President Muhammadu Buhari has asked the Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo, to ignore the directive of the National Assembly pertaining to the recruitment of 774,000 Nigerians.
Keyamo and the leadership of the National Assembly recently clashed over the recruitment of Nigerians for the Special Public Works Progamme (SPW).
The country has 774 local government areas and each council is entitled to 1,000 slot for the SPW programme.
When he recently appeared before a committee set up by the legislative arm of government, the minister refused to adhere to their instructions on how the initiative should be executed. He thereafter accused them of attempting to hijack the programme.
Weighing into the matter, Ahmad Lawan, President of the 8th Senate, directed that the process which has long begone should be aborted, and restarted afresh.
Mr Lawan gave the directive after Chris Ngige, Labour Minister, apologised for the outburst of the junior minister in his ministry.
But on Tuesday, Mr Keyamo said his principal gave him the approval to continue from where he stopped.
“I have the instructions of my boss, Mr. President, to proceed unhindered,” he told The Nation Newspapers.
“I have instructions from Mr. President to proceed. The states selection committees are proceeding already with the programme. Nothing stopped them before.
“National Directorate of Employment (NDE) are part of the programme. The state coordinators of the NDE throughout the country are the secretaries of those committees.
“We will work hard to meet the timeline but if there is any need for a change we will inform Mr. President,” he added.
