Performance: Jonathan gives ministers marching orders

President Goodluck Jonathan yesterday told his ministers to sit up and improve on their performance towards the realisation of the Transformation Agenda of his administration.
The President, at the first Federal Executive Council, FEC, meeting for this year, also outlined the priorities of his government for 2013, which are geared towards development in all sectors of the economy.
President Jonathan had last year signed Performance Contract Agreement, PCA, with the ministers where they were expected to set agenda and programmes for their ministries which would form the basis for assessment of their performance and contribution to the transformation agenda of the administration.
Recently, there were reports of possible cabinet shake-up based on how each of the ministers performed.
Also yesterday, the council approved the President’s ratification of three additional federal universities for the three states left without such institutions. The universities are expected to commence academic session in 2014.
Briefing State House correspondents after the FEC meeting, Information Minister, Labaran Maku, said that the ministers had been ordered to work harder and faster since the administration would soon be half way into its tenure.
The minister also noted that the President acknowledged the progress that had been made so far, particularly on infrastructure development.


He added that President Jonathan also warned the ministers not to take anything for granted but must remain on top of the situation in their respective Ministries, Department and Agencies, MDAs.
The minister said: “Mr. President gave ministers his priority for the year. He gave us the marching orders to work harder, faster. By May, the administration will be half way through, hence the need to move faster to give Nigerians results.”
Maku noted the achievements of government in different sectors of the economy, including transport, with the reactivation of the Lagos-Kano rail line, which he said was now conveying most of the petroleum products that go to the North from Lagos, thereby reducing pressure on the nation’s roads.
He said that it was the first time in a long time that this had happened stressing that economic activities in the country would be greatly enhanced when the Port Harcourt-Maiduguri corridor was fully reactivated.
The Education Minister, Prof. Ruqqayat Rufai, said that the establishment of three new universities marked the fulfilment of the promise by the Jonathan administration that every state of the federation should host a federal university before the end of his tenure.
She said: “We have made a case and the President approved it. Every year, we have made a case for access to education. We have seen applicants scramble for placement in the universities, over 1.3 million of them every year, but we don’t have space for more than 200,000 candidates.”
Rufai also disclosed that all the nine federal universities approved by the present administration in November 2010 had taken off except the one sited in Otuoke, Bayelsa State, which she said was affected by the flooding that ravaged parts of the country last year.
Also addressing journalists, the Minister of Culture and Tourism, Chief Edem Duke, said that FEC ratified a new tourism agenda for the country as government was determined to give priority national attention to the sector.
The Minister of State for Finance, Alhaji Yerima Ngama, regretted that Nigeria’s economic growth rate had been slowed down by poor infrastructure which he said the present government was addressing.