 It's still the breakfast on PlusCV Africa right now. We're taking our second hot topic, which will be the final thing we do this morning. Like we read of the press from the headlines on our national dailies, and we saw the clip yesterday when the screening was done. Balarabia Bas collapsed during screening for ministerial position. We know that it happened yesterday. We often talk about the importance of physical and mental capacity of candidates to do the jobs they campaign for. Now, we're going to be talking with Nick Agoule to look at this question of someone collapsing just at a screening. Nick Agoule, good morning and welcome to the show. Yes, good morning and good morning to our viewers. Unfortunately, I don't know if the volume of my computer is. I can't hear you very clearly. I'm a bit loud enough. Maybe I should be a bit louder. Can you hear me better now? This is better now. Yes. Okay. So now yesterday there was screening for the ministerial nominees and one of them, Abbas from Kaduna, who replaced Nasir El-Rufai, slumped. No, let me not use the word slumped. He fainted in the course of the screening. They said it's exhaustion so far that's what we heard. And let me just ask you for your comments on what happened. He fainted and was revived at the clinic. We haven't heard so much details about it, how he's feeling right now and whatever happened there. But we know that he fainted. What are your comments? The first comment is that I want to wish the candidate for ministerial appointment well. I don't know what his medical situation is now, but I hope that he's okay and he's now fully fit because the Senate has already approved the nominations and so I hope that he's now fully fit to take off his office as an honorable minister of the federal government of Nigeria. So that is my first comment that I wish him well. But then it also comes to mind the challenges in healthcare generally that we have in Nigeria. A lot of us in Nigeria who are going about without knowing the status of our health and it's important that government should provide the healthcare facilities around the country so that people can assess healthcare as where the government has complete database of each and every citizen or resident and like Amir, I live in the UK, you will see that the National Health Service, the NHS, will send me letters to say that you are due for this, you are due for this test, you are due for this, ensuring that preventive healthcare is better than curative healthcare. So in Nigeria we don't have public healthcare, neither do we have hospital healthcare and these are things that play out. So I'm not the honorable minister's doctor so I cannot say precisely what happened, could it be that he succumbed to the pressure of facing the Senate or are there underlying medical issues that he has, but either way it comes down to Nigeria having not only a total and comprehensive healthcare facilities available to the resident, but this is something that governments all over the world don't let go into the private sector. So even if you go to economists like the US, the UK, where the economists are being run by the private sector, you still see that government is taking care of education and healthcare. Those are the two sectors that most governments in the world don't let go into the private sector and we want the Nigerian government to do this. Okay, but if you watch the ministerial screening, maybe you have general comments on that. The things that struck me too, I've already mentioned them when we're talking of the press. First of all, like political office holders, we always say that physical and mental capacity of the candidates for the jobs they campaign is very important and we were asking ourselves, should this not be the same for even appointees that are in government? You make someone an ambassador to a country and he goes to that country and falls sick and throughout his tenure, he's a sick man in the bed. He cannot do his job. You make someone a minister who is going to be fainting all the time because he has a medical condition. He cannot be on his feet. He cannot even attend the Federal Executive Council meeting which will require him to come and give reports. He will be sending proxies and all that. Shouldn't this be a requirement as well? And then we had a young woman of 37 who was nominated as well to be a minister and in trying to defend her, the Senate president said that she should not be grilled that much because she is the face of the renewed hope because the president wants youths to be part of the government so she should not be asked a lot of questions and it got me worried. Like, if she will fail, can there be no youth in Nigeria that can answer the questions if that is a criteria of becoming a minister? And then the person who fainted that was still given the nod, what if, like you said, he has an underlying medical condition that will not enable him to make the right decisions or do his job well? How far should we take our screening for job positions, political job positions, public offices in Nigeria? How far should we go? Should we be taking a bow or should we be doing extra things to make sure we get the best brains? I think you are actually very correct and aligned with your views and in that indirect answer to your question, my view and personal opinion is that the ministerial screening or whatever screening that goes on to the Senate or to the National Assembly is a joke, it's a session in comedy and we see this in play house before the international community and we want them to take us serious because look, first and foremost, you receive a list of ministerial candidates without knowing which portfolios they are going to be assigned to. So you will see the Senate say, assuming you are appointed as minister for this, you know, assuming based on your theory you are appointed as minister for this, what are you going to do for the country? And in terms of that, the people don't get appointed into the ministerial positions to which they have provided answers to the Senate. So for me, that is a joke, it's a complete joke. You know, it's just like a session in comedy being watched not only by Nigeria but by the international community. So if it has to take a change in the constitution to force the hands of a president that they must forward the list of ministerial candidates to the Senate to get with the portfolios that they are going to take, those who make the case that, oh, the president can transfer the ministers and all of that. How about things like the central bank governor? The president doesn't just send a list of, like recently, the Senate screened the central bank governor and I think four or five deputy governors. Why didn't the president just send a list of five or six to the Senate to be screened? Later on, he will now appoint who will be the central bank governor who will be deputy governor. No, he sends the list attaching the portfolios to the Senate. The same thing with EFCC, the same thing with ICPC, all those appointments that require the National Assembly assent. They assent together with the portfolio. It's not as if the president sends a list of five candidates to the Senate and then they don't even know who is the one that is going to be the EFCC chairman. And afterwards they say, okay, we're appointing no. He sends to the portfolio and this has to also be the case for the ministerial appointments. They must go with the portfolio so that the Senate will hold them to account to the promises that they make during the screening because if they must say if the minister of the ministerial designate for power, for instance, says that I am going to increase power supply in Nigeria from these misery and beggarly 3,000 megawatts. What UAE is supplying to 1 million people? We are supplying it to 200 million people. If that candidate says I'm going to increase that power supply from 3,000 to 10,000 within one year, then that same Senate will summon him after one year and say you promised that power is going to get to 10,000 megawatts. Where is the power? And if there is no power, we ask for your second from the cabinet. That is the kind of thing we should be looking at. I'm not sending an amorphous list of people. Look at the minister of Solid Minerals now. Everybody thought he was going to be minister for information. And at the Senate they were asking him questions about minister for information. Only for him to be sent to Solid Minerals. Is that not a total waste of time for the Senate? So that is a great job. And then to the other point that you raised which is whether medical examination should be part of the screening exercise. I agree with that totally. You know, in Nigeria we have been unlucky. Let me say unlucky because for some reason we have had presidents in India first who have spent a huge amount of time on healthcare. So we know President Yeraduwa was struck with illness. President Buhari was struck with illness. And President Thinibu now, he left New York and for a week we didn't know where he was. And some people say he was in France which we know is the destination for him. So we actually need medical examination. Like in the US, the presidents do yearly medical examination of fitness and the result is published so that Americans will know the health status of their presidents. And if you are an individual and you don't want your health status to be the proper domain please stay at home. Don't come and captain this ship that we all are onboard in Nigeria as a leader. And then the other matter that you raised which is concerning the young appointees that were asked to take a bow and go is still part of the committee session that the Senate engages in in the name of screening. If somebody is 20 years old and they have been decimated as a ministeria apodhi you must treat them. You must ask them what they are bringing on the table. You cannot just say they should go because they are young. What lessons are we teaching to the upcoming generation? Do you understand? Because no matter your age you have to show course that you are capable of handling this office that you have been given. And if you cannot handle the office then of course the office should go to somebody who is more competent than you are. So in summation the Senate engages in committee and it is high time they change this thing because it's not only us in Nigeria who are watching this thing. The whole world is watching it and I don't think the origin of us will be high. Okay just a final one. Now we have 48 ministers in a country of 36 states even if the constitution says that every state must have a minister but we have 48. 48 is 12 ministers more than the number of states that we have. Even if you include the federal capital territory it's still more than 10 of the territories that we have. So I'd like your comment. Are we going anywhere? Or are we going backwards? Because one of the cardinal points we were hoping to see was a cut down in governance. A cut down in the way monies go. These offices are duplicated and we have minister, minister for state. We have these and that. 48 now that we will be paying humongous salaries for doing the things that may not be even important for us. Do you think we are progressing or going backwards? We are going backwards. Nigeria in totality is going backwards because I will soon be 60 years old. I will be 58 in March. So I have grown up in the Nigeria of post-colonial days. So I was born in 1966 meaning six years after independence I was born and the Nigerian experienced in those days and the Nigerians that are experienced now in my adult age are two different Nigerians and I can say authoritatively as a Nigerian who has lived in this country experienced this country even as I speak to you now I am in Makodi in Buenos Aires that's why I'm speaking to you now. So I can authoritatively tell anybody that the Nigeria I grew up in was a big carrier. Can you hear me? Yes, I can. Yes, the Nigeria I grew up in I grew up in a place called Boko in Buenos Aires. In Boko in the 70s we had pipe ball water running it was the pipe ball water was not running into our homes but it was running to public taps that were spread across the town of Boko and we would go and open the taps and fetch water that would be slowly very fresh with chlorine or what was that they were using to clean the water. You understand? We had education that was effective and comprehensive. I was giving free books free writing materials we had healthcare that was comprehensive and effective when I attended the general hospital in Boko from the cutting of my card my registration of my card to me seeing a doctor to consult for me to the doctor ordering my tests to the doctor reviewing my tests and giving me medication when I went on admission at the hospital I did not pay a dime not one dime did my parents pay and when I was on admission every morning the nurses would come and change my bedsheets into freshly laundered bedsheets that would be smelling so nice there were no security issues you know as an 11 year old I mean 12 year old I left Boko to go to one place a road to go and start secondary education there was no fence in any building there was no fence the only building that had fence in Boko was the prisons in Boko you know that was in Nigeria I grew up in the Nigeria today is a far-thirsty Nigeria a far more painful Nigeria a Nigeria where even the government hospitals now you cannot go and assess healthcare there except you have to pay so if you don't have to pay then the government hospitals that now became consulting clinics as Abacha said in his school speech they are no longer even doing the consultation they gave for any party there are government hospitals that you work in now you have to bring 30,000 50,000 100,000 if you are talking about surgery they are calling one million for you like we recently put money together for a cancer patient to go to better medical center in Gaffi and pay 1.7 million for surgery how many Nigerians can afford 1.7 million to go to a government hospital a government hospital that is being funded by the budget of Nigeria that is the Nigeria we have today so this Nigeria we have today is a far-regressive Nigeria and the worst case scenario here is that we don't even see a hope of any change in where we are going we continue to march into the bush every day and Presidentinibu is marching us into the bush as far as ministerial appointments are concerned because he doesn't need 48 ministers he doesn't need them we are dealing with a government that is using almost all its revenue to service deaths so where is the money to not look after 47 convoys or 48 48 sets of aids 48 offices to manage 48 ester codes that will be paid and all of that he didn't need it in fact 36 ministers is even too much the United States where the Presidentinibu came back from from the UN General Assembly they have a thing like 15 departments if they are too much they are 18 if they are 20 departments and the United States is an economy that is multiple times Nigeria's economy their population is far more Nigeria is only about 10% of the size of the US in terms of land mass and they have only like 15 or 18 departments the same thing happens in the UK so if Presidentinibu is asking us to tighten our best and go through these austere times of few price increase of forest crisis and everything why is he not leading by example why is the President not leading by example but cutting his own expenditure and saying I don't really need 36 ministers they see the position for 6 my hands claiming a point at this is 148 there is absolutely no need for that and I expect the President I expect the President to be sending an executive bill to the National Assembly to cut down on ministerial slots to something like 15 or 18 at the most not him going above point okay well that is where we have to wrap it up Nika Gule thank you for your time this morning okay we were talking with Nika Gule Public Affairs Analyst he was talking to us from Maccordy Ben West state and this is where we draw the curtain on today's episode of The Breakfast my name is Nyam Gul Agadje saying thank you to you on behalf of my entire team