The boards of no fewer than 14 agencies are exempted from Monday’s sweeping shake-up that aborted the tenure of the top hierarchies of the Nigerian Government’s agencies, parastatals, institutions and state-owned companies.
President Bola Tinubu’s directive to dissolve the management boards of all establishments falls within the ambit “of his Constitutional Powers and in the Public interest”, the government said in a statement on Monday night.
The rejig continues a chain of leadership changes in major government institutions since the president assumed power barely three weeks ago.
Credible News recalls that the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele was asked to vacate his seat on 9 May to allow the government to start a probe into the operations of the apex bank under his watch. The State Security Service has since detained Emefiele.
The bank’s Deputy Governor, Folashodun Shonubi, has been overseeing the operations directorate, acting in his stead.
Similarly, on Thursday, the head of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Abdulrasheed Bawa was suspended. He later presented himself to the secret police for questioning.
President Tinubu will temporarily handle issues that, ordinarily, members of the dissolved boards were duty-bound to treat until new boards are in place, the statement said.
Such matters will reach the president via the permanent secretaries “of their respective supervisory Ministries and Offices”, the statement added.
The dissolution, however, did affect boards, commissions and councils listed in the Third Schedule, Part 1, Section 153 (i) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria as amended.
The list of the immuned boards, commissions and councils are the Code of Conduct Bureau; Council of State; Federal Character Commission; Federal Civil Service Commission; and Federal Judicial Service Commission.
Others are the Independent National Electoral Commission; National Defence Council; National Economic Council; National Judicial Council; National Population Commission; National Security Council; Nigeria Police Council; Police Service Commission; and the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission.
