President Bola Tinubu is planning to reshuffle his cabinet and remove non-performing ministers, Podium Reporters authoritatively gathered. This is in line with the President’s declaration during the cabinet retreat held last year to usher in the new Ministers, that he will not hesitate to sack non-performing Ministers.
At the retreat, the President through the Policy Coordination Unit headed by Hadiza Bala Usman outlined KPIs for each ministry and cabinet member and the Ministers were made to sign a performance bond.
President Bola Tinubu clocked one year in office over a month ago and there were huge expectations that he may announce a cabinet reshuffle during his first year anniversary activities/stock taking. However it did not come to pass.
Podium Reporters has now learnt that a cabinet reshuffle is imminent and this has thrown many ministers into some kind of frenzy, especially those who feel they have been unable to reasonably tick most of the KPIs assigned to their ministry.
Some of the Ministers whose continued stay in the cabinet is uncertain have been trying to secure a private audience with the President to seek a second chance but the President does not want to meet anyone once the subject matter for discussion borders on lobbying for retention as Minister.
Podium Reporters gathered that some desperate Ministers have been trying to go through Senators and close friends of President in attempt to negotiate their political future with the President. However, the President has been adamant in his resolve that the time for politics is over as his legacy is on the line.
The stance of the President not to entertain any form of lobbying from some of his ministers seeking to remain in his cabinet is what the Chief Whip of the Senate, Ali Ndume alluded to on Wednesday when he alleged that President Tinubu has been “caged” in the Presidential Villa that some forces are preventing “well-meaning people from physically discussing the truth with him.”
Sen. Ali Ndume, who represents Borno South Senatorial District, is known to court controversy by some of his utterances. On this particular case, Sen. Ndume’s grouse is because he reportedly met a brick wall when he tried to secure a audience with the President to lobby for retention of some ministers who desperately went to seek his help.
In the press conference he held at the National Assembly Complex on Wednesday, Sen. Ali Ndume said: “Mr President is not in the picture of what is happening outside the Villa. He has been fenced off and caged. So many of us won’t go through the backdoor to engage him.”
“Now they have stopped him from talking and he doesn’t have public affairs managers, except that his spokesman, Ajuri Ngelale, who writes press statements.
“The president should wake up, it seems he isn’t in the picture of what is happening because he has been caged off. He has been fenced off by plutocrats.
“He should open his doors and meet those who will tell him the truth. Unfortunately, the people who will tell him the truth won’t struggle to meet him. I am very worried not only for the president himself but myself”, Ndume complained.
The Borno Senator went on to also talk about food security and hunger in the land. However, his major reason for the press conference was to lay out his annoyance at being shut out.
The highly anticipated cabinet reshuffle by the President is understandably unsettling many in President Tinubu’s cabinet especially those whose appointment had more to do with politics than their individual competence.
President Bola Tinubu wants to increase the pace of his administration in his second year in office after a turbulent first year that saw a raft of bold unprecedented reforms and policy directions that shook the foundations of the Nigerian economy. This is why he wants to rid his cabinet of any dead wood that is not living up to the performance they signed.