President Bola Tinubu has ordered the full implementation of the Oronsaye report, including the recommendation to merge, subsume, scrape and relocate several agencies of government.
The Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris told State House Correspondents after Monday’s Federal Executive Council meeting that the President has constituted a committee to implement the mergers, scrapping and relocations within 12 weeks.
An eight-man committee has a 12-week deadline to ensure that the necessary legislative amendments and administrative restructuring needed to implement the reforms are effected in an efficient manner.
Committee members are the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Head of the Civil Service, Attorney General and Justice Minister, Minister of Budget and National Planning, DG Bureau of Public Service Reforms, Special Adviser to the President on Policy Coordination and the Special Assistant to the President on National Assembly. The Cabinet Affairs Office will serve as the secretariat.
“In a very bold move today, this administration, under the leadership of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, consistent again with his courage to take very far-reaching decisions in the interest of Nigeria, has taken a decision to implement the so-called Oronsaye Report.
“Now, what that means is that a number of agencies, commissions, and some departments have actually been scrapped. Some have been modified, and marked while others have been subsumed. Others, of course, have also been moved from some ministries to others where the government feels they will operate better,” said Idris.
The report submitted in 2012, listed 541 statutory and non-statutory government parastatals, commissions, and agencies.
A year earlier, President Goodluck Jonathan raised the Presidential Committee on Restructuring and Rationalisation of Federal Government Parastatals, Commissions and Agencies, under the leadership of former Head of Civil Service, Mr. Stephen Oronsaye.
READ ALSO: Vice President Shettima unveils Aba’s 188 MW power plant
The 800-page report recommended that 263 of the statutory agencies be slashed to 161; 38 scrapped; 52 be merged and 14 be reverted to departments in various ministries.
The report also recommends that the law establishing the National Salaries and Wages Commission be repealed and its functions taken over by the Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal Responsibility Commission.
It advised the Federal Government to merge the nation’s top three anti-corruption agencies—the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission,the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission and the Code of Conduct Bureau.
Credible News recalls that he Federal Government in July 2022 raised a second another White Paper Committee to review the Orosanye Report.
A decade earlier, a committee was set up on the restructuring and rationalisation of Federal Government parastatals, commissions and agencies which was chaired by former Head of Service, Mr Steve Orosanye.
The committee submitted its report on April 16, 2012, with various recommendations such as the abolition, reduction, merger and reversion of some of the agencies to departments in ministries.
Subsequently, a White Paper on the report was issued in March 2014 followed by an implementation committee that was inaugurated in May 2014.
The White Paper rejected most of the recommendations, while those accepted were not implemented.
In November 2021, the Federal Government inaugurated two committees, one of the Committees was to review the Steve Orosanye report and its White Paper chaired by Mr. Goni Aji, a retired Head of the Civil Service of the Federation.
The second committee was constituted to review agencies created from 2014 till date and was chaired by Ms Amal Pepple, also a retired Head of the Civil Service of the Federation.
Former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha lamented the inability of the government to implement the recommendations of the report, adding that it had impacted on the scarce resources of the government.
He gave the committee six weeks to submit its report. “You would all agree with me that the inability to implement the report of the Committee on Restructuring and Rationalisation of Federal Government Parastatals.
“Agencies and the Commission are costing the government highly. This cost grows higher and the situation is further worsened by the fact that new agencies are being created.
“After the submission of the Amal Pepple report, there is the need to constitute a White Paper Committee to consider its recommendations by the Government; hence the inauguration today of this Committee,” Mustapha said.
Credible news.ng
