The Senior Special Assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on Media, Garba Shehu, in an interview with Sahara TV on Saturday, argued against comparing Buhari’s government to such states as Kaduna and Rivers, which have appointed some commissioners.
He said, “The President did say he would hit the ground running, but he has not been given the chance to hit the ground running because the administration that he succeeded — the Jonathan administration — did not deliver the handover notes until two or three days to the inauguration, meaning that these handover notes were submitted at a time when everyone had been consumed by (inauguration) activities.
“Unfortunately, there was no time to look at them until after the President had been inaugurated. The President was left in the dark. He had to understand what the situation was and what was on the ground. That was why he set up a different transition committee. It was only this week that the committee, led by Dr. Ahmed Joda, scrutinised the handover notes and handed over the report to him (Buhari).
Shehu explained that the ministerial appointments had yet to be made because the committee needed to conclude its findings first, an 800-page report of which was presented to Buhari on Friday. (Punch).
Well, it’s all been said. There are notable approaches to scrutinising and actioning a pre-handover Report – which is to be SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic/Reliable and Time-bound) about it. From various views on ministerial appointments, a summarised handover brief could have been offered since ex-president Jonathan conceded defeat. This would enable his successor to ready his men/women to analyse and disseminate salient information which would guide him (successor) to conduct competence and qualification-based assessment of potential ministers.
As things are now, there is obviously an air of ambivalence as the nation continues to second-guess on appointees.Indeed, what had occurred in the past 3 weeks can be traced to non-accountability in some quarters, and ongoing patterns show that things could become more desperate, questionable and convoluting in weeks to come, with inadvertent fall-back on political stability,growth and development maximisation.
The nation has a right to know their ministerial delegates in a timely manner.