The newspaper review for Tuesday, November 7, leads with the report that President Muhammadu Buhari has thrown his weight behind Governor Nasir El-Rufai’s decision to sack 22,000 teachers in Kaduna state who failed competency test and recruit 25,000 new ones among other stories.
Vanguard reports that a week after being suspended from his post as Chairman of Special Investigation Panel on Recovery of Public Property, the Presidency has restored him to the post but with some changes to his operational guidelines.
The restoration of Obono-Obla, who is also Buhari’s Senior Special Assistant on Prosecution, to his post, followed last week’s meeting between him and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo a day after he was suspended by Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami.
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Vanguard newspaper
A top Presidential official confirmed to Vanguard last night that Buhari’s intervention and restoration of Obono-Obla to his post followed the explanations by Osinbajo after getting briefings from the presidential aide.
The source, however, said Obono-Obla would, henceforth, operate under the shadow of the Vice President, who would supervise the work of the Special Investigation Panel on the Recovery of Public Property.
The Punch reports that eleven governors elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party quizzed all the eight National chairmanship aspirants of the party at their meeting in Enugu on Sunday.
The meeting ended in the early hours of Monday.
The questioning was said to have taken place after a meeting that the governors and members of the party’s National Caucus had with the aspirants.
The Punch newspaper
In attendance at the meeting were the Chairman of the party’s National Caretaker Committee, Sen. Ahmed Makarfi, all the PDP governors, except that of Ebonyi State, who was represented by the state deputy governor.
Aspirants at the meeting were Bode George, Gbenga Daniel, Uche Secondus, Tunde Adeniran, Jimi Agbaje, Taoheed Adedoja, Raymond Dokpesi and Rashidi Ladoja.
The Guardian reports President Muhammadu Buhari yesterday threw his weight behind Governor Nasir El-Rufai’s decision to sack 22,000 teachers in Kaduna State who failed competency test and recruit 25,000 new ones.
El-Rufai had vowed that threats of industrial action by the state chapter of the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT) would not deter his government.
Digressing from his speech after addressing participants at a special retreat of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) on the challenges facing the education sector in Nigeria, which held at the Banquet Hall, Abuja, Buhari who gave the tacit support to El-Rufai, described the development as “a serious situation.”
The Guardian newspaper
If nothing else, the presidential endorsement will embolden Governor El-Rufai whose decision last week to sack almost the entire teachers in public schools in Kaduna State has attracted criticism from around the country.
Buhari said his administration was committed to revitalising the education system and making it more responsive and globally competitive.
The Nation reports that the House of Representatives has written the Acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) Mr. Ibrahim Magu to arrest and prosecute the former Chairman of the Pension Reform Task Team, Mr. Abdulrasheed Maina.
The decision of the Representatives was conveyed in a letter through the Clerk to the National Assembly, Mr. M. A. Sani-Omolori .
The November 7 letter was in line with the House’s resolution of October 24.
The Nation newspaper
In the letter, the House urged EFCC to “immediately arrest the former Chairman of Pension Reform Task Team, Mr. Abdulrasheed Maina, for prosecution “in order to serve as deterrent to others who might have corrupt tendencies”.
“The House of Representatives has already constituted an Ad-Hoc Committee charged with the responsibility of investigating the circumstances surrounding the re-surfacing, re-absorbing and subsequent elevation of Mr. Abdulrasheed Maina from the rank of Assistant Director (the position he held before he was removed in 2013, to the position of an Acting Director) and to recommend strong sanctions against any person or persons who are implicated in the scandal.”
ThisDay reports that in a move to keep to his promise to the chieftains and loyalists of the All Progressives Congress (APC) to appoint more ministers to his cabinet, President Muhammadu Buhari is considering a tentative proposal to restructure some of the ministries, appoint eight new ministers to his cabinet and reshuffle the cabinet.
Presidency sources privy to the proposal informed THISDAY on Monday that the plan is to appoint eight new ministers who will all be politicians, to accommodate the yearnings of his party members including its national leader, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu and at the same time position APC for the 2019 general elections.
ThisDay newspaper
In order to accommodate the eight new appointees to the cabinet, the plan is to get the president to split the Ministry of Power, Works and Housing into three ministries that will be manned by full ministers, and hived off the aviation and marine transport units from the Ministry of Transportation.
One minister will man Aviation and another may lead Marine Transportation.
A presidency source who spoke on the issue said the proposal that has been sent to the president provides for the appointment of eight new ministers, one representing each of the six geopolitical zones in the country and one from Lagos (who may be a nominee of Tinubu) and Kano State (who may be a nominee of Rabiu Kwankwaso).
Source: Naija.ng