A former Minister of Agriculture, Audu Ogbeh, has emerged as Chairman of the northern socio-cultural group, Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF).
His emergence followed the election of new officers to pilot the affairs of the region which took place on Tuesday.
Other elected officers of the forum include: Ambassador Shehu Malami, the Board of Trustees (BoT) Chairman; Murtala Aliyu, former Minister of State for Power; Emmanuel Yahweh, National Publicity Secretary; Shaibu Shehu, Legal Adviser and Ibrahim Moriki, Financial Secretary.
The out-going Secretary-General, Anthony Sani, while giving the progress report and shortcomings of ACF, reminded members that the ACF was not only a pressure organisation but also an intervention and reconciliatory body.
“It is the usual practice of the forum to visit and intercede between feuding communities, even if at a reduced frequency as occasioned by the circumstance of the situation such as that of Benue State and many others.”
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“The leaders of this forum have had cause to visit some of the governors of the 19 northern states, and indeed, quite recently, it paid courtesy call on President Muhammadu Buhari where several expectations of the North were brought up for realistic appreciation that can impel progress,” he stated.
Sani, however, noted that due to “paucity of fund needed for management of the forum for optimal performance, we have not been able to achieve all we planned for, and as a result, we had to embark on some austerity measures ostensibly to keep the forum alive and functional, however minimal.
“We had to take bitter lines of action by limiting activities to existential ones by reducing the frequency of meeting of the National Working Committee (NWC) and the National Executive Council (NEC) from monthly to bi-monthly, the number of meetings of standing and ad-hoc committees as well as those of sub-committees.”
The out-going Secretary-General further lamented the refusal of the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) to register ACF as a corporate entity, saying: “It is pertinent for me to inform you that the forum applied for registration with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), which was declined because of some misinformation arising from mistaken identity.”
