President-elect, Muhammadu Buhari, has distanced himself from the ministerial lists which went viral recently in the social media, noting that he will not follow the same pattern used by the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in selecting members of its Federal Executive Council, FEC, in the last 16 years. He asserted that if state governors are at liberty to appoint their commissioners, he, too, should be at liberty to choose those who would serve with him in the FEC.

Dismissing the speculative list in an interview with Daily Trust at his Daura country home, Buhari said, “I am not speaking about it; I have not put anything on paper, so nobody has seen it and I haven’t discussed it with anybody; I am just keeping it close to my chest.”

According to him, “I am ardent listener of Hausa Service of Voice of America (VOA) and the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) from 6am to 7am every morning. I am going to quote myself because I heard in one of the interviews that I said the type of people I am supposed to appoint, like in the cabinet and the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, and service chiefs, will be different. Definitely my approach is going to be different from what we had under the PDP where governors nominated ministers.”

Speaking on the caliber of people that would populate his cabinet, Buhari said “I have been around long enough to know people that I can approach for things like that… Deliberately we will look for competent people, dedicated and experienced to head ministries and, of course, there will be schedules for ministers and we will expect them to fill them. Economically we will try and stop a lot of wastages and encourage austerity so that we can fund the ministries”.

He noted that in the incoming administration, “Education and healthcare will get more attention. Of course, security is Number One. Certainly, there is a lot to do but we are hoping that we‘ll get good people to be in charge of ministries who can apply themselves to their responsibilities so that in no time Nigerians would begin to see the difference.”

He however refused to comment on whether he would present the list of his ministers to the Senate in the first week of the proclamation of the 8th National Assembly.