The national chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), John Oyegun has confirmed speculations in certain quarters that the 27 heads of parastatals sacked by President Muhammadu Buhari on Monday were caught sabotaging the efforts of the present administration.
Oyegun confirmed this to State House correspondents on Tuesday after a meeting of the National Working Committee of the ruling party with the President
President Buhari had on Monday sacked the heads of Nigerian Television Authority (NTA), National Orientation Agency (NOA), News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF,) Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN), Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP), Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) among several others and directed them to hand over to the most senior directors in their respective agencies.
Oyegun stated that the agitation by members of the ruling party for their removal was not necessarily to succeed them but to stem the tide of what he described as ‘internal sabotage’ that was allegedly going on in the agencies.
He also accused officials of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) of being part of efforts to sabotage the government.
“APC members were not concerned about the positions, we are concerned about the internal sabotage that is going on in a lot of the PDP filled positions which are critical to our national growth and development.
“It is happening in INEC, it is happening in a lot of other institutions and that is what the concern of the party is, not necessarily taking over; we should take over and they should be people who believe in the change agenda, we have no apologies for that at all, that is it,” the APC boss said.
On the controversy surrounding the figures of the 2016 budget proposal, Oyegun attributed it to the complexities arising from the adjustment of ministries from over 40 in the past administration to a little above 20 in the current dispensation.
“There is absolutely no confusion. This is a serious issue. I want you to please understand the complications that come from adjusting a structure from over 40 ministries to just over 20 ministries and the necessary adjustments of figures and movements of institutions that entails.
It was very complicated, so it is natural that adjustments have to be made to the process and that is just what is happening,” he said.
