Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday finally submitted names to serve in his cabinet, four months since taking office and after announcing he intended to take personal charge of the country's crucial oil portfolio.
The long-awaited list of nominees was submitted to Senate president Bukola Saraki at the National Assembly buildings in Abuja, the leader of the upper chamber of parliament wrote in a tweet.
Names of the nominees were not immediately disclosed.
Thursday is a public holiday in Nigeria to mark the 55th anniversary of independence from Britain, meaning senators will not reach a decision to approve the candidates before parliament resumes next Tuesday.
Buhari, who has been running the country with permanent secretaries (civil servants) at government ministries, on Tuesday evening said he would appoint himself minister of petroleum resources.
A junior minister will oversee the day-to-day affairs in the sector, which provides the majority of government revenue, his spokesman Femi Adesina confirmed to AFP.
Buhari, 72, has made stopping the rot in the oil sector a priority, as he seeks to cut graft and put the country's crippled, crude-dependent finances on a firmer footing.
OPEC-member Nigeria -- Africa's number one crude producer and biggest economy -- has been hit badly by a slump in global oil prices since last year, squeezing government revenue.
Oil accounts for some 90 percent of Nigeria's foreign exchange earnings.
The president has vowed to recover "mind-boggling" sums of stolen oil cash, starting with a drastic overhaul of state-run oil firm the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC).
The NNPC has become a byword for corruption and last year was accused of failing to remit $20 billion (18 billion euros) in revenue to the central bank.
Former military ruler Buhari has vowed that corruption and the corrupt will have no place in his government and vetting of candidates has been seen as delaying his nomination of senior ministers.
- 'Maximum power' -
Buhari has prior experience of dealing with the oil industry. In 1977, he was oil minister under General Olusegun Obasanjo and helped establish the NNPC.
He was later in charge of the Petroleum Trust Fund during the time of General Sani Abacha in the 1990s.
A committee advising Buhari on policy before he took office has recommended he streamlines the number of ministries and ministers.
He has already moved to revamp the NNPC, sacking the entire board, announcing a probe into opaque accounting practices and appointing a new boss to make the company more transparent and profitable.
Malte Liewerscheidt, senior Africa analyst at risk consultancy Verisk Maplecroft, said Buhari's decision "furnishes him with maximum power to push through necessary reforms" in the oil sector.
It also demonstrated the importance he places on overhauling the industry but the analyst cautioned that concentrating powers "could send the wrong signal for the reform path ahead".
"Concentration of powers is among the chief reasons for the poor performance of Nigeria's oil sector governance," Liewerscheidt said in an email.
"Buhari will need to make clear that combining the roles of president and petroleum minister will only be an extraordinary and temporary measure to accelerate reforms."
Obasanjo also oversaw the oil ministry when he was civilian president from 1999 to 2007 and Buhari will have to guard against the perception of a potential for abuse.
"Buhari's self-appointment is a high-risk strategy, as it links his fate as president with successful reform of the oil and gas sector," he added.
"If he fails to deliver tangible successes soon, there will be no minister to shift the blame to."
AFP
Wednesday, September 30, 2015
Video - President Buhari promises to free kidnapped schoolgirls at UN General Assembly
President Buhari seemed to lament on the lack of adequate support from the international community in fighting the Boko Haram insurgency at the UN General Assembly.
President Muhammadu Buhari to become oil minister of Nigeria
Buhari, who took office at the end of May promising to fight corruption, has made it clear he wants to overhaul the oil sector in Africa’s biggest economy, which provides the government with about 70% of its revenue.
“I intend to remain the minister of petroleum resources,” Buhari said in an interview on the sidelines of the annual meeting of world leaders at the UN general assembly in New York.
A minister of state would oversee the day-to-day running of the petroleum sector.
Buhari has not named a cabinet but is expected to submit candidates to parliament in the coming days.
A former general who briefly ruled Nigeria 30 years ago said Buhari has deep knowledge of the oil sector, having been head of the petroleum trust fund under the military ruler, Sani Abacha, in the 1990s and oil minister in the 1970s under president Olusegun Obasanjo.
A collapse in global oil prices has damaged Nigeria’s public finances and weakened its naira currency, delaying public salaries and fuelling inflation.
Buhari has said he would trace and recover what he has called “mind-boggling” sums of money stolen over the years from the oil sector.
The dealings inside the state-owned company Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation are so opaque that PricewaterhouseCoopers, commissioned to conduct an audit over the missing funds, said it was unable to obtain sufficient account documentation.
Not only is oil money stolen through accounting gymnastics and oversight gaps, but oil goes missing at unmetered oilfield wellheads, pipeline taps and export terminals.
Buhari has already split the NNPC into two, and said on Tuesday he was considering breaking up the company further to improve efficiency and better root out corruption.
“I haven’t absolutely made up my mind about that,” he said. “We want to see what we have done in reducing the size and redeploying most of the management. We want to see the impact of that before we decide further.”
He would re-evaluate in about 18 months.
Guardian
Tuesday, September 29, 2015
Video - President Muhammadu Buhari urges China to continue cooperation in oil sector
President Muhammadu Buhari has urged the Chinese government to sustain its cooperation in ongoing reforms in Nigeria's oil sector. Speaking at a meeting with President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the 70th General Assembly of the United Nations, Buhari thanked President Xi for China's continued help in curbing crude oil theft, saying that prosecution of those who misappropriated the NNPC's revenue under past administrations will soon commence.
President Muhammadu Buhari calls on world leaders to return Nigeria's stolen wealth
Addressing world leaders at the 70th General Assembly of the United Nations, President Buhari also urged his counterparts to do more to return stolen funds and assets to their countries of origin.
Observing that corruption, cross-border financial crimes, cyber crimes and human trafficking are major challenges of the 21st century which the international community must work collectively to overcome, President Buhari reaffirmed his administration’s determination to frontally confront the twin evils of corruption and illicit financial outflows.
“Let me reaffirm the Nigerian government’s unwavering commitment to fight corruption and illicit financial flows. By any consideration, corruption and cross border financial crimes are impediments to development, economic growth, and the realization of the well-being of citizens across the globe,” Mr. Buhari said.
“Nigeria is ready and willing to partner with international agencies and individual countries on a bilateral basis to confront crimes and corruption.
“In particular, I call upon the global community to urgently redouble efforts towards strengthening the mechanisms for dismantling safe havens for proceeds of corruption and ensuring the return of stolen funds and assets to their countries of origin.”
President Buhari also proposed the adoption of peace as a seventh essential element of the Sustainable Development Goals adopted last Friday by world leaders in New York.
“The Secretary General has grouped the SDGs into what he calls six “essential elements” namely: Dignity, Prosperity, Justice, Partnership, Planet and People.
“As a prerequisite to these and as we look at history and remember the terrible events that gave rise to the birth of the United Nations in 1945, I would like to propose a seventh: PEACE.
“Peace is close to the hearts of Nigerians, as we are in the front line in the war on terror. Boko Haram’s war against the people of Nigeria, Chad, Niger and Cameroon may not attract as much worldwide attention as the wars in the Middle East but the suffering is just as great and the human cost is equally high.
“This is a war between progress and chaos; between democracy and the rule of law. Boko Haram celebrates violence against the weak and the innocent and deplorably, they hide behind their perverted interpretation of Islam. Boko Haram is as far away from Islam as anyone can think of,” President Buhari declared.
The President assured the global community that his administration was doing all within its powers to quickly overcome the challenge of terrorism and insecurity.
“The new Nigerian Government which I have the honour to head, moved with dispatch to put in a bold and robust strategy to defeat Boko Haram. Nigeria and her neighbours Cameroon, Chad and Niger plus Benin are working together to face this common threat within the regional framework of the Lake Chad Basin Commission.
“We have established a multinational joint task force to confront, degrade and defeat Boko Haram. We have driven them away from many of their strongholds, killed or captured many of their operatives or commanders and freed several hundreds of hostages,” President Buhari told the General Assembly.
The President reassured the international community that rescuing the Chibok girls remains one of the major objectives of his administration.
“We are working round the clock to ensure their safety and eventual reunion with their families. The girls are constantly on our minds and in our plans,” he said.
President Buhari condemned the new and dangerous dimension which human trafficking has assumed in the world.
“We in Africa are grieved to see hundreds of our able bodied men and women dying in the desert or drowning in the Mediterranean.
“We condemn in the strongest terms these people traffickers and will support any measures to apprehend and bring them to justice,” the President said.
Noting that the world was witnessing a dreadful increase in conflicts fuelled by availability of small arms and light weapons, President Buhari called on the international community to work towards the effective implementation of the Arms Trade Treaty to ensure that small arms and light weapons can only be legally transferred.
Reminding the global assembly that peaceful co-existence and self-determination were among the key principles that led to the establishment of the United Nations, President Buhari called for the urgent resolution of the question of self determination for the people of Palestine and Western Sahara.
“The international community has come to pin its hopes on resolving the Palestinian issue through the two – states solution which recognizes the legitimate right of each state to exist in peace and security.
“The world has no more excuses or reasons to delay the implementation of the long list of Security Council resolutions on this question. Neither do we have the moral right to deny any people their freedom or condemn them indefinitely to occupation and blockade,” the President said.
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