The Department of States Services (DSS), has today slammed the comment attributed to its Ex-Assistant Director, Dennis Amachree, on how the Minister of Communication, Isa Pantami scaled the screening of the DSS prior to his confirmation in 2019.
The DSS spokesperson, Peter Afunaya in a statement sent to a journalist said that what Amachree said was his personal opinion and not that of the DSS as an agency.
Afunaya maintained that the opinion of Mr. Amacree does not in any way represent the stance of the service as a government agency while urging the general public to disregard all his views as representing the service.
Afunaya said, ”Opinions expressed by Mr. Dennis Amachree on sundry national security issues are his personal positions and do not in any way represent the stand of the Service (the Department of State Services),”
Amachree had on Wednesday while featuring on an online interview program stated that Minister Pantami must have sailed through the secret police and the senate screening due to some factors like federal character and politics.
Mr. Amacree also throws his weight behind those calling for Mr. Pantami's resignation. He said that the secret police have information on all persons of interest in the country including Mr. Pantami’s alleged past extreme views and was duly communicated to the federal government.
Mr. Amacree while speaking during the interview said, ”During the vetting process for anybody to be appointed a minister or commissioner or anything, your name is sent to the SSS for vetting. They check your background up to the extent of your grandmother. They check your schools up to the extent of your primary school.
”And of course, they keep a tab on you online and offline. We get a lot from open-source intelligence and I can tell you that in Pantami’s case, we have it. But there is a political angle to it.
He further explained ”When somebody is being appointed, if the security agencies see that there is something wrong with his name, they will send it to the appointing agency. The appointing agency will now decide amongst other variables either religious variable, federal character balancing variable, or political variable and say that ‘Oh, yes, we know that this guy has this and that but let’s appoint him.
He added that “the political decision is not being taken by the SSS. Even when you go to the Senate for confirmation, there is party by party and you can see that there are some political candidates that the opposition party will say that this one will not be appointed but because he belongs to that party, they will appoint him.
”So, these are political and federal balancing where they will say that there is nobody from this place that has been appointed, so let’s appoint him.”
Minister Pantami has come under scrutiny in the last one week over his comment in the last decade which was considered a pro-terrorist group by many opinions.
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