Newspaper Review: How Independence Celebration United President Buhari, Saraki

Although Thursday, October 1, was the 55th independence anniversary celebration in Nigeria but the major issues that became the focus on front pages of the national daily newspapers today Friday, October 2, are on President Muhammadu Buhari’s ministerial nominees and how the celebration united him with the Senate president.

For the first time since he became the president of the 8th Senate, Bukola Saraki was allowed to join other dignitaries at the presidential villa in Abuja yesterday during the Independence Day celebration to mark the anniversary.

According to The Union, intensive behind-the-scene lobby was undertaken on Saraki’s behalf by some leaders of the All Progressives Congress, the special adviser to the president on national assembly matters (Senate), Senator Solomon Ita- Enang, and other notable Nigerians.

The Union front page, Friday, October 2, 2015

The Independence celebration eventually broke the ice between President Buhari and the Senate president.

Both men sat close to each other, shared jokes and laughed heartily sending photographers in frenzy as they struggled to photograph them, Daily Sun reports.

However, Rivers, Kano, Kwara, Ekiti states shunned the celebration and failed to mark the 55th Independence Day anniversary.

The Ekiti state governor, Ayo Fayose, had said that there was nothing to celebrate. As such, many people in the state stayed at home.

Governor Nyesom Wike on his part gave the reason that the government was yet to offset debts it inherited from the former governor Chibuike Amaechi’s administration particularly school fees of indigent Rivers students studying abroad.

Daily Sun front page, Friday, October 2, 2015

On the backdrop of the anniversary celebration speech by President Buhari, protesters deplored the plight of students, workers and other suffering people in Ekiti, Osun and Ondo states, The Guardian reports.

The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) frowned at the president’s silence on agitation for the reform of the Nigeria Police Force.

The group, in a statement by its national co-ordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko, particularly criticised the president’s failure to use the occasion to unveil his government’s programme on comprehensive police reform.

The Guardian front page, Friday, October 2, 2015

On the issue of the ministerial list, The Punch reports that the Senate has set criteria for screening on Wednesday, October 7.

The upper legislature will decide the procedure for screening ministerial nominees submitted to it by President Buhari.

The Senate leader, Ali Ndume in an interview said: “The communication from Mr president, which contains the list of the ministerial nominees and which remained sealed as I am talking to you, will be opened by the Senate president as soon as we resume plenary on Tuesday.

“It will appear on the Order Paper on Wednesday morning and the Senate will set up the necessary legislative procedure for the screening exercise. I wish to assure Nigerians that the screening exercise will be thorough just the way the nomination process was thorough.”

The Punch front page, Friday, October 2, 2015

The high-wire tension and expectations with which Nigerians awaited President Muhammadu Buhari’s ministerial nominees have been doused with his submission of names of 21 nominees to the Senate, Vanguard reports.

However there are indications that the remaining 15 names which will make up the list to 36 nominees will be given to the Senate before its Wednesday screening.

The delay for it has been attributed to what was described by sources as ‘laborious’ security checks and vetting of the prospective nominees.

Vanguard front page, Friday, October 2, 2015

The 21 would-be ministers even those close to the president were said to be unaware of their nominations, The Nation reports.

according to the report, the president neither met nor hinted any of the nominees of their appointments.

Reports have it that as soon as the president finished choosing those he deemed fit for the positions, he directed security agencies to conduct discreet investigations into their records.

The Nation front page, Friday, October 2, 2015

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