It is no more news that a new Controller-General of Nigerian Correctional Service, NCS, Haliru Nababa, has been appointed by President Muhammadu Buhari.
However, the appointment of Haliru Nababa has generated outrage due to the fact that seniority and merit were blatantly sidestepped in the process of the emergence of Nababa.
Yusuf Kasali Oladipo, who hails from Ogbomoso, Oyo state, was the most senior in the NCS, and not only that, he was said to have come out on top in both written and oral interviews conducted for five candidates.
In fact SaharaReporters quoted a source in a report, “Yusuf Kasali Oladipo is the most senior and the only candidate with the widest experience and exposure to all levels of our career and who has also worked in nearly all the geo-political zones in Nigeria amongst those invited for screening and exams. He is also the only candidate from the South West who took part in the process,”
If ranking and merit were to be the guiding principle, Oladipo, an assistant controller, ought to have emerged but perhaps because of where he came from, from the southern part of the country, he was dumped for “another northerner.”
To nail him cooked up security reports were written against him. “Despite directing the DSS to cook up security reports to disqualify him, they didn’t find anything to nail him with,” SaharaReporters added.
But this also failed, so, President Buhari in cahoots with the northern oligarchy went ahead to announce another northern officer to head the NCS, in flagrant disregard for merit and federal character principle.
Oladipo, is Abese of Ogbomosoland by virtue of which he is among the kingmakers in the town.