Head Of Service Engages In Employment Racket, Group Claims

Some civil society groups under the aegis of Coalition of Civil Societies for Equity, Justice and Good governance, on Thursday threatened to occupy the office of Head of Service of the Federation, Folasade Yemi-Esan, if she failed to resign within the next five days over alleged abuse of office.

The co-convener of the group, Comrade Danesi Momoh, made the call in Abuja during a press briefing on alleged employment racket going on under her watch.

Momoh, during a peaceful match held at Unity Fountain, specifically alleged that the Head of Service has been giving “recruitments from the backdoor” even though there’s official embargo on employment, and had “attracted a lot of lawsuits and enemies because of her recklessness.”

The group also said the circular, which placed embargo on employment was adversely affecting the nation’s tertiary institutions which are currently suffering from a dearth of qualified academic and non-academic manpower.

The statement issued by Momoh partly reads, “The Federal Ministry of Education and National Universities Commission do not decide when Universities will recruit. These two bodies are not involved in staff audit and therefore cannot grant approval for a University to recruit. The Head of Service is being economical with the truth and must be made accountable for her anti- government and anti-youth policies.

“It is totally false that the office of the Head of Service does not recruit. Apart from the official recruitment into the federal civil service, the Head of Service has been known to conduct recruitments from the backdoor for a long time even in the face of the so called embargo on employment.”

“Dr. (Mrs) Folashade Yemi-Esan is well known for her not so popular policies and anti -people sentiments. She has attracted a lot of lawsuits and enemies because of her recklessness. Just last month, she blocked 17 federal directors from participating in the permanent secretary examination. The case is still in court and as damning as it is, the federal government is lukewarm about out rightly sacking her.

“Not just are Universities understaffed, federal colleges and even secondary schools are grossly understaffed because the Head of Service has been playing politics with sensitive national issues in gross violation of existing federal rules. This is contrary to Buhari’s anti-corruption stance and must not be allowed to continue.

“Under Folashade’s tenure, employment racketeering has become the other of the day. Even in Universities, people now pay to get job without minding how qualified or not they are. This is new to Nigerians as never was it heard that one can buy a job, talk more of a University lecturing job. This is an evil dispensation and must not be allowed to go unchecked. Her veiled claim of getting approval from the federal ministry of education and NUC is a big lie. This racketeering is coordinated by her office and she is well aware of it.”

The coalition called on President Buhari to sack her so as not to cause more damage to the government and the country.

The group further alleged that many institutions had lost accreditations because of manpower shortages, citing the case of University of Abuja where students that graduated from such courses suffer unjustly for no faults of theirs.

The group said the HoS refused to heed the advice of the Nigerian Senate, which acted due to the numerous complaints received against her.

The group therefore said “ We hereby give final warning that within 5 days if the Head of Service fails to honourably resign or the Federal Government fails to sack her from office, we will be left with no other alternative than to mobilise and block the office until the right thing is done.”

However, efforts made to contact the Head of the Media Office of the HOS, Mr. Abdulganiyu Aminu, were unsuccessful.