What do you think of way the ministerial nominees were screened by the National Assembly?

Ken Emeka Eze, author and computer scientist: Many Nigerians were pondering the way the ministerial nominees were being screened by the senators. I believe that the way the screening was done is such that change cannot happen with the present crop of politicians. Things have continued to remain the same. I don’t approve of the […]

Ken Emeka Eze, author and computer scientist: Many Nigerians were pondering the way the ministerial nominees were being screened by the senators. I believe that the way the screening was done is such that change cannot happen with the present crop of politicians. Things have continued to remain the same. I don’t approve of the way the screening was done. For me, it is still the same way of constituting the federal executive council, no difference and that means that there might be no significant change in the performance of the new ministers because it is the same old system that produced them. The same old people have been recycled. One would have expected that new breeds would be introduced into the system but it is disappointing to see that it is the same old people again. The need to inject new hands into the polity which would go a long way to change Nigeria for the better has not yet been realized.

Mohamed Shamsuddeen Musa, Islamic scholar: My opinion about the present crop of ministerial nominees is that the senate has failed to carry out a credible job. The senators simply asked the nominees questions in a way that gave the impression that they were trying to just fulfill all righteousness. The real questions about productivity and capability were not asked. What I expected to see during the ministerial nominations screening was serious questions asked and then the senate would take time to examine the answers given by the nominees to examine whether the individual knows what they were doing or not. The whole thing was just done in a hurry.

Igitious Edoja, security consultant: My opinion is that the National Assembly did not do a good job of the screening exercise because the whole thing was too brief. The real issues were not addressed and when that is the case, it is the entire country that suffers because, mediocres end up becoming ministers.

Also, some of the lawmakers decided to use the opportunity to settle old scores with the nominees which ought not to be. My expectation was the screening exercise should have been a medium where the ministerial nominees would be asked direct questions related to the job they would be doing as ministers but most of the questions asked bordered on personal issues and issues that had nothing to do with the ability of the ministers to perform when they get to office. Another thing for me was the time factor. The screening was just too brief. And because of that, the real issues were not completely addressed.

Ezekiel Yahaya: I believe that given the circumstances that surrounded the entire screening exercise, there was nothing the national assembly could have done. Here we have an acting president who forwarded the list of ministerial nominees to the lawmakers with the expectation that they will be confirmed almost immediately. So, the lawmakers were left with no other choice than to do the bidding of the acting president. What I can make out of the entire screening exercise is that the national assembly danced to the tune of the executive and did what I can describe as a poor job. Ordinarily, I had expected that some of the nominees would not make it through the screening but what did we see? All of the nominees were confirmed. Is the national assembly trying to tell us that they could not find one single fault with all the nominees? I think these entire thing just boils down to what some of us have been saying all these while, that it is time Nigerians come together to decide the quality of people who should be our leaders.

Arikpo Eta Jnr. Information Technologist: In my opinion, the system of voting within the national assembly is actually outdated. The situation where you ask for an opinion from the senators and you rely on what you see or your ability to hear the ‘ayes’ and the ‘nays’ is no longer in practice. For instance, I noticed that for as many people who said ‘ayes’ also said ‘nays’ and I heard that the “ayes” took the vote. Personally, I think this is where we really need to look into because the selection, even in the national assembly, is already faulty.

It depends on the basis for dropping the ministerial nominees. Personally, I don’t expect that the national assembly accept all the names that were sent to them and like I said, only on very strong grounds would the national assembly drop any nominee.