The management of Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) on Tuesday described alleged lopsided appointments of General Managers/Heads of Departments as “unfounded and riddled with untruth”.
According to NPA, General Managers are usually appointed from the pool of Assistant General Managers “who would ordinarily have been in the service of the Authority long enough to have acquired significant experience in every aspect of the NPA’s operations”.
Explaining further, NPA in a statement issued by General Manager, Corporate and Strategic Communications, Jatto A Adams said:”In the interest of public accountability, the management of Nigerian Ports Authority wishes to respond to reports of alleged lopsided appointment of General Managers supposedly to northernise the Authority.
“While stating upfront that the allegation is unfounded and riddled with untruth, the management would like to inform stakeholders and the general public that the appointment and promotion of General Managers and Asst.General Managers are routinely guided by vacancy, exigencies, seniority, competency and strict application of Federal Character Principle in order to ensure equity and even distribution of positions in the organization.”
Part of the statement read: “Records at the moment show that while some zones may have fewer representation in General Manager cadre, they have higher representation in the two other most senior roles of Assistant General Manager and Principal Managers. As the table presented below will show:
| General Managers | Assistant General Managers | Principal Managers | Total | |
| North-Central | 3 | 6 | 36 | 45 |
| North-East | 7 | 10 | 27 | 44 |
| NorthWest | 5 | 3 | 26 | 34 |
| South East | 4 | 10 | 36 | 50 |
| South South | 1 | 10 | 43 | 54 |
| South West | 2 | 13 | 60 | 75 |
| Total | 22 | 52 | 228 | 302 |
“Stakeholders and the general public should also kindly note that while the General Manager, Finance is from the South East, the offices of General Manager, Seaview and General Manager Accounts do not exist, contrary to the reports being circulated.
“On allegations that some retired General Managers have had their tenures extended on contract in order to stop their “potential successors” from succeeding them, management asserts that this is totally untrue.
“The two cases that were mentioned, General Manager, Human Resources Mr. Yahaya Bukar (Aug.2018-Aug 2020)and General Manager, Engineering, Engr Ahmed RufaiMohammed( Feb 2020-2021) had their tenures legally extended for the specific reason of the completion of some of the very important projects that were started within the period of their services as General Managers. This situation also applied to the immediate past General Manager, Finance, Mr Simeon Aniobi, whose tenure was extended between Oct 2017 and October 2019.
“The management of the Authority is confident to say that it is guided by principles of fairness, equity and the law of the country in all its operations”.
