The appointments were made known in a statement issued by the president's Special Adviser on Media & Publicity, Ajuri Ngelale, in Abuja.
President Bola Tinubu, on Wednesday, announced the removal of Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) of three agencies under the Federal Ministry of Communications, Innovation, and Digital Economy.
The president appointed new heads to the agencies just as the heads of two separate agencies retained their positions.
The appointments were made known in a statement issued by the president's Special Adviser on Media & Publicity, Ajuri Ngelale, in Abuja.
According to the statement, the appointed chief executives (new and returning), are heads of agencies such as the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Nigerian Communications Satellite Limited (NIGCOMSAT), National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Nigeria Data Protection Commission (NDPC) and Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST).
A review of the appointments indicated that the president has replaced three top executives with new individuals, while two of the executives retained their seats for another tenure of five years.
According to the statement, Mr Tinubu approved Aminu Maida as the new Executive Vice Chairman/Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the NCC, following the removal of Umar Danbatta, while Nkechi Egerton-Idehen was announced as the new Managing Director/CEO of NIGCOMSAT to replace Tukur Funtua.
Similarly, the president appointed Tola Odeyemi as the new Postmaster General/CEO, to replace Sunday Adepoju at NIPOST.
However, the Director General of NITDA, Kashifu Abdullahi and the National Commissioner of NDPC, Vincent Olatunji, retained their seats.
Removal
The removal of some of the chief executives might surprise some of them as they had a few years to spend in office before the expiration of their tenures.
For instance, the removal of the former EVC of the NCC, Mr Danbatta, came three years after he was reappointed and confirmed by the Senate in July 2020 for a second term of five years by former President Muhammadu Buhari.
On his part, the former NIPOST boss, Mr Adepoju, was sacked barely a year after he assumed office. Similarly, the replacement of the NIGCOMSAT chief, Mr Funtua, came less than a year after he was appointed last December by Mr Buhari.
As of press time Thursday, no official reasons were given for the dismissals.
Meanwhile, amidst efforts to leverage Nigeria's technological and digital economic prowess to reposition the nation's economy toward greater financial inclusion, Mr Ngelale said the president also approved the appointment of Idris Alubankudi as his new Special Adviser on Technology and Digital Economy.
All the appointments, according to the statement, are to take effect immediately.
Profiles
Mr Maida worked as the Executive Director of Technology and Operations at Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System Plc (NIBSS).
He has almost two decades of multi-functional and international experience in FinTech, Telecoms and Enterprise Technology. Prior to his appointment at NIBSS, he was the CTO at the Nigerian-based FinTech Arca Payments Network and Senior Manager at Cisco Systems UK.
Mr Maida holds an MEng in Information Systems Engineering from Imperial College London and a PhD in Electrical & Electronic Engineering from the University of Bath UK.
Mrs Egerton-Idehen, according to her LinkedIn profile, is a high-energy, dynamic leader who has consistently set clear visions, established comprehensive strategies, built award-winning sales & marketing teams, and driven excellence throughout her career.
She described herself as an accomplished senior Fortune 500 technology executive, angel Investor, strategic advisor and spokesperson who has helped startups and businesses take their products/services to market, generate revenue and build high-performing sales teams.
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With almost two decades of experience in the tech sector, she has sold and managed sales teams in multinational organisations like Ericsson, Nokia-Siemens and Meta, and has worked across Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
She is also a published author of the Amazon bestseller, Be Fearless.
On her part, Mrs Odeyemi is a Public Policy Professional with a background in Electrical and Systems Engineering.
She has demonstrated competence in the deployment of technology to accomplish policy/regulatory requirements and formulation of technology policy.
With over 15 years in the Technology policy space, she has a proven track record of success in supervising technical teams and ensuring the execution of core objectives within the set organisation.
Mrs Odeyemi has extensive policy implementation advisory expertise in both government and private sector-led strategic implementation of frameworks for Public Sector, Technology projects, and Infrastructure financing.
