Tinubu appoints Muri-Okunola Principal Private Secretary
By Emma Ogbuehi
President Bola Tinubu has tapped another staff of his while he was governor of Lagos State to join him in Abuja.
This time, the beneficiary is Hakeem Muri-Okunola who the president has appointed as his Principal Private Secretary (PPS).
Muri-Okunola is presently the Lagos State Head of Service (HoS).
TheNiche gathered from reliable presidency sources that Muri-Okunola, who was Personal Assistant to Tinubu when he was Governor of Lagos State from 1999 to 2007, has already received his letter of appointment.
He is expected to leave Lagos for Abuja to resume at his new office in the Villa when Tinubu returns from the United States General Assembly (UNGA) in New York, United States.
The presidency source disclosed that Muri-Okunola’s appointment had been concluded and the Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, had already been briefed.
Muri-Okunola who is seen not only as one of the ‘Tinubu Boys’ but an insider in the Tinubu political machine was personally handed over to Sanwo-Olu by the strongman of Lagos politics to be the State’s number one civil servant.
Muri-Okunola holds a Bachelor of Law degree from Lagos State University (LASU) and a Master’s degree in International Business Law from the Queen Mary & Westfield College, University of London.
Aside Muri-Okunola, Tinubu made 15 other appointments.
Muri-Okunola, a 51 year-old lawyer, joined the Lagos Civil service in 2001 as personal assistant to then Governor Tinubu.
By 2005, Tinubu appointed him Executive Secretary of the Land Use and Allocation Committee.
Six years after, he was promoted permanent secretary and was appointed the head of service in December 2018.
Among those appointed is Moremi Ojudu, first daughter of Babafemi Ojudu, the former special political adviser to Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo.
Moremi, who supported the Tinubu campaign, will serve as senior special assistant to the president (SSAP) on community engagement in the South west.
Tanko Yakasai, Chioma Nweze, Abiodun Essiet, Abdulhamid Yahaya Abba, were similarly appointed to serve the other geographical zones.
Yakasai is for North West, Essiet North Central, Nweze South East, Yahaya Abba North East.
The appointment batch also showed that former deputy governor of Lagos, Adejoke Orelope Adefulire has been reappointed as SSAP Sustainable Development Goals.
Muri-Okunola’s appointment is coming on the heels of Tinubu’s appointment, on Thursday, of his special adviser on revenue, Zacchaeus Adedeji, as the acting chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS).
On Friday, the President also nominated Dr. Olayemi Michael Cardoso as the new Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
The nomination is for a term of five years.
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