka, with a chain of experience in management in the private sector spanning over 30years and a former chairman of the Kaduna Chamber of Commerce, Mines and Agriculture (KADCCIMA), a place which is on record that she put in place a system to promote transparency and accountability. She is agreed from the North Central geo-political zone of the country and in particular, Kwara state. Today, her reform programme is working seriously for our country especially the centralisation of the monitoring and enforcement department.
The president appointed her chairman by simply placing a square peg in a square hole.
Her appointment as chairman was done by simply not loosing sight of the required constitutional and legal requirements expected of the president which is geographical spread as in respect to other principal staffs.
What wrong has the president done in these appointments?
The secretary of the commission was re-appointed by the president after meeting the eligibility criteria for reappointments as stipulated for the relevant public office as secretary. It is the dictum of a good term deserves another that is the overriding factor in this appointment.
We need to commend the president for not sacrificing merit in this instance. The relevant federal character principles-established by virtue of the clear provisions of sector 14,sub-section 3 of the 1999 constitution of Nigeria has been met and not breached by the president. He is very aware of the danger of observing the federal character in the breach as a potential threat to the unity and peace amongst the federating states in the country.
The president, since coming on board as the head of state, has been avoiding acts that could unnecessarily heat up the polity. Why do we as citizens trying to heat up the polity by raising issues that disunite us? We have an extremely bright and exciting future in one indivisible and indissoluble nation that is propelled by unity in diversity.All must be on deck to ensure that we support the president and it is an action that as citizen, we should ensure we defend jealously.
The proponents of the federal character principles, as enshrined in our laws, did not stipulate that the principles should be pursuit at the instance or expense of merit and competence. The states that produced the chairman and the secretary have offered by their performances high quality human resources for this public offices they occupy today and we must support them to succeed because if they fail our nation fails.
– Musa Wada writes from Abuja.
