The Harvard University alumnus, while speaking with 90Minutes Africa’s Rudolf Okonkwo, expressed surprise that the former FCT minister was nominated by Bola Tinubu’s government in the first place.
Former Executive Chairman of the Nigeria Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), Dr. Sam Amadi, has said that Nasir El-Rufai should not have been nominated as a minister because the former Kaduna State governor is too divisive.
The Harvard University alumnus, while speaking with 90Minutes Africa’s Rudolf Okonkwo, expressed surprise that the former FCT minister was nominated by Bola Tinubu’s government in the first place.
“He shouldn’t have been nominated,” Dr. Amadi said with reference to Mallam El-Rufai. “Many Nigerians are mistaken about leadership. El-Rufai no doubt has the technical competence, brilliance, and capacity to deal with difficult issues but lacks the central political skill to build community.”
The former aspirant for the Labour Party governorship ticket in Imo State said that although El-Rufai was responsible for some development projects as governor, he left Kaduna State greatly divided.
“Nigeria is at a point where security and national cohesion should be central because you must have a country before you can talk about making anybody a minister,” the law professor said.
El-Rufai was among the first batch of 28 ministerial nominees submitted to the Senate for screening and confirmation. However, three nominees, including the former Kaduna State governor, among 48, failed to secure the nod of the Senate to become ministers in Tinubu’s government. The Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, said the reason for withholding their confirmation was because the nominees didn’t have security clearance.
But Amadi expressed the belief that the idea of security clearance might have been deliberately designed to block the confirmation of El-Rufai.
“This is just a foretaste of the level of manoeuvring that we might see as we continue in this journey,” the social commentator posited.