Ministerial List: Still A Long Wait, As Senators Proceed On Annual Recess This Week

By Akinwale Kasali

The Senate will embark on its Annual Recess this Friday, 25th July, 2019, and reconvene on October 2019.

This development was disclosed by the Chairman, Senate ad hoc Committee on Media and Public Affairs Affairs, Senator Adedayo Adeyeye.

In line with the National Assembly calendar, members are meant to go on their annual recess on July 26 and resume on September 26.

But, there is a problem.

President Muhammadu Buhari is yet to send his ministerial list to the Senate since his  inauguration for a second term as the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

If the President fails tp send his ministerial list to the Senate before the end of this week, it would mean that the nation would have to wait till October when the Senate reconvenes after its annual recess.

Adeyeye said the red chamber would proceed on its annual two-month recess this week if the Senate did not get the ministerial list by Friday.

Adeyeye explains that “If the list does not come before Friday,  the Senate will proceed on its annual recess. We are not giving the President any ultimatum. The schedule of the Senate will go ahead if the Senate does not receive the list. The list is the only thing that can hold us back.”

It would be recalled that during the first term administration of President Buhari, it took six months before he submitted his ministerial list to the Senate for screening. This is a repeat of 2015.

President Buhari had, during a dinner with leadership of National Assembly, appealed for more time to collate his cabinet list, stating he will only work with people he personally knew.

With just five days before the Senate embarks on its  recess, political observers, enthusiasts, analysts and Nigerians are waiting anxiously to see  whether President Buhari would hasten  in submitting the list of his ministers for screening, or the nation would still wait till October to get the economy working.

The six-month delay in 2015 sent Nigeria into recession.