President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Tuesday approved cost-cutting measures, slashing the entourage and expenditure on all official travels – domestic and international – by 60 per cent.
Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Ajuri Ngelale, told State House correspondents in Abuja that the directive applied to the Offices of the President, Vice President, First Lady, Second Lady and all Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs).
The President is known for having huge entourage in his travels. In last December’s COP28 Climate Change Summit in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), the Nigerian delegation was 1,411, the third largest.
According to the Presidential Spokesperson, official trips within the country, involving the President or the Vice President, will see significant cost reductions as a result of the president’s directive to slash the substantial bills associated with allowances and estacode for security details traveling from Abuja to those states.
Ngelale said the security outfits within states, whether it be police Department of State Services DSS, or branches of the military, will frontline protective detail when the president, vice president and their spouses travel to those states.
Ngelale said on foreign travel the limits placed on all ministers of the Federation are four members of their staff, appointees and the like. For heads of agency, that will be limited to two members of staff.
Furthermore, the numbers that the President has now approved for official travel with him will be no more than 20 individuals.
That number will be cut down to five in the case of the First Lady. Additionally, the number in the entourage on official international trips for the Vice President will be cut to five, the number that will be placed as a limit on the wife of the Vice President is also five.
Ngelale explained that in terms of local trips, the President has approved a new limit of 25 members of staff to accompany him on domestic trips.
He confirmed that the Office of the First Lady and Second Lady are now limited to 10 staff members to accompany them on official trips within the country. The Vice President will be limited to 15 members of staff on official trips within the country.
“Henceforth, the President is insistent that the notion of government wastage, the notion of recurrent expenditure being in excess, the notion that government officials will be allowed to conduct their affairs in a way that is different from what we are asking of Nigerian citizens with respect to prudence and cost management, those days are over,” Ngelale said.
