- By Harry Awurumibe, State House, ABUJA
…. As Buhari swears in 9 Perm Secs
For President Muhammadu Buhari, it was a busy Wednesday at the Presidential Villa, Abuja as he presided over both the swearing-in of the new Permanent Secretaries and the last Federal Executive Council (FEC) for 2019.
Buhari started what turned out to be a long day at work with the swearing-in of nine new Permanent Secretaries including the wife of minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Nwabueze Ngige at about 10:30pm in the Council Chamber.
The President later took charge of the last FEC meeting of 2019 which ended by 6:30 pm just as the extended period may have been occasioned by the appearances of many heads of Federal Government’s agencies at the meeting.
Meanwhile, the Minister of State for Petroleum, Timipriye Silva told State House Correspondents after the FEC meeting that the ministry of Petroleum had nine mandate areas which he said are on course.
“Today, we reported to council that we (Petroleum ministry) have achieved at least one of those mandate areas, which is the passage of the Deep Offshore Amendment Act. We also reported that work is ongoing on the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) and that hopefully it will be passed into law by June next year.
“We also reported that next year we will open the gas sector and a lot will happen in the gas sector in Nigeria. Rehabilitation of the Port Harcourt Refinery will commence in January and hopefully 2020 will be a very busy year for the oil industry in Nigeria”, Silva revealed.
