Ahead of the inauguration of the Federal Executive Council consequent on the screening and confirmation of ministerial nominees by the Senate on Monday, former national Vice Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Salihu Lukman, has advised President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to set annual targets for his Ministers.
Lukman gave the advice in a statement, titled; “Road to Renewed Hope,” issued to newsmen in Abuja on Wednesday.
The APC chieftain maintained that apart from giving set targets, there should be a supervisory mechanism to ensure that the Ministers deliver on the set targets.
He said, “What is it that can be done to ensure that truly President Asiwaju Tinubu’s led APC federal government succeeds in emerging as a strongly responsive and representative government? For APC to emerge as a truly progressive party beyond bearing the name, President Asiwaju Tinubu’s government must be dynamic, action-oriented and therefore competently able to improve on the quality of lives of Nigerians. What this requires at these early stages in the life of the administration is that the government must be able to set clearly defined targets, which must be achieved within the next four years. For instance, the government should define annual targets for all sectors and each mandate ministry led by the newly confirmed ministers should be given the responsibility to achieve.
“Setting those targets and orienting all the newly elected and appointed APC representatives to apply themselves towards meeting them should not be taken for granted. In fact, once Ministers are sworn in and no ministerial target is given to them by the President, the seed of failure would have been planted. Therefore, the first task before President Asiwaju Tinubu is ensuring that ministerial targets are given and putting in place stronger supervisory and regulatory framework both within government and as a party to ensure delivery.”
The former Director-General of the Progressives Governors Forum further suggested that towards ensuring fidelity to the Party manifestos, the President being the National Leader of the ruling party and the National Secretariat must find a way to regulate the conducts of all elected and appointed APC representatives to be accountable to Nigerian citizens.
“Again, both as party members and as Nigerians, we should support President Asiwaju Tinubu to succeed in bringing APC back to its founding vision of emerging as a truly progressive party capable of regulating the conduct of all elected and appointed APC representatives to be accountable to Nigerian citizens. Supporting President Asiwaju Tinubu should include being able to disagree with him when he takes any decision that is unjust to any section of the country. Both APC members and leaders, as well as Nigerians must be courageous in reminding President Asiwaju Tinubu that any claim of being progressive must guarantee social justice and equity, especially regarding distribution of resources and opportunities in all manifestations.
“All the challenges that confronted APC and the federal government since 2019 borders on the strong perception by many sections of Nigerians of unfair and inequitable treatment. Contentious as it may appear, being a democracy and especially as a party envisioned to be progressive, we must demonstrate sensitiveness and responsiveness to these perceptions. We therefore must appeal to President Asiwaju Tinubu to demonstrate balanced commitment to providing truly progressive leadership to both the APC and the Nigerian nation as whole.”
READ ALSO FROM NIGERIAN TRIBUNE
