The Chief of Staff to the President of the Senate, Dr. Hakeem Baba Ahmed, has come under intense criticism, for openly disparaging the Director General, National Institute for Legislative Studies (NILS), Prof. Ladi Hamalai.
Dr. Ahmed, had, during the opening ceremony of a 3-day training, jointly organised by NILS and UNDP for Senior Legislative Aides of Principal Officers of the National Assembly, in Abuja on Monday; allegedly cast aspersions on the NILS boss, Hamalai, while making an opening remarks.
Saraki’s Chief Servant took a swipe on Prof. Hamalai, describing her as incompetent, adding that, she should handover to someone else, if she knew she would not perform on her duties.
The Chief of Staff also berated the Aides for being overzealous, describing them as “fools”; adding that, if he, as Chief of Staff had difficulty in accessing his Principal, owing to the exigencies of his office, other aides would find it a hundred times more difficult having access to their principals.
On the composition of the Resource Persons for the training, Saraki’s Chief of Staff said the “Core Northerners” were not fairly represented in the list.
According to him, “the composition of the list of Resource Persons does not reflect the principle of Federal Character. Are there no qualified persons from the Core North that can act in the capacity of Resource Persons?”
Meanwhile, a copy of the programme of event obtained by our Reporter who was at the opening ceremony shows that, Dr. Bolaji Kehinde of the UNDP, Dr. Yemi Fajingbesi of the NILS, Kogi born Prof. Samuel Egwu of the University of Jos, Hon. Ossai Nicholas Ossai of the House of Representatives, Prof. Shola Omotola and the DG of NILS, Prof. Ladi Hamalai, were slated as Resource Persons.
Reacting to the comments credited to the Chief of Staff, a Senior Aide of a ranking Reps Member, who spoke on condition of anonymity, condemned the censorious utterances made against the DG NILS, whom he described as “pragmatic and diligent” public servant, worthy of commendation.
“Look at the way the Chief of Staff talked to the woman as if she was his house girl. This is the same woman who has laboured to make NILS what it is today”, the aide said.
Another Participant from the South East Nigeria in the training who would not want his name mentioned, expressed total displeasure over the comments of the Chief of Staff to Saraki.
According to him, “the outburst was uncalled for. It looks as if the Chief of Staff was the one who appointed the DG of NILS or has issues with her position. Even if he had issues against her, he would have called her privately to ventilate his anger, rather than, turning our training ground to a place to muscle egos.
“The Chief of Staff was grievous that the Core Northerners were not represented as Resource Persons, what about Prof. Egwu and DG NILS? Are they not Northerners? We from the East should rather make such observation because there is no one from the Ndigbo here as Resource Person”.
Prof. Hamalai, however, refused to respond to the Chief of Staff, in the same manner she was addressed. She rather, addressed other issues raised by Dr . Ahmed and other participants, which were related to the training and admonished the aides to take the training workshop more seriously so as to assist their principals in the discharge of their legislative functions.
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