Skip to main content

Keyamo On His Call To Resign-No Law Is Being Violated

A pro-democracy Organisation, the Transition Monitoring Group (TMG) was reported to have called for the resignation of the Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Mr Festus Keyamo. The Chairman of TMG, Awwal Ibrahim Rafsanjani, said that incorporating the roles of a Minister and a spokesman was going to conflict with his duties as minister.

Mr. Festus Keyamo has defended his continued stay in office, despite accepting to serve as campaign spokesman for the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Ahmed Tinubu. He is blaming the call for his resignation on the opposition.

"My attention has been drawn to a statement by a certain CSO alleging a conflict of interest between my role as a campaign spokesperson and as Minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria

“What does the law say? Section 84 of the Electoral Act clearly states that political appointees are to resign if they are to contest for any party position or any public office. No mention was made of ad hoc appointments for party activities. So, strictly speaking, no law is being violated here.

“Therefore the so-called position of these people are untenable, ill-informed and consequently rejected.  They are jittery about the stout defence of our party and government we are putting up and the unblemished projection of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu (our candidate) that we are making.“I am sorry to disappoint them, but I will serve my country and I will serve my party,” he said.Keyamo attributed the call for his exit as minister to people he said were working in alliance with the opposition parties, but disguising as CSOs.“We know them. I cannot recall a single statement like this from these people throughout the PDP era when PDP Ministers were fully involved in presidential campaign activities.

"For instance in 2015, my brother, Special Duties Minister, Kabiru Turaki, served as the Deputy Director-General (North) of the PDP/Jonathan Campaign Council. These characters kept mum. So, you can be sure that this is PDP speaking through one of their NGOs.

“Secondly, I am a full member of my party, the APC, and I am entitled to participate in Party activities. My dues to my party is deducted every month from my meagre salary and sent to the party. Being a Director in a Campaign Council is like every other party activity. They want to deny me my fundamental human right to freedom of association because I am a minister.

"Thirdly, there is no conflict of interests. I fail to see any. Am I using public resources to campaign? Not at all. We have an APC campaign office and I have my well-furnished private chambers, better equipped than my Minister’s Office.”

Keyamo insist that he has not allowed his new assignment affect his work as Minister.“This is now on record and my Permanent Secretary can attest to this. I grant interviews after my day’s work or at weekends or at break time. Fourthly, Campaign Directors are volunteers; at least I am.“We are not paid a single salary or allowance for our work, so the allegation of double privilege is incorrect,” he said.




Comments

Post a Comment

Type your comments here

Popular posts from this blog

Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Wins Big In Governor Nyesom Wike's Local Government Area

The presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu, has won the Obio-Akpor, the Local Government Area of Governor Nyesom Wike in Rivers State by a landslide. Tinubu polled 80,239 votes to defeat the Candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi, who came a distant second with 3,829 and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), who got 368 votes.
Post a Comment
Read more

Breaking! BDC Operators Close Operations In Abuja - Over Dollar Scarcity

Bureau De Change operators have announced shut down of operations in Abuja as a result of unavailability of the dollars,  The Chairman of the association, Abdullahi Dauran, made the announcement on Wednesday. The chairman of the Association of Bureau De Change Abuja chapter, issued the directive to stop sales as the exchange rates in both the official and parallel markets have become unfavourable. Dauran attributed the closure to online business transactions and cryptocurrency. Echoblog spoke to Jamilu a BDC owner who also confirmed the news. The closure of business would take effect from Thursday, February 1, 2024. On Tuesday naira closed at an all-time low of N1,482 against the United States dollar on the official window. It stayed stable at N1,450/$ at the parallel market.
Post a Comment
Read more

$1 Billion Arms Sale To Nigeria-Approved By The US

The U.S. government has announced that it has approved the sale of attack aircraft and other equipments to Nigeria. The aircraft are expected to to be used against terrorists and other gunmen operating in the West African country. According to a statement Thursday by the U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency, the equipments are to cost Nigeria about $997 million. The acquisition of the aircraft and other equipments comes less than a year after the U.S. government supplied the country with 12 units of super tucano aircrafts paid for by Nigeria. PREMIUM TIMES had last year reported that the Nigerian Air Force (NAF) had taken delivery of the second batch of six A-29 Super Tucano aircraft from the United States. The first batch also comprising six aircraft was delivered in July 2021. New Equipments According to the Thursday statement, the equipments requested to be purchased by the Nigerian government include 12 AH-1Z Attack Helicopters; twenty-eight (28) T-700 GE 401C engines (24 insta...
Post a Comment
Read more