YAR’ADUA’S CABINET:

•Obasanjo nominates 9 ministers, Chief of Staff
By STEVE NWOSU
Thursday, April 26, 2007

http://odili.net/news/source/2007/apr/26/806.html

President-elect, and Katsina State governor, Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, appears to be receiving his baptism of fire already, as pressure is mounting on him concerning those who should be in his first cabinet.

Daily Sun gathered that the biggest pressure Yar’Adua is getting is coming from none other than his godfather, President Olusegun Obasanjo.

Despite widespread local and international condemnation of last week’s flawed presidential election as well as the efforts by key Presidency functionaries to win some credibility for both the controversial poll and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) president-elect, it was gathered that serious tussle for federal appointments have already begun, with Obasanjo in the vanguard.

Information available to us indicates that President Obasanjo is currently helping to constitute the cabinet of the incoming government and has already nominated nine persons of his own for appointment as ministers by the Yar’Adua government.

Apart from the ministerial nominees, Obasanjo is said to have also taken up the responsibility of appointing a ‘suitable’ Chief of Staff for the new president. He is said to have verbally shortlisted three candidates, among whom he intends to pick from. Top on the list is Governor Adamu Mu’azu, the outgoing governor of Bauchi State, who not only lost in his bid to install his Secretary to the State Government as his successor, but also failed to clinch a senatorial seat in last weekend’s National Assembly elections.

The appointment would be seen as an apt compensation for Mu’azu, who is believed to have done well in Bauchi but was so busy campaigning and touring the country to deliver the Yar’Adua/Jonathan that he had no time to sit down and plant his own man at home in Bauchi.

Also in the race for the post of Chief of Staff are Governors Ahmed Makarfi of Kaduna and Adamu Abdullahi of Nasarawa State. Both are believed to be die-hard Obasanjo loyalists who allegedly dropped their respective presidential ambition as soon as the president asked them to do so. In the build up to the failed bid to kick Vice President Atiku Abubakar out, both governors were reportedly promised the VP slot.
However, the president-elect is believed to have also put in a word for his own present chief of staff in Katsina State.

A highly reliable Presidency source however, told Daily Sun that whoever is appointed Yar’Adua’s Chief of Staff may still have to work in the shadow of Gen. Abdullahi Muhammad, the current Chief of Staff to President Obasanjo. Obasanjo is said to have directed that Abdullahi works with the new president and his team for the next two years, to help groom the new chief of staff.

Asked to explain what this "grooming" entails or whether it has always been the practice in the Presidency, the source said he was "not aware if anybody groomed the current chief of staff" and had yet to hear of chief of staff being groomed by anybody. "But that is what Baba wants as another way of ensuring continuity," the source said.
He denied that it was any attempt on the part of Obasanjo to perpetuate himself and his influence in Aso Rock.

Meanwhile, Obasanjo is also said to have impressed it on Yar’Adua to do everything possible to ensure that his daughter, Iyabo, emerges as the next Senate President. However, the president-elect is said to have told him that whoever would emerge to lead the Senate would have to be decided in the Senate by the senators themselves.

Meanwhile, as Obasanjo busies himself with the self-imposed task of constituting a cabinet for Yar’Adua, his government continues to battle with the issue of credibility raised by the widely acclaimed monumental fraud that characterized both the April 14 and April 21 elections, even as several opposition figures head for the courts and tribunals to seek to void the results of the polls that produced Yar’Adua, among others.


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I am particularly interested in the senate president for Iyabo angle and the response of Yaradua to that inordinate ambition of Obasanjo. Yaradua is prooving to be a man of his own. Many rude surprises may yet await Obasanjo as he exits ASO ROCK. Lets keep our fingers crossed.

You need to provide a link to the page where you got the article from, sir.

Its provided now. Sorry about the oversight

Hm! This OBJ gorilla is a bloody greedy guy. So after 8 years, you want your equally gorilla-daughter to be number three. Let's see what the incoming senate will say. As hinted by the poster, Yaradua may well be showing OBJ the signs of things to come

nothing can be farther from the truth - propagandas and unending effort to rubbish OBJ and Yar'adua.

Calm down fellows - the responses we've seen so far show how gullible we are as Nigerians!! This is certainly another unsubstantiated article from the SUN newspaper and the personal viewpoint of Orji Kalu - that over-ambitious and clueless dimwit.

One rule of thumb - Any article in the Sun, Saharareporters and theNews is not worth the paper it's printed on. Let's open our minds.

There is no smoke without fire ke

Breaking News : Ribadu El-Rufai, Others Get Key Posts In Yar’Adua’s Government


By Tony Orilade/Abuja

There are indications that some key members of the present administration have been pencilled down as ministers in the in-coming administration of Alhaji Umar Musa Yar’Adua, the President-elect. P.M.News authoritatively gathered this morning that 18 members of the present administration would be part of Yar’Adua’s cabinet when the Katsina governor eventually assumes office on 29 May, 2007.

Some of the names on the list, allegedly drawn by President Olusegun Obasanjo for Yar’Adua, include: Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, the current boss of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), who is expected to be announced as the Inspector-General of Police, to succeed the current IGP, Sunday Ehindero; Malam Nasir El Rufai, expected to be named the Minister of Finance; Mrs. Nenadi Usman, Frank Nweke Jnr.; and Chief Femi Fani-Kayode.

Others are: Alhaji Adamu Maina (former PTDF Executive Secretary); Alhaji Adamu Muazu, former governor of Bauchi, who lost the state to ANPP, Chief Onyema Ugochukwu (PDP governorship candidate who lost the Abia gubernatorial election); Mr. Akin Osuntokun, former Special Adviser to the President on Political Affairs and Director General, News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), etc.

P.M.News gathered that unlike in the past when governors were given the mandate to nominate candidates for ministerial positions, the PDP hierachy did the nominations this time around for the President-elect.

It was also learnt that ministerial nominees would cut across party lines, as members of the opposition would also be incorporated into the new government.

Presidency sources also revealed that the ruling party would not pass through any of the opposition parties in choosing any of their members to serve in the Yar’Adua cabinet.

Alhaji Yakubu Jibril, a former field officer in charge of Bauchi State at the National Economic Intelligence Committee, while confirming the nomination of Muazu, said: “We are aware that the federal government will be accommodating Governor Muazu, but we are ready for him because he cannot be our representative.

“We have an avalanche of petitions against him at the EFCC and ICPC and we are ready to produce same before the National Assembly, which is constitutionally empowered to screen ministerial nominees.”


http://www.thenewsng.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=2655