One month after Awolowo’s exit, export council still without head
The Nigerian Export Promotion Council (NEPC) has been without leadership one month after the expiration of the tenure of Mr Olusegun Awolowo, findings have shown.
Daily Trust
Awolowo was appointed by President Goodluck Jonathan as executive director and chief executive officer of the NEPC on November 28, 2013. His four-year tenure expired on November 28, 2017.
Insiders told Daily Trust that Awolowo didn’t hand over to the most senior director when he was leaving as has been the practice.
“Instead, the former CEO just locked his office and went away the keys. He also went away with the official vehicles of the council he’s using before the expiration of his tenure,” a staff of the council who declined being named because he was not permitted to speak to the press, said.
Daily Trust observed that despite the expiration of his tenure, Awolowo is still being addressed as the chief executive officer of NEPC.
For example, on December 8, he accompanied Vice President Yemi Osinbajo to the inauguration a cashew processing factory in Ilorin, Kwara State in his capacity as executive director of the council.
Also, last Tuesday, Awolowo was at the 50th birthday of the House of Representatives Speaker Yakubu Dogara at the International Conference Centre (ICC), Abuja where he was introduced as NEPC boss.
It was gathered that he attended several other public events as the council boss after November 28.
Daily Trust recalls that Awolowo has been having a running battle with the House of Representatives since 2015 following a promotion scandal that rocked NEPC that year.
The promotion exercise was for directors, deputy directors, and assistant directors. Eight staff of the council were promoted, but some staff of the council said the exercise was flawed.
They accused Awolowo of bias and promoting staff from his ethnicity, especially those in the directorate cadre.
The promotion was allegedly dogged by controversies ranging from sectionalism, ethnicity and religious bias. For instance, all the 13 promoted staff at the time in the directorate cadre have the same religious affiliation.
Among the promoted staff in the directorate cadre, the northeast has 1 (Taraba), northwest 1 (Kaduna), northcentral 2 (Kogi & Benue), southwest 5, south-south 2, and southeast 2.
Not satisfied with the development, 27 aggrieved staff of the council petitioned the House in November 2015 to look into the matter with a view to bringing justice.
The petition was referred to the committee on public petitions, which directed that no further action should be taken on the promotion exercise until all issues raised in the petition were resolved.
However, the council issued the affected staff queries, demanding explanations on why they took the matter to the House even as Awolowo ignored several invitations by the committee to hear his own side of the story at the time.
Because of the way Awolowo has been behaving towards the House, the committee on commerce last year threatened not to approve the council’s budget, until he finally succumbed to the wish of the House.
Some lawmakers told our correspondent that Awolowo’s behaviour towards the House was as a result of his relationship with the wife of the Vice President, Mrs Dolapo Osinbajo.
However, latest development showed that a fresh process of sacking the affected staff has been initiated, but the House would not allow that to happen as it passed a motion in October to constitute an adhoc panel to probe the matter.
The panel, chaired Aliyu Hammad-Pategi (APC, Kwara) had concluded its assignment and submitted its report to the House earlier this month.
In its report, the panel recommended that NEPC should stop any plan to sack the affected staff and that none of them should be castigated, victimized or humiliated in any manner for writing the petition management.
The panel also said that all staff due for promotion in the council should be promoted with effect from the date of their due promotion. by
A new CEO for NEPC was not appointed because of the “nonreceipt” of signals from the Presidency, sources at the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (OSFGF), said yesterday.
The council is under the Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade, and Investment, but the SGF announces the appointments of the heads of federal agencies.
The spokesperson of the OSGF, Mohammed Nakorji, was not available for comment yesterday. He didn’t return calls nor replied messages sent to his mobile over the issue.
Top bureaucrats, however, told our reporters that there was no signal from the Presidency who has the sole responsibility of appointing Awolowo’s replacement if his tenure was not renewed.
Another source said the action of the former CEO may not unconnected to his “closeness to some forces at the Presidency. He believes that his tenure will be renewed despite the controversies he created at the council.”