The last has not been heard of the recent secret recruitment by the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, as about 121 more names who are politically related to President Muhammdu Buhari have been further revealed.
Investigations by SaharaReporters indicated that the bank gave well-remunerated jobs to another 121 relatives or wards of people who are politically connected with Buhari.
There was no advertisement of the job vacancies to welcome applications from well qualified Nigerians, and this action has called for concern.
A bank source said: “The jobs were never advertised, and those hired were never interviewed to ascertain their suitability for the jobs they received.”
The new recruits of the illegal employment were scheduled for induction on Apirl 4 and 5 set in Lagos State.
The apex bank acting director of Corporate Communications, Isaac Okorafor, had on Wednesday, March 16, 2016 defended the secret recruitment process by the bank, adding that there was “nothing illegal” about it.
He said: “In the last two years, we have had cause to recruit specialists, and what the law says is that if we are going for that kind of recruitment we should apply for waiver, so that we can do targeted recruitment.
“The other issue is that there are states that are not well represented (in the CBN), and in this case we focus on those states to recruit people of certain classes that we used to cover the shortfall in those states.”
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Among those on the new list are daughters of President Buhari’s personal assistants, a daughter of Governor Bindo Jibrilla of Adamawa State and and the daughters of the Deputy Governors of Bayelsa and Delta States respectively and several names of politically influential people, including Falila, a daughter of the Comptroller of Nigeria Customs, Hammeed Ali
The initial list of the beneficiaries of the illegal hires included a nephew of President Buhari, a son of the Comptroller General of Customs, and a daughter of the Inspector General of Police, Solomon Arase.
The apex bank boss, Godwin Emefiele was said to have resorted to the illegal recruitment in his bid to save his job which had been threatened by some loyalists of President Buhari.
A source disclosed that the bank abandoned its practice of using a professional human resources organization known as Nextzon to vet the credentials of its recent hires.
The source stated that Emefiele unilaterally decided that the newly employed relatives of the rich and powerful would not go be scrutinized through the aptitude tests and interviews that are usually part and parcel of the recruitment process.
In addition, Mr. Emefiele also waived the induction protocol required to familiarize new employees with operations at the CBN for some of the new hires.
The source said: “Those we recruit newly usually go for training at the CBN Learning Centers in Lagos.”
It was gathered that the CBN had on Thursday, March 17, 2016 brought in forensic experts to check all the computers at the human resources department with the aim of finding out who leaked the list.
Previous report stated that Emefiele reportedly accused the Director of Human Resources, Chizoba Mojekwu, for being the brain behind the leak and thereafter, redeployed her as the bank’s Director of Capacity Development and IT.
