APC chieftain advises Buhari to drop non-performing ministers

Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Kaduna state, has advised President Muhammadu Buhari to drop non-performing ministers.

Baba-Ahmed gave the advice in an interview with NAN on Sunday.

He also urged the president to quickly push through, policies that would reduce current high level of poverty in the country.

“If you go by the opinion of a lot of Nigerians, some of the ministers are just filling up space,” he said.

“There is a case to be made for the argument that the president should critically assess his ministers and remove those that he believes have not performed as well as they should.

“Replace them with people who will bring greater energy, greater vibe and greater imagination in managing scarcity and high expectations in the context in which we live.”

Baba-Ahmed said the level of poverty in Nigeria require urgent solution, advising government to continue mobilising resources to tackle the problem.

“What the government can do is what I think it is doing, trying to come up with policies that in the short time, can alleviate the crushing poverty,” he said.

“There are a lot of people who feed only once a day, there is a lot of hunger, frustration and bitterness.

“If we have N500 billion in the presidency now waiting to be disbursed, one would like to see an imaginative and productive use of that money, so that it reaches people that need it to feed, pay school fees, pay medical bills, rent and to go to places where they can earn a living.

“Government must mobilise resources directly and make sure that it gets to the people.

“In the longer term, we need bold and imaginative policies that should reposition and restructure the economy, to reduce dependence on oil.”

On the performance of Buhari, the former APC state chairman said “one year is long enough to assess people and too short to actually pass judgment”.

However, he said a lot had been achieved by the current administration, but that there was room for improvement.

“I will say yes, he has done well in the area of fighting security, he has done well in terms of signaling his intention to fight corruption, and has many challenges in managing economic recession,” he said.

“He can do a lot better in terms of the quality of people he works with, the quality of his policies and his ability to work with a political platform to engineer and sustain public confidence.”