FG approves two new agencies, ignores Oronsaye report

Months after President Bola Tinubu called for the full implementation of the Stephen Oronsaye, the President alongside the legislative arm of government have continued to push for establishment of a new ministry, agencies and commissions.

A tally done by our correspondent revealed that two new commissions were approved by the President from February 26, 2024 to date.

These two are the South East Development Commission and North West Development Commission.

On February 26, 2024, the Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga in a post on X (formerly Twitter) announced the decision of the President.

“Twelve years after the Steve Oronsaye panel submitted its report on restructuring and rationalising Federal Government parastatals and agencies and a white paper issued two years after, President Tinubu and the Federal Executive Council today decided to implement the report,” Onanuga wrote.

“Many agencies will be scrapped and many others will be merged, to pave the way to a leaner government,” he said.

The Presidency had since released a list of agencies to be scrapped and those to be merged.

In 2011, former President Goodluck Jonathan set up the presidential committee on the reformation of government agencies chaired by Steven Oronsaye, a former Head of Service of the Federation.

Its terms of reference included, among others, examining the enabling Acts and mandates of all the federal agencies, parastatals, and commissions to determine areas of overlap or duplication of functions.

The committee, in its report, recommended that of the 541 Statutory and Non-Statutory Federal Government Parastatals, Agencies and Commissions, 263 statutory agencies should be reduced to 161, 38 agencies should be abolished, 52 agencies should be merged, and 14 should revert to departments in ministries.

A white paper committee, headed by the then Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mohammed Adoke, reviewed the report and rejected most of the recommendations of the committee when it submitted its report in 2014.

However, even the accepted recommendations were not implemented until the Jonathan administration left office in 2015.

In 2021, the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari inaugurated two committees to implement the report.

One of the committees headed by a former Head of Service, Bukar Aji, was mandated to review the Oronsaye Report and the government white paper.

The other committee chaired by Amal Pepple was mandated to review MDAs created between 2014 and 2021.

The then Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha, in July 2022, set up another white paper committee, headed by Ebele Okeke, to review the report of the Pepple committee. However, the Buhari administration failed to implement the report.

While the discourse on the implementation of the report was ongoing, the National Assembly and successive governments have been creating agencies and institutions, therefore, increasing the cost of governance in the process.

The consequence of the bloated government has been the steady increase in the recurrent expenditure of the Federal Government.

On September 14, 2023, the National Livestock Reforms Committee recommended that Tinubu create a “Ministry of Livestock Resources” to, among other deliverables, reduce the decades-long gory conflict between farmers and nomadic cattle herders.

Former Kano State Governor and Chairman of the All Progressives Congress Chairman, Abdullahi Ganduje, disclosed this to State House Correspondents shortly after he led the committee in an audience with the President at the Aso Rock Villa, Abuja.

It formed part of 21 recommendations captured in a document submitted to the President.

The post FG approves two new agencies, ignores Oronsaye report appeared first on 36ng.