By Aliyu DANLADI
The Senate Committee on Federal Roads Maintenance Agency (FERMA) on Wednesday screened nominees for the FERMA Board, three months after their nominations.
The Committee screened Mr Tunde Memo for appointment as Chairman of the Agency, Nurudeen Rafindadi, an Engineer, as Managing Director and five others as members of the board.
They are, Buba Abdullahi, Babangida Aji, Shehu Abdullahi, an Engineer, Loretta Aniagolu and Mujaidu Dako.
The sixth nominee, Vincent Kolawale, was not present for the screening.
The Chairman of the Committee, Sen. Magnus Abe, said the screening of the nominees had lingered because of some abnormalities in the nominations.
According to him, the members of the committee are assigned the position of Executive Directors, which is against provisions of the Act setting up FERMA.
He noted that the act made provision for members of the board drawn from different agencies and relevant bodies but not as executive directors.
He said the matter was reported to the Senate Liaison Officer, Sen. Ita Enang, for the proper thing to be done to avoid breaching FERMA act.
“The nomination has been long and we have serious observation on your nominations.
“Section 2 of the FERMA Act provides for the establishment of the Board that will consist of Chairman and members drawn from the ministries and agencies including Finance,Transport and an engineer of at least ten years experience registered with COREN.
“However, the current nominations to this board has six members as executive directors and the law establishing the agency does not provide for directors.
“The committee has written Sen. Enang to change the nomenclatures.
“We do not have anything against anybody but it is for the good of the nation so that we do not set a bad precedence,” he said.
The chairman said aside the fact that nominating six directors was against the law, FERMA was too small to have six directors.
He added that such would amount to having ” a top heavy management, which is not the intention of the National Assembly for passing the law establishing FERMA.
“However, we will go ahead to screen you pending when the matter is resolved.”
The Senate had on Oct. 18, 2018, considered the request of President Muhammadu Buhari to confirm the nominees and referred it to the Committee on FERMA for screening.
The committee is expected to submit its report to the Senate in the whole for consideration and possible confirmation.
