Photograph — Point Blank News

“I do not want a government appointment,” said no Nigerian ever… Well until recently of course.

Two ambassadorial nominees from Katsina and Plateau State, Usman Bugaje, and Pauline Tallen have both turned down President Buhari’s offer of appointment. While Bugaje was prevented from making his rejection public, Tallen on the hand announced her rejection citing improper consultation as the basis for her decision.

Tallen, who is a former deputy governor of Plateau state also said the decision was made in fairness to other parts of the state who did not have ambassadorial representatives. According to Simon Lalong, the governor of Plateau state, quite a number of the President’s appointments are concentrated in one zone (the southern zone of Plateau state), the result of which is an unbalanced representation of the state.

Lalong said, “You can’t have two appointments, very key appointments at that, coming from a particular zone that is already overloaded with appointments. All the federal appointments are from the southern zone, so it would not be fair. That is why we are approaching Mr. President to consider fairness and appoint people from those areas that do not have representation.”

Given the notoriety of Nigeria’s political climate for greedy, self-serving and aggrandizing public servants, Tallen and Bugaje’s act of rejecting an appointment from the President is quite exceptional. No doubt, many would label them “fools” for this. Who in Nigeria turns down an opportunity to get a share of the national cake?

Perhaps President Buhari thought he was doing Governor Lalong a favour by giving out so many key appointments to “his people”, the people in the southern zone of Plateau, but he must have been surprised to learn that there are actually leaders who have the interest of their people/state at heart; a few who actually care about justice and a fair representation.

The President has in the past been criticized for making unfair and non-inclusive appointments; be it gender, age, region, and religion, Buhari has come under fire for being selective and bias in his appointments. However, this incident has highlighted yet another shortcoming of the president–the fact that he makes a number of his appointments without proper consultation as pointed out by Tallen and Governor Lalong.

“All these appointments came again from one zone. So the complaints that are coming from our state is not about her own personal interest; it is the fact that two ambassadorial appointments are coming from the same zone. That is my zone… It is not a big issue but at times a little consultation would have solved that problem because these are issues in the interest of the state,” said Governor Lalong.

It is refreshing to know that in a sea of corrupt and self-seeking politicians there are a few good men and women like Bugaje and Tallen whose integrity will not be clouded by unfair appointments from the presidency. Imagine how much better the country would be if we had more individuals challenge certain decisions of the government, taking a stand for what is just.

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