<\/p>\n
By Emmanuel Oloniruha<\/p>\n
Director-General of National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies (NILDS), Prof. Abubakar Sulaiman, has dismissed allegations of lopsided appointments and violations of federal character principle at the institute.<\/p>\n
Sulaiman, while featuring on the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) Personality Interview Series on Sunday in Abuja, insisted that all recruitments, promotions and internship programmes under his administration were conducted strictly on merit and competence.<\/p>\n
He also \u200c\u200c\u200d\u2060\u2060\u200d\u2060\u2060\u200c\u200d\u200d\u2060\u200d\u200c\u2060\u200csaid that all staff appointments and internship retainerships were free from religious or ethnic considerations.<\/p>\n
Sulaiman defended his leadership record of equitable recruitment and promotion in NILDS, saying he cannot be found wanting because he adhered to the federal character principle, reflecting national diversity.<\/p>\n
He dismissed assertions of favouring his home state, Kwara, explaining that senior appointments and departmental directorships were based on merit.<\/p>\n
\u201cOut of our 13 directors, none is an indigene of my home state, Kwara.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you want to do lopsided appointments, you place your people at the top, as directors and deputy directors, not as drivers or junior staff.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have been nationalistic and patriotic, strictly adhering to the rules,\u201d Sulaiman said.<\/p>\n
He added that the only person from Kwara at the senior management level in the institute is a professor on sabbatical who would soon return to University of Ilorin where he came from.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe prioritise merit, regional equity and national cohesion, ensuring that recruitment across all cadres reflects fairness and constitutional guidelines,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The director-general insisted that internal governance at the institute remained anchored on fairness, meritocracy and justice.<\/p>\n
Suleiman particularly cited the transparency of the institute\u2019s internship scheme for legislative drafters, where selection and retainership depended entirely on performance.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the last seven schemes we have done, maybe only two of them were Muslims. The majority are Christians and I retained all of them.<\/p>\n
\u201cI try to impress it on my staff members to always be just. Don\u2019t play religion; don\u2019t do ethnicity, and be fair to your colleagues,\u201d Sulaiman stated.<\/p>\n
On his vision and legacy, the director-general said he hoped to be remembered as a leader who institutionalised progress, upheld equity and significantly enhanced staff welfare.<\/p>\n
He added that he would want to be remembered for his contributions to the institute\u2019s efficiency and improvement of Nigeria and Africa\u2019s democracy.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to be remembered as one person who came, sustained what he met on ground, improved on it and advanced it for future development,\u2019\u2019 he said.(NAN)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Director-General of National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies (NILDS), Prof. Abubakar Sulaiman, has dismissed allegations of lopsided appointments and violations of federal character principle at the institute.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":819,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[511,512,508],"class_list":["post-818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-appointment","tag-federal-character-principle","tag-nilds"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/IMG-20260828-WA0048.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=818"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":820,"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818\/revisions\/820"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/819"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/primerisenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}