Timothy Golu the honourable member representing Kanke/Kanam federal constituency has commented on the non-federal nature of president Buhari’s appointments.

Speaking to newsmen, Golu said the appointments fall drastically below the requirements of federal character. He cited both the military and political institutions as areas where the president’s appointments have particularly fallen short of federal character. He said, looking state-by-state, you’d see that several states are conspicuously missing from the appointments and others are overly represented with 3 or 4 nominees. I fully understand that the president has to appoint his most loyal and trusted aides in key places, but where other appointments do not cover all states, people are bound to feel disaffected.

Speaking further, he said “I always give the example of the Yar’adua PDP administration. Under that PDP administration, the ANPP and other opposition political parties were given political appointments. Yar’adua had special advisers that belonged to other political parties. In Plateau State for instance (which was a PDP state), we had an appointee, Alhaji Ibrahim Makande who was appointed to represent the state under ANPP. That to an extent was able to build up political unity because it also reconciled the political parties, reduced conflict and brought down tension.

So, we expected the President to approach these political parties for political unity. He has the discretion to do that, he may not necessarily breach any constitutional provision. And for some political positions, the president has his own discretions, he may not have violated any constitutional provision, but for political expediency, for political unity the president should come to terms with the reality that it is not only who voted for him that should be given positions.

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Timothy Golu comments on Buhari’s lopsided appointments