While briefing State House correspondents immediately after the Federal Executive Council Meeting, Information Minister, Mr. Labaran Maku, said prior to the commencement of the FEC Meeting, the Principal Secretary to the President introduced members of the Presidential Committee of Experts on Inter-Professional Relationships in the Public Health Sector, to be inaugurated by the President.
He described the chairman and members as experienced, reputable and competent technocrats who would bring their various experiences to bear to resolve the unhealthy rivalry among the healthcare professionals in the country. The committee was given eight weeks to complete its assignment and submit a report to the President.
Maku said, the President tabled a memorandum to seek Council's ratification of his anticipatory approval for the procurement of 30 numbers 33-seater diesel air-conditioned Innoson Bus-IVM6800, by Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation.
That, the choice of Innoson Buses is in consonance with the directive of the FEC at its meeting held on Wednesday, 20th January, 2010, that locally assembled vehicles be patronized instead of foreign vehicles where there are close substitutes.
The procurement of the buses would serve as welfare package for civil servants and as a palliative for transportation difficulties experienced by the teeming Federal civil servants living in satellite towns within the Federal Capital Territory, as well as enhanced their productivity and raise staff morale for improved service delivery.
Maku said, in view of the priority placed on service delivery at institutional and individual levels in the Public Service by the Administration and the enormous benefits of the scheme on the lives of the beneficiaries, Council ratified the President's anticipatory approval for the procurement of 30 Nos of 33-seater Diesel Air-conditioned Innoson Bus-IVM 6800, in favour of Messrs Innoson Vehicle Manufacturing Company Ltd., in the sum of N311,850,000.00, inclusive of VAT, with a delivery period of 10 months.
Maku said, the Minister of Education brought a note to apprise Council of the outcome of the 59th National Council on Education (NCE) held at the International Conference Centre, Abuja, Federal Capital Territory (FCT), from 24th to 28th June, 2013.
He said that among the considerations and approval of the NCE was the implementation of the revised 9-Year Basic Education Curriculum, with effect from 2014 beginning with Primary 1 and Junior Secondary School 1.
That, States which are ready to implement the examination of students based on the new senior secondary school curriculum in June, 2014 should commence and other States must implement the policy from June 2015.
He said that the admission ratio of students in Science and Trade subjects into Technical Colleges should be 30:70 respectively. Every student in Federal and State Science and Technical Colleges must offer a Technical subject.
And that at the end of the meeting, stakeholders forwarded their recommendations.
The Minister of Special Duties brought a note to apprise Council of the status of implementation of the 2013 Zonal Intervention/Constituency projects.
He said that the Ministry is faced with serious funding challenges as funds were not appropriated in 2013 for the Ministry to enable it fulfill its mandate. And that, the Ministry had formally made a request to Budget Office of the Federation (BOF) for the setting aside of 5% of the funds allocated to constituency projects to be shared between the Ministry and other implementing MDAs to take care of supervision, monitoring, evaluation, verification, certification and general administrative activities.
He further said that there is need to establish a legal framework for implementation of constituency projects and work was actually being done in that regard by some stakeholders.
The Information Minister said that the President directed that all existing Constituency projects should be completed before embarking on new ones; the management of the Constituency Projects be decentralized, as much as possible, to cater for the needs of contractors at the Zonal and State levels; projects wrongly located in MDAs should be supervised by appropriate technical officials in the relevant MDAs; and the Executive Arm of Government should not be involved in the Private Member Bill in the NASS on Constituency Projects.
Council noted the apprisals.
Source: Federal Executive Council resolutions for Wednesday, 18th September, 2013. (http://fmi.gov.ng/fec-resolutions/31558/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=federal-executive-council-resolutions-for-wednesday-18th-september-2013)
Federal Ministry of Information (FMI) Nigeria
Okay them let's just wait and see how it will all pan out.
I hope it's successful!