Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State has reduced the number of ministries and commissioners in the state in a bid to reduce the cost of governance.
Governor El-Rufai announced that the number of ministries in the state has been reduced from 19 to 13, while the number of commissioners have been shrunk to 13 from 24.
With the new arrangement, the surviving ministries are:
1. Ministry of Justice;
2. Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry;
3. Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Tourism;
4. Ministry of Local Government;
5. Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture;
6. Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources;
7. Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Development;
8. Ministry of Water Resources;
9. Ministry of Health and Human Services;
10. Ministry of Education, Science and Technology;
11. Ministry of Budget and Planning;
12. Ministry of Finance and
13. Ministry of Works, Housing and Transport.
In reducing the ministries Governor El-Rufai further directed that the former Ministry of Lands, Survey and Country Planning be transformed to a department attached to his office while the former Ministry of Rural and Community Development becomes a department in the Deputy Governor’s Office.
He also disclosed the scrapping of the ministry of information, adding that each ministry will have its own public relations unit.
It would be recalled that upon assumption of office, Governor El-Rufai slashed his salary and that of his deputy by half.