I knew nothing about education sector when Buhari appointed me as a minister — Adamu Adamu

Education Minister, Mallam Adamu Adamu has confessed that he was inexperienced in the education sector before President Muhammadu Buhari appointed him in 2015.

Adamu, who is the longest serving minister revealed this at a valedictory session with officials and heads of parastatals of the Ministry on Thursday. He thanked Buhari for trusting him with such a responsibility that he was not prepared for.

He said: “I didn’t know anything about education except superficially. When
Buhari decided to make me Minister of Education, there is somebody here sitting and looking at me; he was the first person I called. He said ‘what do you want to achieve?’ I said I want to achieve good things. And these are my ideas as a learner.

After that meeting, professors of education were called and I told them what I wanted to achieve and let them put it in writing for me and they (the professors) did. And then we had a document.” Adamu said he called some people to assist him work on a policy document on education because he was a novice in the sector. He said he shared his idea with them and “they assisted me greatly, and I remain grateful to them for these years.”

Earlier, he said, “I was busy making recommendations and suggestions to the President on whom to appoint into his cabinet in 2015. All of a sudden, he announced my name to my surprise and that was it. We worked together till 2019.

“In 2019, I told the President that it was time for him to change his ministers. But I know him very well and I knew it will be difficult for him to do that. But I decided to make it easy for him by promising to make bring people that would do the job better for me and others who served as Ministers in the first tenure.

“I promised him that I will give him names of competent people from at least, 19 northern states. So, I suggested to him to drop all the ministers that worked with him in the first tenure including me, but I knew it would be difficult for him.”