President Jonathan Places Stella Oduah on ‘Tactical Suspension

Minister of Aviation, Ms. Stella Oduah

President Goodluck Jonathan may have placed the embattled Minister of Aviation, Ms. Stella Oduah, on “tactical suspension,” findings by The PUNCH have revealed.

A reliable Presidency source said Jonathan decided on the “tactical suspension,” hours before the signing of the Bilateral Air Service Agreement between Nigeria and Israel on Monday.

The Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Aviation, Mr. George Ossi, had on October 24 told the House of Representatives Committee on Aviation that Oduah led a Nigerian delegation to Israel to sign the BASA.

The House committee is probing the purchase of two bulletproof cars at a whopping N255m price by the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority for the minister.

Our source explained that it was the ‘tactical suspension’ that made Jonathan to direct the Minister of State (1) for Foreign Affairs , Prof. Viola Onwuliri, to sign the agreement instead of Oduah.

When asked by one of our correspondents what ‘tactical suspension’ meant, he said, “Oduah will not be allowed to attend public functions that will have the President in attendance until the three-member committee set up to investigate the matter turns in its report.”

The source, who said he did not know whether the “tactical suspension” order had been formally communicated to the minister, stated that the step became necessary in order to dissuade Nigerians who hold the opinion that the President was shielding Oduah.

In what seemed a corroboration of the “tactical suspension,” the Special Adviser to the President on Political Matters, Mr. Ahmed Gulak, insisted that Jonathan would not associate with or shield anybody found to be corrupt.

He insisted during an interview with one of our correspondents on Tuesday, that the minister did not travel to Israel on the entourage of the President.

“Did you see them (Jonathan and the minister) together in Israel? The President will not associate or shield anybody found to be corrupt. That is why he set up that panel because he will not want to act based on media reports,” Gulak said.

Shortly before our source and Gulak spoke, the Presidency said the BASA was signed by Onwuliri because it was a matter bordering on foreign affairs.

The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati, in an exclusive telephone interview with one of our correspondents, argued that there was no politics involved in Onwuliri signing the agreement on behalf of the government.

He said Nigerians should not reduce the matter to “the politics of political appointees who are all ultimately birds of passage.”

The President’s spokesman said Oduah did not only attend the signing ceremony but was also involved in framing the technical details of, and in preparing the agreement along with her Israeli counterpart.

He said it was when that was done, that the Foreign Ministries moved in at the level of G2 diplomacy.

Abati added, “The groundwork (for the agreement) was done by the Ministry of Aviation hence the involvement of the Aviation Minister, but this being a country-to-country agreement, more or less a treaty, it had to be signed by the Foreign Affairs Minister.
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“It is also the convention in diplomacy to pair ministers. The Israelis brought their Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister, so we did the same. There was no politics involved and there is no doubt that it is within the provenance of the Foreign Ministry to sign agreements on behalf of the country.