After three weeks of consultations with international and
Nigeria’s political leaders, President Muhammadu Buhari appears set to
effect major changes in the administration of the country in a bid to
translate the ‘change’ mantra of his party into reality. To start with,
the President is said to have accepted the recommendation of the
transition committee he raised a few weeks ago to slash the number of
ministries from the present 42 to 19 with a view to saving cost and
making them more effective and responsive to the needs of Nigerians.
In the same vein, many of the ministries have been merged to ensure
proper coordination of duties and ensure greater efficiency and service
delivery.
A source close to the Presidency told Sunday Vanguard that the
number of Federal Government departments and agencies had also been
trimmed in line with the policy of the administration.
Effectively, it means that no fewer than 50 of the MDAs that were not
backed by relevant laws might be scrapped and their staff moved into
relevant departments to save cost.
The Presidency source hinted,”But the point being made is that
relevant MDAs that will exist under the present administration must be
those backed by laws.
“What that means is that the era of doing things the wrong way to please certain persons in positions of power is over.”
Shedding light on some of the ministries that had been merged, the
official pointed out that the Ministry of Aviation and relevant agencies
had been subsumed with Inland Waterways and associated agencies.
Similarly, the Ministry of Agriculture has been merged with that of
Water Resources under what the Presidency source described as the
consolidation of larger ministries.
It was learnt that under the administration of Buhari, only 19
ministers and 17 ministers of state would operate as opposed to the
previous arrangement where there were at least 42.
It was further gathered that some ministries would be run by senior
ministers while others would be manned by junior ministers to save cost.