In what observers see as a significant step towards consolidating his power, President Bola Tinubu swore in ministers to his cabinet on Monday, nearly three months after his inauguration.
Tinubu appointed former investment banker Olawale Edun as finance minister and coordinating minister for the economy.
He named Heineken Lokpobiri as junior minister of petroleum and Ekperipe Ekpo as junior minister of gas resources.
A main petroleum minister has yet to be appointed, even as speculations are rife that he might toe the line of his predessessor, Muhammadu Buhari in retaining the ministry.
However, some analysts say the headship of the ministry by the former president did not bring the much needed transparency as some of the activities were shrouded in secrecy, resulting in some sksrming and fudturbing revelations l, eight years after.
Also, the analysts say on Monday that the job is however cut out for the ministers considering the high level of poverty ocassioned by high price of pump price of petrol, inflation and heightened level of insecurity.
But the present high level of despondency is as a result of years of unfulfilled promises by elected
public officials that have led to high level of deficit of confidence between government and the governed.
Consequently, Nigerians
expect the ministers to be provided with Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) which should serve as the basis for assessing them preferably half yearly.
This, according to them is because president Tinubu’s policies since almost three months, such as the removal of subsidy on
petrol and foreign exchange
unification, have caused a spike in
the price of a litre of petrol
which currently sells for about
N650 and more in some places, while the naira/dollar
rate fluctuates around N860, and even went as low as N950/$ at the parallel market.
The resultant effect has been high cost of living that has seen more Nigerians joining the multidimentionally poor bracket.
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With headline and
food inflation rates rising for the
seventh straight month in July
2023 to 24.08 percent and 26.98
percent, respectively, the antidote by President Tinubu declaring a state of emergency on food security is yet to manifest even though it was greeted with scepticism by industry stakeholders.
It is amid these worrisome and disturbing trends, with some Nigerians not sure of where one meal a day would come from are looking to the new cabinet to work with President Tinubu to quickly
bail them out of the present
socio-economic quagmire.
This, to some analysts, underscores the need for a marking
scheme for the ministers, rather than living then to be lords in their verious ministries without accountability as witnessed even in the immediate past administration.
Another concerned area is the likelihood of Tinubu retaining the petroleum ministry as being speculated.
They reason that with growing deficit between the government and the governed and need for accelerated growth, retaining the portfolio by President would serve as a distraction.
According to them, the situation is further compounded by the regional assignment on him as the chairman of the ECOWAS.