By Yusuf Bello
Lawmakers and Minister of state for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo on Tuesday disagreed over recruitment of 774,000 Public Works Programme, under the National Directorate of Employment (NDE).
SINL Nigeria reports that the lawmakers had invited Keyamo to give details of the planned recruitment.
Specifically, the joint Committe of the National Assembly on Labour sought to find out the method of selection of a 20-man Committe from each state for the programme.
This disagreement over who get the upper hand in the recruitment of the workers made the lawmakers to walk Keyamo out of their meeting.
Recall federal government had said that it will recruit 1,000 workers in each of the 774 Local Government Areas (LGA), in the country from October to December for roads rehabilitation, construction, sanitation among others.
However, a heated argument erupted when Keyamo, who is in charge of the programme was invited by the National Assembly joint Committee on Labour, Employment and Productivity to explain how the States’ Selection Committees for the Extended Special Public Works Programme was done.
Indeed, Keyamo insisted that his ministry was asked to supervise the recruitments by the President Muhammadu Buhari.
The shouting match between the lawmakers and the Minister almost degenerated into unpleasant situations.
According to Keyamo, the lawmakers have been given 15% slots of the program and still desires to have a total control over the program.
The Minister noted that the lawmakers wants to have a total control of the program which, according to him, is not possible.
He explained that a couple of days ago, the committee started mounting pressure on him to bring a list of those to be recruited in each of the 774 local government.
Keyamo noted that the intention of the lawmakers is to direct him on what to do from state to state.
He said: “The Chairman insisted that I must come to him privately for him to give me instructions about how the program should be run all over the country. But I said no, that I am only answerable to the President and I can only be answerable for what I have done by virtue of the provision of the constitution.
“What they are getting wrong is that they said I am questioning their power to investigate me. They wanted the cameras to be out before I talk, that is, going into an executive session, but I declined that everything must be done in the open with all the cameras so as to expose any kind of corruption. The Nigerian people must know what is going on” he said.
The Minister added that the committee cannot accuse him of lopsidedness in the allocation and turn back to clean him up in an executive session.
Reacting to Keyamo’s allegation while addressing newsmen, the lawmakers said that the Minister thought he could manipulate them in their decision because he has lots of skeletons in his cupboard.
They further accused the Minister of trying to guide their sitting by his attempt to disorganize it.
The Chairman of the joint committee, Senator Godiya Akwashiki said that the Minister totally contradicted himself when asked to brief them on activities of the ministry, especially with the lopsided nature of the 20-man committee set up in each state for the recruitment exercise.
Akwasiki said that while Keyamo said that 20 person were recruited for the exercise, the DG of NDE is only aware of 8 people out of the committee set up by the Minister.
“The DG NDE said he only know about eight people, but how the Minister came about the remaining 12 people is best known to him. We want him to explain to us how they selected 20 people from each state. He has skeleton in his cupboard, he’s trying to bring confusion.
“We want him to tell us about the 12 people because the DG said he is aware of only eight people. He is trying to confuse us,” the lawmaker said.
The lawmakers added that they are not here to witch hunt anybody but to carry out their duties of checkmating the activities of the executive.
