Senate Kicks Against Removal Of Argungun As NDE Boss

Nigerian Senate has expressed displeasure over the removal of Dr. Nasir Ladan Argungun as the Director-General, National Directorate for Employment (NDE) and  urged President Muhammadu Buhari to reconsider  the action with a view to reverse it .
The lawmakers also urged  President Buhari  to direct an investigation into causes of  the frictions   between the sacked  DG and  the Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Kayamo.
The Senate’s resolution  was sequel  to the consideration of a motion sponsored by. Senator Ibrahim Hadejia ( Jigawa State ), which came to the floor under, Orders 42 and 52 of Senate  rules
Senator Hadeja in his motion  said it was a matter of concern to  the upper legislative chamber rover media reports of the removal of Argungun as the NDE director general as announced  by the  Presidency on December 8.
Though Senator Hadejia noted that it was within the executive  powers of the  President to appoint and  remove  any  of his appointees, he informed his colleagues of the controversy surrounding Argungun’s removal from office.
He specifically pointed out that the Presidential directive on the removal  gave room for speculations in some  quarters that some unpatriotic people were out to undermine the laudable programme of the federal government.
Senator Hadejia said the removal was capable of creating needles and avoidable leadership crisis at the NDE at this critical time that the federal government was leveraging on public works programme to address issues of unemployment and youth empowerment in the country.
According to him, it is in the overriding public interest to reconsider and rescind the said Presidential directive on the removal to ensure leadership stability in the agency.
This, he said maintaining the the Directorate’s  leadership  would  aid and sustain smooth implementation of jobs creation, skills acquisition and the federal  government’s SPW programme aimed at benefiting the youths, many of whom were unemployed.
Contributing, Senator Rochas Okorocha, (APC Imo West) advised the Senate to apply wisdom in handling this the matter given the political and economic situations in the  country.
“Let us adopt a non formal method of resolving  these issue and not create more conflicts among arms of governments,” he stressed.
In his remarks, the Senate President, Dr. Ahmad Lawan said his understanding of the motion was that  the National Assembly was in support of the  NDE programme.
Lawan said the leadership of NDE, under the sacked director general had successfully embarked on a pilot implementation of the federal government’s SPW progra-mme in six states.
He stressed the need for solution to the issue so that the minister and the NDE boss could work together harmoniously, warning that the change in leadership of the agency at  the moment could derail the genuine intentions of the programme.

By: Nneka Amaechi-Nnadi, Abuja