FESTUS ADEDAYO BEATS ANTHONY SCARAMUCCI’S RECORD OF SHORTEST APPOINTMENT IN HISTORY

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Ife Adewole

The Ibadan based columnist, Festus Adedayo was one of the candidates nominated to be interviewed for the position of media aide to the Senate President, emerged as the most qualified for the job and was given appointment letter on Thursday, June 19, 2019 through the office of the Senate President.

Almost immediately, by the noon of that same day his appointment began to trend on twitter, having over 5000 tweets and thousands of comments on other social media, a campaign tagged #sackfestusadedayo was initiated on Instagram. This action was believed to have been initiated by some loyalists of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) who effectively used their social media handles to demand the reversal of his appointment due to the nature of his write-ups that appeared anti-APC.

As if that was not enough, towards the closing hours of work on Thursday, the Senate President, Dr. Ahmed Lawan was said to have received a presidential query in respect of the appointment of the Ibadan based columnist.

As a result of the uproar, Adedayo’s appointment was withdrawn in less than 48 hours by the Senate President.

This act of the Senate President made Festus Adedayo to beat the American Financier, entrepreneur and political consultant; Anthony Scaramucci nicknamed ‘The Mooch’ who briefly served as the White House Director of communications for 10 days, from July 21 to July 31, 2017.

In a statement made available to journalists by Festus Adedayo, tagged “They thought they could pull me down”, he vowed to continue to speak the truth despite the reversal of his appointment and gave analysis of the works he has done for the present and past government administrations and some other individuals.

Similarly, the Special Assistant to the Senate President on Media and Publicity, Mohammed Isa on Sunday, June 23, 2019 confirmed the resignation of the Special Assistant on New Media to the Senate President, Olu Onemola.

Olu Onemola who was one of the aides that served the former Senate President, Bukola Saraki but was reappointed by Senate President Ahmed Lawan applauded Lawan for the priviledge given to him to serve and promote the works of the 9th Senate.

In his resignation letter, Onemola said, “…However, at this time, given my antecedents and the controversy this has generated, I would respectfully like to be excused from taking up this national assignment.

“It is my hope that whoever does fill this role will build upon what we have started in terms of opening up the activities of the Nigerian Senate to the public”.

The Senate President has since approved the resignation and wished Onemola all the best in his future endeavours.