After Initial Slowdown, Buhari’s Administration Set to Fly, Says Fashola

The Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola, has said that after an initial slowdown, due to circumstances beyond its control, the President Muhammadu Buhari administration has eventually hit the performance mode, delivering on its programmes.

Speaking on ARISE TV, monitored by our correspondent in Abuja, Fashola explained that with the ministers and other senior officials of the government settling into their offices, they had become more equipped to increase the pace of performance at their duty posts.

Comparing them to a football team, Fashola said they needed time to understand the business of governance and what was expected of them. He, however, said that as soon as they found their rhythm, they have now become unstoppable and committed to live by their electoral promises to Nigerians.

“I know how much team work required to evolve a plan. We are ready to make that explanation and defense. Ministers of government, heads of agencies are not different from a football team, they are a team in government, and some of them are just coming in, they’ve never worked in government before. They’ve never worked at federal level before,” said Fashola, in response to questions thrown at him during the feisty interview.

He further stated: “It requires time for everybody to understand what everybody feels and consult, because if you don’t have that team rolling, government is a very slow burning but deliberate fire.

“We were going to bring change, but anybody who doesn’t know that government is a very slow but deliberate fire and that because of its size, it is a behemoth that takes some time to start and when it gathers momentum, it is unstoppable.

“We have momentum, we are unstoppable, we will deliver on what we have committed to do, and the signs are in the right direction.”

Fashola equally made excuses for Buhari’s delayed appointment of ministers and officials into his cabinet, stating: “If you have run government as I have, you will look at what the president set out to do – he wanted to reduce the number of ministers – you cannot reduce what you don’t know.

“If you want to reduce 42 ministries, you meet with the ministries and that is 42 days, about one and half months done. During that period, he was travelling, trying to contain the crisis in the northeast, meeting with presidents on a regional basis.

“After meeting and taking a brief, you have to reconstitute into 24, after that you have to consult each of the states. He wanted 24 and he said so, you have to balance national interests otherwise, he would have all sorts of accusations.

“The screening took a couple of weeks, and if you factor all of that, you will fairly account for about four months that is reasonably defensible but that is not the point.”

He further took time to defend the government he serves in claiming the policy decisions it took within the first months of being in charge could not be blamed for the huge job losses the country recorded then.

This Day