President Bola Tinubu, an ethnic Yoruba, has increasingly been accused of favouring his ethnic group when it comes to appointments to top jobs. This allegation has increased in profile with the publication of an article by BBC News which highlights that: “Worries about fairness in presidential appointments are not new, but a chorus of criticism is growing over President Bola Tinubu’s picks, with some accusing the head of state – who has been in power for two years – of favouring people from his own Yoruba ethnic group”.
The article goes on to make a misleading claim that echoes what many Nigerians believe – that with the exception of ministerial appointments, the president has a free hand to fill up positions with people from one part of the country: “While the constitution requires regional representation in cabinet positions, the broader distribution of other prominent roles has traditionally followed a convention aimed at fostering national cohesion”.
Chapter 4, Section 147(3) of the Nigerian constitution is explicit that “the President shall appoint at least one Minister from each State, who shall be an indigene of such State”. No president since 1999 has avoided fulfilling this requirement. But many think that’s where their constitutional obligations in appointments end. This is clearly wrong.
Chapter 2, Section 14(3) states: “The composition of the Government of the Federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a manner as to reflect the federal character of Nigeria and the need to promote national unity, and also to command national loyalty, thereby ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few State or from a few ethnic or other sectional groups in that Government or in any of its agencies”.
The BBC article claims that as of April, all the heads of the following key agencies of government are Yoruba:
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central bank
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state-owned oil company, NNPC
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police
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army
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customs service
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intelligence agency
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anti-corruption agency and
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revenue service.
This is in clear violation of the constitutional provision that there shall be no predominance of persons from an ethnic group in government agencies. Such behaviour by the president doesn’t “promote national unity” or “command national loyalty”. Contrary to the claim in the BBC report, this is not about traditionally following convention. It’s about upholding the constitution – something Tinubu swore to do when he took the oath of office.
Some Nigerians have taken to social media to argue that competence is what matters not where the appointees come from. Well, for starters, the constitution matters in constitutional rule. Secondly, if Tinubu can only find allegedly competent Yoruba people for high office, then he’s either not bothering to see beyond his nose or he’s implying there are no competent people from other ethnic groups. Both are terrible positions to hold by a president.
Leading a multi-ethnic country such as Nigeria goes beyond any pretensions to appoint “competent” people irrespective of their ethnic origin. The president must not only be fair in his appointments, but needs to be seen to be fair in a country ravaged by separatist and religious violence amid claims of “marginalisation” from some ethnic groups.
The fact that the president has neither bothered with the legality nor the spirit of fairness in his appointments and has instead adopted a position that seems to say “we’re the best, sod the rest” to other ethnicities, is strong evidence that he has no leadership bone in his body.
