Thieves Everywhere, No Clean Person to Appoint Minister-Buhari

President Muhammadu Buhari has again returned a damning indictment on Nigerians and insisted most people jostling to be as ministers in his cabinet are corrupt.

He said all those who had either shown interest or had been referred to him so far, had been compromised, selfish and lack the moral rectitude to work for the common good.

Specifically, he said he was yet to find any independent-minded, selfless, credible individuals to man the ministries for him.

The President who spoke on Nigerian Television Authority (NTA), early morning programme, “Good Morning Nigeria” said many Nigerians had become hostages and compromised, ready to do anything that would further damage Nigeria’s economy and security.

“From what I have seen so far, we need very patriotic Nigerians; that can work very hard with knowledgable experience, committed Nigerians to be in charge of ministries. “A lot of institutions in Nigeria are compromised, everybody for himself and God for all of us. It is most unfortunate. We have people, educated and experienced people, but everybody seems to be working for himself on how much they could get away with as soon as possible”, he said.

The President who insisted that he is “looking for technocrats, politicians, and decent people” to give them the responsibility of being in charge of ministries and important parastatals, added that “we will try as much as possible to avoid appointing hostages. “By this, I mean people who have been in the system but compromised their personal and professional integrity”.

The President explained that it was taking so much time, because a number of knowledgeable people had been compromised. “They have been compromised by people who will like to depend on them to damage our economy and security; a lot of them have been compromised. The worst thing that I think can happen is to get a compromised person to be in charge of institutions”, he said, adding that there was no way such persons, if appointed, could be efficient or patriotic.

“Somebody behind the scene will be tele-guiding him at the expense of the nation. This is what we are trying to avoid”, he said. President Buhari, while also noting that so much damage has been done to Nigeria, added that “we cannot rush to give this responsibility to people that have unfortunately been compromised”.

“Because there is no way you can effectively supervise let’s say 20 ministries, you have to give it to people you trust and you allow them to perform according to the constitution of the country. If you appoint compromised people, then we will be back to square one and Nigeria will be the loser”.