Amidst complaints of massive unemployment in Nigeria, more indications have emerged that some Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the Federal Government have been engaging in secret recruitment of personnel to fill the available vacancies in their organisations. A couple of weeks ago, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) was alleged to have recruited about 909 personnel without adherence to the laid down rules on hiring new employees.
Majority of the beneficiaries were said to be children and relatives of top functionaries of the Federal Government and chieftains of the ruling party, the All Progressives Congress (APC). Although the apex bank did not deny the report, officials of the bank said there was nothing wrong with what they described as “targeted recruitment.”
New Telegraph investigations, however, revealed that similar “selective or targeted” hiring of personnel into the public service have continued to take place behind closed doors. It was learnt that agen-cies such as the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Petroleum Technology Development Fund (PTDF), Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) and the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) have also indulged in secret recruitments.
In some of these agencies, it was learnt, hundreds of employees have been recruited since the inception of the Muhammadu Buhari-led administration in May 2015. Investigations have also revealed that many of those recruited were essentially handpicked from lists sent to these agencies by some influential politicians.
In PTDF, for instance, about 200 persons were reportedly recruited without any form of advertisement for the jobs as required by law while an unspecified number of persons have equally been recruited into the Nigeria Immigration Service. When New Telegraph contacted the PTDF to clarify the report of the recruitment, a senior official of the agency could neither deny nor confirm it, but urged our correspondent to seek the needed information from the management.
Head of Press and External Relations, PTDF, Mr. Kalu Otisi, did not re-spond to calls made to his mobile phone in respect of the issue. In the case of NIS, a senior official in the organisation confirmed that it had taken in new employees but said, “it was not a recruitment, but a mere replacement exercise.”
It could be recalled that about 2,000 persons recruited into the Immigration Service in the twilight of the Goodluck Jonathan administration were sacked when the APC-led government took over power. The affected personnel, who were recruited through a presidential directive after the 2014 immigration recruitment scandal, lost their jobs on the excuse that the process of their recruitment did not follow due process.
However, they have now been replaced secretly, contrary to the civil service rules. Recently, the sacked immigration officials staged a protest at the Federal Ministry of Interior, Abuja. During the protest, the sacked workers lamented their plight and urged the government to reconsider its stand on their matter.
But an official of the NIS explained that what happened was not recruitment, but a replacement exercise meant to fill existing vacancies created by death, retirement or resignation of some former employees. In the case of NSCDC, New Telegraph learnt that the authorities of the agency allocated job slots to prominent political office holders and chieftains of the ruling APC as a form of political patronage.
Beneficiaries of the “guided recruitment” into the NSCDC have since been sent to their respective states of origin for training. There were, however, allegations that some job slots allocated to some leaders of the ruling party were hijacked by the Buhari Support Group, resulting in a protest at the party secretariat.
A private media group, True Verdict Magazine, recently petitioned FIRS over the alleged recruitment of about 215 new staff into the agency in the last six months. In the letter addressed to the Chairman of FIRS, Mr. Tunde Fowler, the group alleged that the said recruitment was done in total disregard to the existing federal character principles and laws as it went through some agents who were collecting as much as N500,000 each from these new recruits. It was also alleged that the secret recruitment exercise was heavily skewed in favour of a particular ethnic group.
Section 4 (1)(g)(1) Federal Character Commission (Establishment Act) 2004 stipulates that: “All ministries and extra-ministerial departments, agencies and other bodies affected by this Act must have a clear criteria indicating the conditions to be fulfilled and comprehensive guidelines on the procedure for determining eligibility and the procedure for employment in the public and private sectors of the economy.”
In addition, Article 3 of the Federal Character Commission Handbook 2011 stipulates that: a) Each MDA shall ensure proper manpower planning in accordance with its authorised staffing/ manning level.
b) When there is a need to recruit staff; available vacancies shall be harvested and identified cadre by cadre.
c) The spread of all vacancies to be filled shall be pre-determined in relation to current levels of (Federal Character) representation, by states or geopolitical zones at a joint meeting of the recruiting MDA and FCC. d) All vacancies shall be advertised in at least two newspapers circulating nationally, giving prospective candidates a minimum of six weeks within which to apply. Similarly, Article 5 of the FCC Handbook says:
“At the close of advertisement and from long list of all applications received, a shortlist of qualified candidates shall be compiled for interview.” Article 6 (a) of the FCC Handbook stipulates, “the list of successful candidates shall be compiled and a special joint meeting of the affected MDA and FCC, matched for consistency, with the predetermined distribution formulae.” Article 7(a) of the FCC Handbook stipulates that “A Certificate of Compliance with the FCC shall be issued as final authority for the release of letters of appointment to the successful candidates by the recruiting MDA.”
Article 7.b says “No MDA shall issue letters of appointment to candidates without this Certificate.” Article 7(f) goes further to say, “the list of successful candidates shall be published in at least two newspapers circulating nationally by the MDA.”
There is yet no evidence that the Federal Character Commission (FCC) was aware of the said recruitment by the FIRS, NIS, NCDSC or any other agency of government. However, the FIRS spokesperson, Mr. Wahab Gbadamosi, has denied that his organisation had recruited 215 employees secretly.
Gbadamosi told New Telegraph that the management was aware of the speculations but assured that FIRS would follow the rules and procedures guiding staff recruitment whenever the time comes to recruit workers into its fold.
