“Asa o naani a nnkunn’gbe, ina njo, eye oko fo lo (a kite doesn’t care if the bush burns; when there’s fire, the bird flies away) This Yoruba proverb can be aptly applied to describe the people behind the pedestrian attempt to disrupt the wheel of progress currently being witnessed at the Federal Character Commission (FCC) under the leadership of its Executive Chairman, Hajia Muheeba Dankaka.
As a youth and a close observer of happenings at most of Nigeria’s government agencies, I can make a bold claim to say that the achievements the Commission has recorded under Dankaka are unprecedented since 1996 when it was established by General Sani Abacha. What has been observed however is that those who have chosen to be clogs in the wheel of progress of Dankaka’s leadership have not only resolved to subject her to character assassination through a richly funded campaigns in the media, they have also gone a step ahead by recruiting unsuspecting youth organisations to do their bidding of staging idle protests at the Commission’s headquarter every week.
Not a small ruckus have been witnessed in the last few weeks by the faceless group against Dankaka whose only sin against them is her creed that as a public office holder, she’s doing her work with utmost efficiency and honesty.
Her dedication to the people and to the nation that things must be done right against the old order has been her greatest undoing against the sponsors of the media trial and incessant protests calling for her removal from office.
This richly funded media campaign is aimed at nothing but to discredit Dankaka with the hope that President Muhammadu Buhari and the National Assembly would one day be swayed and dismiss her from her current position. While this smear campaigns are not surprising, what is however dumbfounding is how facts and true representation of happenings at the Commission under the leadership of Dankaka are consciously being manipulated.
For the sake of clarity, this piece will try to address some of the spurious allegations being bandied around against Dankaka and what the FCC Act says. Have there been infractions and abuse of office as they have alleged? What power does an Executive Chairman of FCC possess and what are his/her limitations? What is the constitutional role and mandate of a Commissioner at the Commission? All these questions would be answered vis a vis response to the allegations raised.
In an article, one Bola Bakare said there was an obnoxious claim that the FCC under Dankaka has derailed from his laid-down mandates. The writer claimed that the Executive Chairman has deliberately sidelined the operational committees and relates directly with the monitored MDAs thus usurping the constitutional roles of the committees and its members. For people like us who are in the know of happenings at the FCC, this claim is not true as it is on record that it was on assumption of Dankaka-led board that the operational committees were expanded from 24 to 37 and this was done in the bid to give every Commissioner a sense of belonging and to be part of the decision-making process. Presently, there are 37 operational committees and every Commissioner is heading at least one each. A little background to this is that the committees were constituted on October 26, 2020. Before then, there were various engagements such as setting up of ad-hoc committees on recruitment audits following reports of corruptions and unethical practices that pervaded the Commission, underhand dealings by staff who connived with many MDAs to circumvent the system without following recruitment guidelines. There was also an orientation programme organized for the Commissioners. Based on the reports for the ad-hoc committees, interactive meetings were scheduled with the affected MDAs. Contrary to the allegation that the Chairman was holding meetings with MDAs alone, the members of the respective ad-hoc committees attended the meetings to discuss their findings and resolve observed lapses. This was before the constitution of the operational committees. With the committees in place, the Executive Chairman has been taking decisions based on the recommendations of the operational committees. The records are there for any discerning minds to verify.
The writer also claimed that Dankaka is withholding MDAs “deemed sensitive, purportedly with presidential directive, thus foreclosing commissioners’ access and visibility to the transactions and activities of such MDAs…” this claim is also not true. It is a known fact the said MDAs were also handled by Dankaka’s predecessors and as a matter fact, the files of these MDAs were handed over to her through Secretary to the Commission.
The writer also accused the FCC Chairman of financial ineptitude, he claimed the Executive Chairman refused to render account of financial transactions as it concerns income and expenditure of the Commission, even of assets. However, section 12 of the Establishment Act of FCC has mandated the Commission to prepare estimate of expenditure and income at the end of the year and same shall be sent to the President. The same section also mandates the Commission to keep proper account which when certified by the Commission be sent to the Auditors appointed by the Commission. From the foregoing, it is clear that the Commissioners have only two roles to play in the account of the Commission, to certify the accounts prepared by the Chairman at the end of the year and to appoint an Auditor to audit the prepared account. To this end, it is a misapplication of the Act to suggest that the Chairman must bring to the Plenary the day to day accounts of the income and expenditure of the Commission before the end of the year when the prepared account will be certified by the commission. It is the practice that at the end of each year, the external auditors will produce an audited report of the Commission in consonance with Section 12(1) and (2) of the Establishment Act. If there is any question, the auditors’ report will reflect the mistakes made.
The writer further alleged that Hajia Dankaka was restricting commissioners’ access to MDA files adding that even where commissioners managed to have access to any, vital documents are surreptitiously removed and file numbering tampered, adding that “this is preventing the commissioners from discharging their constitutional responsibilities.”
This allegation is also false as it is a common knowledge at the FCC that committees have been making recommendations on their monitoring activities to the Chairman for approval in the MDAs’ files. What the Commission has in place in the streamlining of the procedures because of observed indiscriminate correspondence from the files by the former committee secretaries to the extent that some pages were either mutilated or removed. Also Section 2 (1) of the establishment Act of the FCC answered this in clear and unambiguous term. It describes the Chairman as the Chief Executive of the Commission, the other members are described as Representatives of their various States in the Commission to ensure and enforce compliance with the principles of the proportional sharing of all bureaucratic, economic and political posts at levels of government as contained in the preamble to the Act establishing the Commission. It is rather a bad interpretation to equate the Chairman with the Commissioners in terms of running the Commission. The FCC Act envisaged situation and interpretation of this nature, the reason it specifically describes the status of the Chairman and also allows for another Commissioner representing the State of the Chairman. Had the Act meant otherwise, the Chairman would have been the representative of her state. The Chairman is not the first among equals as claimed but rather, the Chairman is the Chief Executive Officer and the ACCOUNTING OFFICER of the Commission. Whereas the constituency of Members is just one state, but that the Chairman is the 36 states and the FCT. Dankaka, as the Chief Executive Officer at FCC and is accountable for all actions and inactions of the Chairmen of Members of the various committees. They cannot carry out any activity or implement any decision of the committees without the approval of the Executive Chairman. Therefore, there’s no sinister misinterpretation and misapplication of this section of the Act as alleged.
At this point, let me also urge my fellow youths to resist being used for the orchestrated plan to oust Dankaka from office. FCC under her watch is operating an open-door policy and has nothing to hide. My fellow youth should be wary of the lies being sold to them and take advantage of the Freedom of Information Act to get the books of the FCC so as to understand the true situation of things at the Commission.
It will interest them (Youths) to note that Dankaka’s vast experience in ensuring accountability and transparency in the private driven sector world has been instrumental in terminating systemic corruption and repositioning of excellence in performance and delivery of quality services within a year of her appointment as the head of FCC. It took less than 6 months for her to fish out the bad eggs sabotaging the system and as investigations would reveal that the vacuum created before the appointment of Dankaka led to the illegalities being unearthed now. Of course, many of these lapses were corrected when Dankaka came on board but as expected, the evil machinations profiting from the illegalities also fought back by planting spurious allegations in the bid to spoil her hard-earned reputation.
Despite the media trial she was subjected to, Dankaka has been managing the crisis and restored sanity to the Commission which is now on the right track of delivering on its constitutional mandate. She has as a matter of fact continued to confound critics with her determination, poise and dedication to duty. She is taking everything in its strides, unafraid to make tough decisions and demonstrating clearly that the change mantra of the present administration is not a mere attempt at sloganeering.
ABDULSALAM Writes from Abuja
