Tuesday 13th September 2016

With Non-members Flooding Market, OPEC Predicts Oil Glut in 2017 Ejiofor Alike with agency report The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) has predicted a larger surplus in the oil market in 2017

from non-OPEC members as new fields come on stream, according to the cartel’s monthly Oil Market Report (OMR) published yesterday.

Apart from new oil fields coming on stream, the anticipated glut in the

oil market will be further buoyed by the United States shale producers, who have refused to be forced out of the market by the low oil price.

The booming output from shale oil fields had

pushed the global market into oversupply in 2014, with prices plummeting from a peak of $115 per barrel in June 2014 to an all-time low of $27 per barrel in January this year.

The prices later recovered

to a 2016 peak of $52 per barrel in June before it dropped, hovering around $47 yesterday after it had approached $50 per barrel at the weekend, following a drop in the United States inventory data to nearly a

two-decade low.

Prices above the $40 per barrel range would encourage the high cost shale producers to boost output, while a price range below $40 would force Continued on page 8

Military Averts Tragedy in Borno, Kills Female Suicide Bomber… Page 6 Tuesday 13 September, 2016 Vol 21. No 7810. Price: N250

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Buhari Hits PDP Again: ‘For 16 Years, No Savings, No Power, No Road, No Security’ Says patriotic Nigerians have nothing to fear in war against corruption Promises bumper harvests this year Tobi Soniyi in Abuja President Muhammadu Buhari is obviously not done with the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as he hit the party again yesterday,

dismissing its 16 years in the saddle as extremely wasteful and of no moment. ‘‘I want Nigerians to realise that what this government Continued on page 6

INEC Chairman: I Was Never Privy to Security Report on Postponement of Edo Election THISDAY check suggests otherwise APGAcandidate calls for shift in new date Bolaji Adebiyi, Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja and Adibe Emenyonu in Benin City Obviously due to the backlash the postponement, last Saturday, of the Edo State governorship election has generated, the Independent

National Electoral Commission (INEC) yesterday stepped up its denial of any complicity in the security report that led to the abrupt shift in the date of the poll to September 28, 2016.

Continued on page 6

Many Displaced as Second Tremor EID-EL-KABIR Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki; Governor of Kwara State, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed; and Speaker, Kwara State Hits Kaduna in 24 Hours… Page 8 L-R: House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Ali Ahmad, during Eid prayers to mark Eid-El-Kabir at the Ilorin prayer ground… yesterday

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Military Averts Tragedy in Borno, Kills Female Suicide Bomber Gunmen raid 8 Kaduna communities Senator Iroegbu in Abuja and John Shiklam in Kaduna The Nigerian military averted an impending tragedy on the eve of Eid-el-Kabir and succeded in killing a female suicide bomber at a security checkpoint while she was attempting to gain entrance into a cattle market in Borno State.

The security agencies were, however, not as vigilant in Kaduna State as one person was killed in yet another attack by gunmen on eight villages in Godogodo District of Jama'a Local Government Area of the state.

The Director of Army Public Relations (DAPR), Col. Sani Usman, in a statement, said that a suspected female suicide bomber was on Sunday evening, seen approaching a troops' checkpoint located at Kara Cattle Market axis, Dikwa, towards Antul and Mukdala, Dikwa Local Government Area (LGA), Borno State.

Usman said that the suspect was challenged from afar by the vigilant duty sentry and that she refused to stop, claiming to be coming from Monguno to see her parents in Dikwa.

"Troops sensing the direction of approach was suspicious and abnormal, fired a shot at her and the gallant sentry was proven right as it turned out that she was carrying a Person Borne Improvised Explosive Device (PBIED), which exploded with a loud bang, killing her instantly and causing minor injury to two soldiers and a civilian JTF assisting them," he stated.

Usman said that the injured soldiers and the civilian had been treated and have continued with their duties.

This incident, he noted, showed that there were a few remnants of the Boko Haram terrorists that are determined to carry out criminal acts to create panic and insecurity in some areas.

In a related development, Usman said: "There is also very reliable information that remnants of the Boko Haram terrorists now disguise or pretend to be mad men or women in order to gain access to some locations especially in Maiduguri."

Against this backdrop, the Army spokesman warned members of the public to be wary of any seemingly mentally unstable or mad men

or women found wandering and report same.

According to him, it is imperative for all to be more security conscious and vigilant especially during the Eid-el-Kabir festivities and public holidays.

"The public are further enjoined to report any suspicious persons or movement to the security agencies," he added.

Gunmen Raid Kaduna Communities One person has been killed in yet another attack on eight villages in Godogodo District of Jama'a Local Government Area of Kaduna State.

The attack came barely two days after two persons were reportedly shot dead in Golkofa village in the area.

The killings were allegedly perpetrated by suspected Fulani herdsmen.

There had been series of attacks on communities in the area leading to deaths and destruction of property.

The latest attack, according to sources, took place on Thursday night.

The source claimed that eight villages were taken over by the rampaging herdsmen.

According to him, the affected villages included Ninte, Unguwan Anjo, Akwa’a, Gada Biyu, Andaha, Farin Ruwa and Ampani.

The source described how the villagers fled their homes following the attacks.

He added that the herdsmen broke into homes in the affected villages and looted the villagers' property.

Narrating the incident, the source said: "After the killing of my uncle and another youth last Thursday, our chief said that we should all move out, since we do not know the extent of the next killings looking at what has happened to other villages.

“So everybody left. I moved to Gidan Waya with my family and many others are also here with us.

“This morning, Mr Audu Avegbak left Gidan Waya to take feeds to his animals that he left behind. The Fulani people were waiting for him.

As soon as he came into his compound, they opened fire on him and killed him instantly.

“We got to know this through the Hausa people who escorted him to the village. Though they left with us to Gidan Waya, the Fulani

INEC CHAIRMAN: I WAS NEVER PRIVY TO SECURITY REPORT ON POSTPONEMENT OF EDO ELECTION The INEC Chairman, Prof.

Mahmood Yakubu, and the National Commissioner for Voter Education and

Publicity, Prince Solomon Soyebi, said emphatically that the security agencies never took the commission into confidence about the security report.

While Yakubu spoke exclusively to THISDAY through his Chief Press Secretary, Mr. Rotimi Oyekanmi, Soyebi spoke to Channels TV on its breakfast talk show, Sunrise Daily.

THISDAY had, however, gathered at the weekend that contrary to the election management body’s claim, its chairman might have had fore knowledge of the security report but failed to disclose it to his colleagues on the board of the commission.

Citing security concerns, the Department of State Services (DSS) and the police had, after a closeddoor meeting between the Inspector General of Police (IG), Mr. Ibrahim Idris, and the DSS Director-General, Mr. Lawal Daura, in Abuja, had last Wednesday advised INEC to consider shifting the election to a future date.

“Credible intelligence availed the agencies indicate plans by insurgent/extremist elements to attack vulnerable communities and soft targets with high population during the forthcoming Sallah celebrations between 12th and 13th September, 2016,” the security agencies said in a statement by the Force Public Relations Officer (FPRO), DCP Don Awunah, and Mr. Garba Abdullahi of the DSS.

But INEC promptly denied knowledge of any such security report and insisted, in a statement by Soyebi on Thursday afternoon, that the election would proceed. The electoral body, however, recanted around 8pm and postponed the election to September 28, 2016, citing communication from the security agencies that stated they would be unable to guarantee security for the election.

Information available to THISDAY, however, suggests that Yakubu might have been aware of the security report but failed to disclose it to his colleagues.

According to the information, as a member of the election security strategy committee, consisting of the IG; DG, DSS; DirectorGeneral, National Youth

Service Corps (NYSC) and Chairman, INEC, which plans security and logistics of every election, Yakubu must have been aware that there were concerns about the capacity of the security agencies to police the election.

The committee, which meeting he had been attending three weeks before the scheduled election, had mooted the idea of shifting the poll date once the federal government decided to declare September 11 and 12, 2016 as public holidays for the celebration of Eidel-Kabir.

This was because the security agencies knew that public holidays of this nature were periods that terrorists and militants Continued on page 8

WITH NON-MEMBERS FLOODING MARKET, OPEC PREDICTS OIL GLUT IN 2017 the shale producers out of the market and prompt OPEC and non-OPEC to mull production cuts as oil companies cut spending.

The shale producers have proved more resilient to cheap oil than expected, thus fuelling a concern of larger surplus next year.

Reuters reported that the prospect of a larger surplus than expected has added to the challenge of OPEC and non-members such as Russia, who are making a renewed attempt to curb output.

According to OPEC’s OMR, the demand for crude from OPEC will average 32.48 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2017, down from the previous forecast of 33.01 million bpd.

OPEC revised up its 2016 and 2017 non-OPEC supply forecasts, citing factors including the start-up of Kazakhstan's Kashagan oilfield and a lower-than-expected decline in US shale output, and said the immediate outlook was for more production.

“It is expected that there will be higher non-OPEC production in the second half of 2016 compared to the first half,” OPEC said in the report.

OPEC expects non-OPEC supply to rise by 200,000 bpd in 2017, versus a previously forecast 150,000 bpd decline.

The revision is mostly due to Kashagan, OPEC said, as the long-delayed giant field finally starts up.

On top of that, the forecast

for this year was revised up by 180,000 bpd.

OPEC itself kept output near a multi-year high in August, pumping 33.24 million bpd, down 23,000 bpd from July's figure, the report said.

The July figure is the highest since at least 2008, according to a recent Reuters review of past OPEC reports.

Reuters reported that oil prices pulled back yesterday amid receding hopes for a production freeze deal and a broad perception that last week’s significant drop in US crude inventories was unlikely to be sustained.

The November contract for global crude benchmark Brent was down 1.4 per cent at $47.34 a barrel, while its

US counterpart West Texas Intermediate was down 1.66 per cent at $45.13 for October deliveries.

The prices at the weekend had surged about four per cent after the United States inventory data showed a drop in stocks to nearly a two-decade low as crude imports into the US Gulf Coast slid last week due to Tropical Storm Hermine.

But most observers have agreed the massive 14.5 million barrel reduction in US oil stocks was driven mostly by inclement weather and that there is a high likelihood prices are correcting themselves already in anticipation of a similarly sized build up when data are released this week.

always allow them to come and do their farm work and tend to their animals. It is the same in all the other villages that left. Everything we know going on in our villages, are through our Hausa people.

“After killing Avegbak, who was the Headmaster of Dangwa Primary School, the police came in. They engaged the herdsmen in a gun battle, but they escaped. None of

them was apprehended."

The spokesman of the Kaduna State Police Command, Aliyu Usman, an Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), confirmed the incident.

Usman said: “The victim went to feed his animals and the gunmen killed him, but our men went after them.

He was actually killed in the bush, not in the village."

BUHARI HITS PDP AGAIN: 'FOR 16 YEARS, NO SAVINGS, NO POWER, NO ROAD, NO SECURITY' inherited after 16 years of the PDP government was no savings, no infrastructure, no power, no rail, no road and no security,” he told journalists in his Daura hometown after the Eidel-Kabir celebrations.

The attack, which came through a statement by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Malam Shehu Garba, is the second within two days of efforts to explain the nation’s economic recession that has imposed harsh economic conditions on the vast majority of Nigerians, many of whom are now grumbling loudly, asking the president and his administration to deliver more quickly on the change he promised them during electioneering.

The president had in an Eid-el-Kabir message on Sunday blamed the recession on the global economic downtown and lack of savings by preceding administrations.

"The present recession is as a result of cumulative effects of worldwide economic downturn and failure in the past to plan and save for difficult times,” he had explained.

His comment had attracted a strong rebuke from the PDP which told him to stop grumbling and face up to his task of reviving the economy.

“The president and his APC were elected to further better the lots of Nigerians, and not to dish out constant complaints on the situation which they mindlessly created not minding the attendant consequences of their actions on our collective destinies,” the PDP’s National Publicity Secretary, Prince Dayo Adeyeye, said in a direct reference to the president’s message, adding: "It is, therefore, high time they stopped this unnecessary grumbling and concentrate on how to redeem our economy by providing good governance to the people."

But Buhari returned to the same theme yesterday contending that his inheritance was less than illustrious, asking for more time to repair the damage of the past.

His message was, however, not all about gloom as he gave a cheering report of progress being made in the agriculture sector, promising that a bountiful harvest was

in the offing this year. ‘‘We should thank God this year, the reports I’m getting, which is very pleasing, is that we will have a bumper harvest this year,” he said, thanking Nigerians for their support for his government’s policies, programmes and actions aimed at improving security, revamping the economy and combating the fight against corruption.

The president gave further reports on his campaign promises to secure the country and fight corruption and gave himself a pass mark. ‘‘Nigerians can see what we have done on Boko Haram and what we are doing to resolve the problem in the Niger Delta,” he stated.

Buhari said he was committed to delivering on his campaign pledges, adding that his economic revival policies were targeted at job creation, particularly for the youth with agriculture as his core route to employment generation. ‘‘For the youths, graduates and non-graduates who are interested in agriculture, the Federal Ministry of Agriculture in collaboration with the CBN are doing something to provide employment for them,’’ the president said.

On his star programme, corruption, he said the war against graft was proceeding without fail, assuring patriotic Nigerians who had nothing to hide to fear not.

“We will ensure justice and fairness for all,” he said, even as he vowed that all those who had abused public trust would not only be brought to book but would also be made to return their loot to the national till.

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T H I S D AY TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

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Many Displaced as Second Tremor Hits Kaduna in 24 Hours Many residents of Sambang

Dagi in Jaba Local Government Area of Kaduna State have been displaced as a result of another earth tremor witnessed in the area in the early hours of yesterday.

The incident occurred barely 24 hours after the first tremor was reported at Nok village about 20 kilometres away from Sambang.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reported that the second vibration occurred around 4a.m yesterday, leaving shocked residents scampering for safety.

It was not immediately clear whether there were casualties.

Earlier, the state government had in a statement urged residents of the affected communities to remain calm.

The government last

Sunday appealed for calm, and sympathised with the residents of Kwoi in Jaba Local Government Area, following the first tremor.

The government said in a statement signed by Samuel Aruwan, the Special Assistant on Media and Publicity to the State Governor Nasir el-Rufai, that it had made a formal report to the appropriate authorities to investigate the development.

The statement said el-Rufai had notified the geological and emergency agencies of the incident.

“The governor sympathises with the people in the Kwoi area over the reported earth tremor,” the statement said.

“He has directed the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) to mobilise to the area and comfort

the citizens.

“The National Geological Agency has also been notified, and has been invited to investigate the tremor in the Kwoi area and provide appropriate guidance.

“The Kaduna State Government is receiving updates from the area and relevant government agencies have been directed to take steps to comfort the residents and to assuage their uneasiness as they come to terms with an unusual event.

“The state government wishes to appeal for calm, and urges everyone not to spread unverified information, or create panic,” the statement said.

The first incident, which occurred at about 1p.m., shook the community and created panic among the people.

Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir el-Rufai

Two Die in Sallah Tragedy in Lagos Chiemelie Ezeobi In two separate incidents, two persons were yesterday night killed during the Sallah celebration around Lagos.

While one of the deceased persons was killed after a drinking spree at the Orile Iganmu area of Lagos, the other person was killed by a hit-and-run driver at the Ikeja area of the state.

The drinking incident

was said to have involved the deceased person, who was simply identified as Onyibo, who had engaged in a drinking spree with some of his friends on Adeyeye Street to celebrate the Eidel-Kabir at Orile.

While drinking, he was said to have collapsed and his colleagues, who were afraid of the consequences, were said to have dumped him at a workshop around

the area and took to their heels.

According to the police, the deceased was said to have vomited blood while battling with his life before he finally gave up the ghost.

After the case was reported to the Orile Police Station, attempts were made to reach his family members but till press time proved abortive.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity, a senior police

officer in the station said: “One Asimiu reported that a man popularly known as Onyibo was found dead in his shop at Alafia bus stop.

“Onyibo and his friends, mostly touts and street urchins were seen drinking heavily during the day. They were competing on who would finish some bottles of some locally brewed spirit popularly called ‘Sepe’.

“From what we gathered,

It was during the drinking spree that Onyibo collapsed.

His friends who tried to revive him immediately took him away.

“When they were unable to bring him back to live, they quickly abandoned him in a workshop and fled for fear of possible arrest by the police.

“According to what we gathered, Onyibo is popular in the area, but no one knows

where he came from. We have taken his body away.”

In another development, a moving vehicle at the Ikeja Along Bus Stop area of Ikeja crushed the other victim late last night.

Reports said the deceased was first hit by a Hillux bus, before other vehicles ran him over, leaving only his canvass and torn clothes behind, as well as his battered body.

adequate security and that the police was going to deploy 25,000 men and he was even warning politicians and any troublemakers that they should not try going to the polling booths to forment trouble.

"It was on that note that we concluded that meeting and we were all happy. In fact it was shortly after that meeting that the chairman of INEC started hearing the rumour that the police and DSS held a press conference in Abuja asking us to postpone the election in Edo State.

"What informed our initial position that we were not going to postpone it was that we didn't receive any official notification as should have been done from the security agencies.

"It was only after 6 pm when the Inspector General of Police and the Director General of the DSS sent two separate letters to us conveying that position that was the time we now reversed our decision and agreed that we are going to postpone the election.

So it is a bare-faced lie for anyone to say that the INEC chairman was aware of the security report and all the INEC commissioners were there with him on that day."

Earlier yesterday, Soyebi had also told Channels TV that the commission was

not briefed until the official communication. He said: “We heard it just like every other person. It came in as text messages. The second day, we did not have any official communication as at 12 noon.

So we told the whole world that we were going ahead with the election.”

INEC CHAIRMAN: I WAS NEVER PRIVY TO SECURITY REPORT ON POSTPONEMENT OF EDO ELECTION attack soft targets. They, therefore, would need the full complements of their officers and men at their duty post to secure their commands.

The security agencies reasoned that it would be difficult to perform this duty if it moved the 25,000 policemen required to secure the election out of their commands, explaining that the logistics for pulling them out of Edo State after the election on September 9/10 was beyond their capacity. Hence the request for the shift in date to a more auspicious day.

Since the Electoral Act 2010 as amended allowed INEC to countermand an election, Yakubu was persuaded to consider the suggestion for a change of date.

He agreed, but requested to be allowed to get the buyin of his colleagues on the commission since he could not make the decision alone. This was a week to the election.

He, however, did not feed the committee back until last Tuesday when he expressed his inability to broach the proposal among his colleagues, suggesting that if the IG and DG, DSS could issue an advisory, it would make his task easier.

This explained the joint press conference by the DSS and the police on Wednesday.

The committee, THISDAY gathered further, was dumbfounded by the turn of events after the advisory as the INEC lashed out at the security agencies, setting them up for public umbrage.

Agitated at the impending stalemate, particularly with the insistence of the DG, NYSC that he would not deploy his corps members, except their security was guaranteed, the committee decided to communicate its request for the postponement of the election to the electoral body officially, which compelled the commission to act and eventually shifted the poll date.

Confronted with this information yesterday, Yakubu pointedly denied any personal knowledge of the security report before the official communication to his commission.

Speaking to THISDAY on telephone through his CPS, Oyekanmi, the INEC chairman said the security agencies only got through to him only after they had addressed a press conference in Abuja on the matter.

He described the insinuation that Yakubu was aware of the request by the police and the DSS for the postponement of the election as "bare-faced lie" which does not hold water.

"You know, there are some things that cannot be said in

public that took place in terms of efforts that the chairman made on that day in order to save the situation. It is just not fair for some people who don't know what really happened to now start saying that the chairman of the INEC was privy to that decision to shift the election and is just feigning ignorance, that is a lie and very mischievous," he said.

Oyekanmi explained that INEC was quite ready to go ahead with the election but it realised that it could not conduct the election without security guarantee.

He said that with the level of efforts and commitment that the INEC chairman had put in for the Edo election, there was no way anyone could accuse him of any connivance.

He said: "We were very ready for the election but when all those who are responsible for security told us that they cannot guarantee security then we were forced to listen to them.

"My brother, I don't know why some politicians like to manufacture lies. Somebody who has been working as if nothing is bad. I was involved and at least I joined INEC in May, this year and I could see the level of preparations that have taken place before I joined and what they were doing after. There is no way someone can prepare like that and then connive.

"Why will he do a thing like that and if you have observed this man for some time, he is very transparent in what he has been doing because I have been involved and I know how much efforts have gone into the preparations for the election.

"What is the point for somebody who is saddled with the responsibility of organising election and he has put all the necessary things in place, of course governorship election is at the state level and organised

by INEC commissioners in charge of that state, not the headquarters’ affair. It is only during the presidential election that the INEC headquarters are directly involved.

On the role of INEC's inter agency committee on election security with regards to the recommendation for a shift in the date of the poll, the INEC chairman's aide said that it is on record that the committee had given a clean bill of health for the election to proceed before the request from higher security authorities.

According to him, "My dear, on that Wednesday when that issue came up, the DIG in-charge of Operations from Police Headquarters in Abuja, Joshak Habila, was there in Benin city at the meeting and he gave a speech assuring us of

APGA Candidate Demands another Shift in Date Meanwhile, the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) governorship candidate in the poll, Mr. Osaro Onaiwu, has asked for a further shift of the election date to around October 1.

He hinged his argument for calling for the shift on the fact that Edo State students would be writing the General Certificate of Education (GCE) examination, and would write Physics on September 28, the new date of the election.

Onaiwu, who further reasoned that the shift he was advocating would enable the students take part in the election after their exam, added that education was number one pillar in APGA manifesto, even as he revealed that some of the students had threatened to sue INEC if they were prevented from voting in the election.

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016 • T H I S D AY

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NEWS

News Editor Davidson Iriekpen Email davidson.iriekpen@thisdaylive.com, 08111813081

Edo Guber: Police Arrest Three Ex-militant Leaders with Two AK-47 Rifles Edo PDP: They should be properly charged to court

Adibe Emenyonu in Benin City Three persons alleged to be ex-militant leaders have been reportedly arrested by the operatives of Edo State Police Command with two AK-47 rifles The ex-militant leaders who are allegedly loyal to the All Progressives Congress (APC), are currently cooling their heels at the state criminal investigation department at the police headquarters.

They were said to have been caught with two AK-47 assault rifles and would be arraigned in court tomorrow.

The leader of the group was said to have been arrested last Thursday at a popular hotel in Benin City, the state capital.

Although the arrest was not confirmed by the police as all efforts to confirm the story proved abortive, but speaking with journalists the state Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, Henry Idahagbon, said: “The rumour that the militants were arrested in his hotel on Friday was purposefully fabrication to obfuscate the arrest of one of

their imported ‘Generals’, Gen. Peres Ejuni, who was arrested with two AK-47 assault rifles and is currently with the police.”

The state Attorney General disclosed that the police have remained resolute and ready to arraign him before the court tomorrow.

“My attention was drawn through innumerable calls to a mischievous publication on the Facebook page of one Ogbeide Ifaluyi Isibor to the effect that the Department of State Services (DSS) arrested 61 militants in my motel. Some days ago, the same fellow also caused to be published that I was buying PVCs within the premises of the Ministry of Justice.

“The PDP having failed woefully to persuade Edo people to return to Egypt have resorted to spinning false stories and marketing same online. We are daily been assailed by different fabricated stories. If the deputy governor wasn’t engaged in a shouting match with the governor, the Commissioner for Information, Kassim Afegbua, will be endorsing one of their two

candidates.

“For the avoidance, these stories are false and a figment of the warped imagination of the writer, no amount of false propaganda against my person or other members of the APC will stop the impending annihilation of the party in Edo State, but will rather reduce the over bloated political ego of their candidate.”

However, the state chapter of the PDP has slammed Idahagbon for allowing some members of the APC caught with firearms to go free, saying this was a travesty of justice

that would embolden them to further perpetrate the heinous act.

The Publicity Secretary, Mr. Chris Nehikhare, said in a statement that “The attention of the Edo State PDP has been drawn to the development whereby five thugs known to be regular escorts and personal driver of the member representing Orhionmwon/Uhunmwode Federal Constituency, Hon. Patrick Aisowieren, who were arrested by the police for being in possession of AK-47 automatic assault rifles,

ostensibly for wreaking havoc in the rescheduled Edo State governorship election, have been charged to a magistrate’s court in Abudu for bail without mention of the illegal possession of firearms.

“This travesty of justice is the more offensive to us against the backdrop that our members have been relentlessly harassed, arrested and charged to court on trumped up charges - and in some cases, murder.

“It beats the imagination, therefore, that the Police would be creating a leeway for

potential felons to escape justice.

We cannot but impute political bias in this matter because the suspects are members of the ruling APC. “We consider this action of the police and state attorney, as being counter to the public interest because allowing these hoodlums to go free would embolden them in the perpetration of their heinous crimes.

“We hereby call on the police authorities and Idahagbon to serve the course of justice by properly charging them to court.”

Dasukigate: Why EFCC Has Not Invited Me, Says TAN Boss, Ubah David-Chyddy Eleke in Awka Mr. Ifeanyi Ubah, the Coordinator of Transformation Ambassadors of Nigeria (TAN), a political machinery used to galvanise support for former President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan’s second term, has said he ensured transparency in the group during the campaign; the reason he has not been invited by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

Ubah who is also Chairman of Capital Oil and Gas, spoke with journalists in Nnewi, Anambra State, adding that he has no regrets working for Jonathan as he remains the only president that gave Ndigbo hope and also ensured that they were integrated into mainstream politics by giving them relevant appointments in Nigeria.

The oil magnate asked journalists: “Have you ever heard my name being associated with stealing? If I did anything wrong during the campaigns, do you think I would be here talking to you today?

“I ensured that I did not involve myself in any shaddy thing during the election, and that is why I am a free man today. What I am saying is that Anambra State needs a man who has a proven track record as a governor, so that things would move on fine.

“If I had any blemish, the President Muhammadu Buhari government would be looking for me today, but I ensured I did not involve myself in things that were not right.

“You may not know, Buhari government has paid me a huge sum of money which was owed me by the Jonathan administration. I worked for Jonathan, but he could not pay me because he was listening to gossips, but Buhari who I even worked against came and paid me.”

Ubah added that he remains proud of Jonathan and has no regret working for him.

“He is the man who ensured that Ojukwu our hero got a burial fit for a General, he is also the man who appointed an Igbo man, Ihejirika, into a high office, and most of his ministers too.

He is the man who gave Igbo an identity, I don’t regret what I did for him,” Ubah said.

Speaking on the state Governor Wike Obiano’s tenure, Ubah picked holes in what the governor has described as achievements so far, saying security which he sees as his biggest achievement is no achievement.

Ubah said he is not afraid to tell the governor the truth as he is not a government contractor who is looking for jobs to do.

“Security is no achievement, but a priority for the governor.

For the three flyover bridges, someone should tell Obiano that the bridges are not priority to Anambra people,” the businessman said.

He said he will continue to do his best to uplift youths of the state, which is one of the main reason for establishing his football club, FC Ifeanyi Ubah.

PRAYERS FOR THE NATION

L-R: Emir of Daura, Alhaji Umar Farouk Umar; President Muhammadu Buhari; and Magajin Gari of Daura, Alhaji Musa Umar, at the Eid Kabir Prayer Ground in Daura, Katsina State...yesterday

APC to #BringBackOurGirls: We Support You But Have Changed Our Strategy Davidson Iriekpen

The ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has reacted to the apparent drift in the relationship between the federal government and the #BringBackOurGirls (BBOG) group.

Responding to a tweet by a leader of the BBOG, Oby Ezekwesili, suggesting a volte face by President Muhammadu Buhari on the issue, the APC said it remains committed to BBOG’s struggle but has only changed its strategy since it is now the party in power.

Before the May 2015 presidential election, the APC was a powerful voice behind the group’s campaign for the rescue of the over 200 Chibok school girls abducted by the extremist group, Boko Haram.

The then opposition party made the missing Chibok girls a campaign issue against the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

Now in power and the girls still not rescued, APC’s relationship with the campaigners has become frosty.

The BBOG members were leadership last Tuesday

prevented by the police from marching to the Presidential Villa, Abuja. A pro-government group had on the same day also joined to block the group’s path to the Villa.

Miffed by the development, Oby Ezekwesili, a former Minister of Education, and a leader of the BBOG, took to twitter on Friday to remind President Muhammadu Buhari that it was 879 days since the Chibok girls were abducted.

“No More excuses. Decide now. Act now,” Ezekwesili said to the president.

The series of tweets released

by Ms. Ezekwesili, since after last Tuesday’s incident, give a picture of what the BBOG now think of President Buhari and his administration.

The former minister, in her tweets, said by slandering, renting a crowd, and attempting to stop their protest march, “officials of low degree” thought they could destroy BBOG, so that the group would stop “disturbing” the government.

As a reminder of what the group insists the president owes the people, Ezekwesili quoted a line from President Buhari’s

inaugural speech on May 29, 2015 in which he said: “We cannot claim to have defeated Boko Haram without rescuing the Chibok girls and all other innocent persons.”

She also referred APC to the party’s December 2014 tweet, in which it said: “It’s hours to New Year celebration. Our Chibok girls aren’t home yet.

If you talk about it, they label you ‘opposition’. Things must change.”

The APC, in its response to Ezekwesili according to Premium Times, said it was committed to the BBOG’s struggle, but that its strategy has changed since it is now the party in power.

“As opposition then, #BringBackOurGirls was an open campaign, since that was the only way we could pressure government into action,” the APC tweeted.

“However, as leading party, our strategy changed. We’re most concerned with actual efforts to rescue the girls and our efforts are evident.”

The party said the BBOG leader would agree that Mr. Buhari’s administration is

succeeding in its war against insurgency.

“Dear @obyezeks, we respect your resilience and commitment to the #BringBackOurGirls struggle and would do anything to encourage you, Ma. “As a party, we’ll continue to work with government and security forces, as much as legally allowed, until they #BringBackOurGirls.”

The Nigerian police, last Friday, reversed itself and declared that public protest was allowed in Abuja, and other parts of the country.

The police statement said public protest was part of democracy, but that it must conform to the rule of law and public order.

“The Nigeria Police Force recognises the constitutional rights of every law abiding citizen to express his or her view through public protest/ procession and other legitimate means,” the statement said.

The BBOG has demanded that the Inspector General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, apologise for the police’ attempt to block them in the first place.

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TUESDAY, september 13, 2016 • T H I S D AY

EID - KABIR MESSAGES…

EID - KABIR MESSAGES…

Without Sacrifice We will Never See Nigeria of Our Dreams, Say Jonathan, Others dictates of Islamic religion.

He urged them to always live by the tenets of Islam; support and respect constituted authority, maintain peace with fellow citizens and share love among virtues.

The Otun Seriki of Ado Ekiti Central said: “Islam is a religion of peace, compassion and love for one another and we should live by these dictates. It is true that things are quite hard now because of the painstaking efforts put in by the government to ensure that things are done differently to effect the change we desire.

“So, let’s be patient and prayerful for our government as only these would help them fulfill the electoral promises they made. The change promised by President Buhari requires a collective sacrifice on the part of all Nigerians and this is not an easy task.”

Meanwhile, some Muslims who had benefited from the gift of rams by the the state Governor, Dr. Ayodele Fayose, also commended the governor for the gesture and prayed for him.

Our correspondents Former Nigerian President, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, has advised Nigerians to put the love of the country above personal interests.

According to him, this would make the “Nigeria of our dreams possible.”

In his goodwill message to Muslim faithful, Jonathan cited the example of Ibrahim who was willing to sacrifice his son.

“Let us imbibe Ibrahim’s ideals and put Nigeria first in all we do. I salute the Muslim Ummah this Salah. Happy Eid-el-Kabir,” he wrote on his twitter handle.

The past president said: “Without self-sacrifice, we will never see the Nigeria of our dreams and will always think ‘what about me’ instead of ‘what about Nigeria’.

“On Eid-el-Kabir, we honour Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son. This must teach us that we must all sacrifice for Nigeria’s greatness.”

Amosun Preaches Love Ogun State Governor, Senator Ibikunle Amosun, has again admonished Nigerians to love one another and continue to support government at all levels.

Amosun, while addressing Muslim faithful after observing the Eid-el-Kabir prayer at Lantoro praying ground, Abeokuta, urged the people not to relent in their prayers for Nigeria.

He assured residents of the state of his government's determination to continue to execute its mission to rebuild the state, and also expressed optimism that Nigerians would soon begin to enjoy the dividends of democracy from the Muhammadu Buhari-led federal government.

Meanwhile, Chief Imam of Egbaland, Alhaji Liadi Orunsolu, in his message, explained that the slaughtering of rams to mark the Salah is a symbolic representation of man's obedience and total submission to the Almighty Allah.

Orunsolu added that Allah did not impose it on anyone who does not have the wherewithal and that the whole essence is to give to those who do not have.

Pray for Peaceful Poll, Oshiomhole Appeals to Muslims Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State has urged Muslims in the state to pray for a peaceful and successful governorship election on September 28.

In his Eid-el-Kabir message signed by his Chief Press Secretary, Peter Okhiria, Oshiomhole said: “I rejoice with my Muslim brothers and sisters on the celebration of the Eid-el-Kabir, a major religious festival, with a profound spiritual essence.

“Even as we rejoice and thank the Almighty God for finding us worthy to be part of this year’s celebration, the essence and significant message which Eid-el-Kabir portrays must not be lost on the faithful.

“I urge the faithful to use the opportunity to deepen their faith in God as we have learnt from His beloved Prophet Ibrahim which is an abundant reward for fidelity to God’s injunctions.

“The nation’s economy is going through turbulence at the moment, but with God on our side and with the prayer of the faithful for our nation and for our President, Muhammadu Buhari, who is totally committed to making a positive difference in the life of the nation, we will soon get out of the woods and deliver the real change we promised the nation.”

Masari Urges Nigerians to Have Faith, Be Prayerful Katsina State Governor, Aminu Bello Masari, has called on Nigerians to have faith in the leadership of President Muhammadu Buhari, promising that the president will not disappoint, even as he urged for continuous prayers for God to deliver the country from the grip of the travails bedevilled it.

The governor made the remarks shortly after the congregation Eid-el-Kabir prayer in Katsina yesterday, asserting that there is no challenge that committed leadership and prayers cannot overcome.

Deputy Chief Missionery, Nasrul Lai-L-faithi Society (NASFAT), Sheikh Mahroof Onike, being assisted to slaughter a ram for Eid-el-Kabir celebration at the Old Secretariat, GRA, Ikeja ...yesterday.

KOLAWOLE ALLI According to a statement signed by the Senior Special Assistant on Media to the governor, Malam Abdu Labaran Malumfashi, stated that Masari promised that in President Muhammadu Buhari the country had the right leader who has the commitment, determination and selflessness to get it out of the economic dire straits it is navigating.

He said he had no doubt in the capacity and ability of President Buhari to lead Nigeria back onto the path of prosperity since he has the commitment and sincerity of purpose required to succeed.

The governor therefore called on Nigerians at home and abroad, especially those currently on pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia to pray for the nation and its leaders, believing that a combination of commitment from the leadership and prayers from the people will see Nigeria successfully through the recession and security challenges buffeting all but few of the economies around the world.

Masari also called on Nigerians to learn from the lessons of the Eid-el-Kabir and live in unity and peace with one another, saying that both Islam and Christianity are religions of and do preach peace.

Ajimobi: Leaders, Citizens Must Sacrifice for Nigeria’s Progress The Governor of Oyo State, Senator Abiola Ajimobi, has enjoined the country’s leaders and the people to be prepared to make sacrifices for its development in the spirit of collective responsibility to bail the country out of the pervading trying times.

The governor gave the advice in an interview with journalists shortly after participating in the Eid-el Kabir prayers at Agodi prayer ground, Ibadan, in company of some members of the state executive council as well as the Aare Musulumi of Yorubaland, Alhaji Dauda Makanjuola, and other Islamic faithful.

He called on citizens of the country and by extension, the people of the state to perform their civic responsibilities and play the role expected of them for the progress and prosperity of the country.

Speaking on the essence of the Sallah celebration, the governor admonished the people and those in position of authority to ensure that they fulfilled every promise they made, which he said was in line with the teachings of the holy Quran.

Ajimobi said: "For every position we occupy in life, there is a responsibility. As Prophet Ibrahim sacrificed his son, we should also be ready to sacrifice.”

El-Rufai Preaches Peace and Love Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai, has called on Nigerians to be peaceful and show love to one another.

In a message to mark the Eid-el-Kabir celebration in Kaduna yesterday, the governor described the celebration as a "festival of sacrifice," adding that it "teaches us that as mere mortals, we can strive

to be better."

He urged Nigerians to be buoyed by faith in these difficult times, and work together to make things better.

El Rufai charged Nigerians to "shun the demagogues who seek to divide people on the basis of faith and tongue, “noting that humans cannot be wiser than the Almighty who bestowed the joy of diversity."

The governor therefore called on Nigerians to work towards peaceful relations with all members of the great family of humanity.

“It is my great honour and privilege to salute our people on the occasion of Eid-el-Kabir. We are celebrating the festival of sacrifice, echoing one man’s absolute faith in the Almighty.

“It is an example that has endured through the ages, and we are invited to emulate sacrifice and faith in our daily lives.

“As we celebrate another instance of the unparalleled omnipotence of Almighty Allah, let us embrace the lesson that even we ordinary mortals can strive, with the grace of God, to be better than we are today.”

Orji Tasks Muslims on Sacrifice Former Governor of Abia State and Senator representing Abia Central senatorial district, Theodore Orji, has urged Muslims in Nigeria to reflect on the values of sacrifice as they celebrate this year’s Eid-el-Kabir.

In his Salah message which was signed by his media adviser, Don Norman Obinna, Orji said the importance of Salah celebration is to imbibe the lessons of commitment, dedication and obedience to constituted authority as demonstrated

by Prophet Ibrahim in his willingness to sacrifice his son in respect to the commandment of God which Eid-el-Kabir memorialises.

The former governor also said Salah would not have come at a better time than this period that Nigeria is at a grave economic and political intersection, adding that if confidence and faith in the unity of the country must be restored, Muslim faithful must use the occasion to pray for the country ceaselessly.

He however challenged Muslims in the country to be worthy ambassadors of their faith by typifying all the virtues that distinguished Prophet Mohammed, saying it is imperative to our collective belief in one Nigeria.

Ekiti Muslims Predict Economic Boom under Buhari, Sue for Patience Islamic leaders in Ekiti State yesterday urged Muslims and indeed all Nigerians to be hopeful and patient with the President Muhammadum Buhari-led administration so that he can help to bail the country out of the present economic recession bedeviling it.

Speaking at the public prayer of the Eid-el-Kabir organised by the state Central mosque held at the Ado Grammar School in Ado-Ekiti, Alhaji Abdulraheem Olowoyo, who is the Awiye Adinni of the state, urged all Muslims to live by the

CAN Preaches Mutual Respect, as Plateau Records Peaceful Celebration As Muslim faithful hold a peaceful Eid-el Kabir celebration in Plateau State, their Christian counterparts have felicitated with them, urging all citizens in the Northern region and Nigeria in general to develop mutual respect for one another.

A statement issued and signed in Jos yesterday by the Chairman of northern chapter of the Christian Association of Nigerian (CAN), Rev Yakubu Pam, admonished Muslims and Christians in the Northern region of the country to exhibit the spirit of love and sacrifice, and be their brothers’ keepers.

He reminded the leaders of the two religions of their one common task of using their positions to preach the message of love, peace and mutual respect for one another to their followers, as well as to build an atmosphere devoid of crises, killings and destruction of property as witnessed in the past.

According to him, Northern region is blessed with human and natural resources, if harnessed by the government and people of the region, they can help develop it and other parts of the country.

Meanwhile, President of Nigerian Youth Congress (NYC), Dr. Yakubu Shendam, has also felicitated with Nigerian Muslims, especially the youths on the occasion of the Eid el Kabir celebration, calling on them to emulate Prophet Mohammed in their conduct.

Also, the Chief Imam of Jos, Sheikh Lawal Adam, in his sermon shortly after the two rakkat prayers at the Jos Central mosque, admonished Nigerians, especially the Muslims, to “live their lives for Allah and have His fear in their hearts as well as practice the true tenets of Islam.”

These came as the state Police command expressed satisfaction over the peaceful conduct of the citizens during the celebration in the state.

Osun Assembly Calls for Patience, Understanding Osun State House of Assembly under the leadership of Speaker Najeem Sallam has urged Nigerians to celebrate this year’s Eid-el-Kabir with fervent hope, sense of gratitude to God and prayers for the government at all levels in order to turn around the economy of the country.

In its Eid-el-Kabir congratulatory message signed by the Chairman, Assembly Committee on Information and Strategy, Olatunbosun Oyintiloye, the assembly said the economic situation currently facing the nation requires all supports needed as the administration strive towards rapidly overcoming its challenges.

The state assembly submitted that great individuals as well as nations have stories of bumpy roads in their journey to greatness, stressing that the resilient and indomitable spirit of Nigerians and sacrifice by all would pave the way for possibilities.

The assembly which commended Nigerians, especially the people of the state for their perseverance and patience in the face of economic crunch, said more patience and sacrifice are required by all.

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016 • T H I S D AY

11

NEWS

Fashola Advocates Movement of Cargo By Rail to Save Roads Says seeds of recession sown by failure of previous administration to pay contractors for two to three years

The Minster of Power, Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola (SAN), has inspected the ongoing rehabilitation of access road to Apapa-Tin Can Island Port in Lagos, calling for the movement of cargo across the country by rail in order to save the nation’s roads.

Fielding questions from journalists after the inspection of the project which included the construction of a new bridge running parallel to the existing one from Liverpool Roundabout across Port Novo Creek, Fashola, who expressed dismay at the rate the roads and bridges are collapsing as a result of stress of cargoes on them by the tankers and trailers, warned that unless the trend is reversed, the transportation business would be adversely affected.

The minister said there was need for all the stakeholders including government and all those in the transportation business, especially those in the trailer and tanker business moving cargo across the country, to agree on reverting to the rail transportation as means of moving heavy cargo in order to save the roads.

Recalling that he had in the past suggested to the drivers of articulated vehicles moving heavy cargos to begin to think of alternative means, seeing the damage they cause on the roads, Fashola pointed out that if this was not done in time the roads may collapse and so would their business.

He declared: “So in the same way they import trailers to move their cargo, they can begin to make arrangements to import

wagons. We must all agree that this is the way to go. I am convinced that this is the way to go for the future,” adding that Nigerians have even designed tankers beyond the capacity found in any other parts of the world.

“We must all agree because this is not sustainable,” he said.

Fashola suggested that instead of building and reconstructing the rail-lines, the same containers and tankers could be configured to run on tracks adding, that the present administration was now moving cattle by rail from the North to Lagos and that, according to him, is how it should go to save the roads.

On the rehabilitation project, the minister, who described it as an emergency intervention, added, “This is why Ijora-Apapa bridge failed because it was just over burdened with cargo for a very long time and after sometime it could not hold it anymore”.

Explaining his reason for the inspection, the minister said: “I am here to see things for myself so that those who will give me budgetary support when they ask me for details I can give to them”, adding that the project could not be appropriated in the 2016 budget but would be accommodated in the 2017 budget.

According to him, “The Chairman, Senate committee on Works is someone who is also committed to this project and to finish it. Unfortunately the appropriation did not deal with it this year probably next year in a sense that we give some relief to the people of Apapa and the environs and we hope that as we go on we will be able to revive the old rail tracks even if

Fulani Herdsmen Moving with Guns are ‘Foreign Terrorists,’ Says Sultan The Sultan of Sokoto, Sa’ad Abubakar III, has said the Fulani herdsmen moving with guns, causing violence, fighting with farmers are not Nigerians, but foreign terrorists.

He described the Nigerian herdsmen as peace-loving.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reported that Abubakar said this in his Eid-el-Kabir message to the Muslim Ummah in Nigeria.

According to him, these are foreigners coming into Nigeria to cause a breach of the peace.

“They are therefore terrorists and should be treated as such by the Nigerian security agencies.

“The Nigerian herdsmen are very peace-loving and law abiding,” he said.

The Sultan, who noted with concern that some ‘‘bad eggs” had infiltrated the Fulani herdsmen, challenged the security agencies to be proactive.

Abubakar, however, acknowledged that there were problems between the Fulani herdsmen and the farmers, which should only be resolved through dialogue.

He stressed the need for all

Nigerians to live peacefully with each other, irrespective of any religious or ethnic differences.

Abubakar said Nigeria would continue to lag behind if there is no peace and unity.

“Our diversity should be our strength and God has not made a mistake by creating us with diverse differences,” he said.

On the economic hardship in the country, the Sultan appealed to Nigerians to go back to the farms.

He also urged Nigerians to learn to be more productive, rather than solely waiting for the government to provide all their needs.

The Sultan also commended the three tiers of government for their ongoing efforts to provide succour to Nigerians.

He promised to continue to offer prayers, and provide counsel to the Federal and state governments.

The event was witnessed by second republic President Shehu Shagari, Governor Aminu Tambuwal, his deputy, Ahmed Aliyu, and Africa’s business mogul, Aliko Dangote, among other dignitaries.

all it does is to move our cargo.”

The Ministry of Transportation, he said, was working to revive the rail transportation.

On how the Tin-Can-Apapa bridge and other roads in the area got to its present situation, Fashola, who recalled that Apapa was the nation’s first industrial estate, declared, “You need to understand the history of Apapa itself. This is I believe Nigeria’s first industrial estate; that is what led to the ports in the early twentieth century.”

Fashola said in pursuing the rail project, there is a lot of inter-ministerial collaboration between his ministry and that of transportation, adding that the Minister of Transportation, Hon. Chibuike Amaechi, who, according to him, understands the issues more than any other person, would be in a better position to explain the progress being made in the sector.

Blaming the present economic recession on the profligacy of the

previous administrations, Fashola declared, “So that is what we did yesterday; so when you hear recession, workers were laid off, they were not paid and they couldn’t pay school fees. While we were buying and selling, contractors were staying at home. So what you see now is a result of what we ate yesterday. So we must just change that diet and fund contractors.”

Concerning the Apapa-Tin Can bridge, the minister, who said he had no appropriation this year for the bridge, however, assured that if appropriation would be available next year, the Bridge would be funded adding, “It is a six-month job done in dry weather and this should be behind us”.

Asked if there would be a review of the contract costs given the rising cost of construction materials, Fashola said there was need for the entire stakeholders in the industry to adjust because

of the prevailing difficult times.

He declared, “As for the contractors and any prospect of project review, I think people have to adjust their expectations.

It is a difficult time and we all must join hands to build this economy”.

Earlier, while conducting the Minister round the project, the Acting Federal Controller of Works in Lagos, Mrs. Osareme Osakue, said the contract which scope of work included the construction of an ultra-modern truck terminal with offices and police posts; construction of new carriageway between Liverpool Bridge and Tin-Can Second Gate among other facilities meant to ease the flow of traffic in the Apapa Ports area was first awarded on November 18, 2009 to Messrs Borini Prono (Nigeria) Limited but had not been completed due to lack of budgetary provision to pay for executed works.

Speaking with the journalists

during a second stop over to inspect the emergency repair work carried out on the Apapa-Ijora bridge by Julius Berger Nigeria Plc, the Minister expressed gratitude to commuters and motorists, who, he said, have had to detour from their normal routes and had also shown commendable understanding, adding that it was on that basis that the contractors have been able to intervene and respond at the bridge.

“The second thing to say here is to publicly express gratitude to Messrs Julius Berger because even at this moment they don’t have a contract on this bridge.

They have done this solely on a letter of authorization to go and stabilize the place. I want to thank them publicly. This is the kind of patriotic disposition the economy needs to bring it back because it then enables us to demonstrate our capacities in times of emergencies”, he said.

SALLAH HOMAGE

L-R: Sokoto State Governor, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal; Sultan of Sokoto, Muhammed Sa’ad Abubakar III; and business mogul, A;iko Dangote, during Sallah celebration at the Sultan’s palace in Sokoto... yesterday

Ondo Guber: Owo Community to Send Emissary to Tinubu on Akeredolu’s Candidacy James Sowole in Akure The Olowo of Owo, Oba Folagbade Olateru-Olagbegi, yesterday said the community would send a team to the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Senator Bola Tinubu, with a mission to appeal to him to accept the candidacy of the former President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Mr. Rotimi Akeredolu (SAN) as the candidate of the party.

The plan of the community was disclosed by the monarch during a solidarity rally organised in Owo by the youths of the ancient town under the umbrella of Owo Youth Alliance in support of the former NBA president, who emerged as the APC candidate.

Represented by Prince Bejamin Koya Adako, the Olowo, who had earlier commended the youths for their efforts to ensure that

Akeredolu eventually wins the November 26 gubernatorial election, said the candidate himself had been reaching out to other aspirants to solicit their cooperation.

“Olowo is very happy for the solidarity rally. He appreciates the candidacy of one of our sons, Akeredolu. He is very happy that we are showing this solidarity to him for the great success at the primary election.

“Definitely, after a primary election, the winner is supposed to bring together all the other aspirants which Akeredolu has been doing. I will expect the other aspirants to reciprocate by joining hands with him to run the election to ensure APC do not lose in the general election.

“Yes are moves to send a team to the leaders because a leader is a leader in any circumstance. Whatever that the National Leader is annoyed for, we should try by all means to appeal to him. A leader

must have a large heart to accommodate different up and down in the party.

“He will not just say he is not interested in Mr. A or Mr. B after the primary, everybody belongs to him and I appeal to him that he should call all other aspirants so that they will come together and let APC win the coming election,” he said.

The appeal of Olowo was preceded by those made by the Coordinator of Owo Youth Alliance, Damilare Aina and a legal practitioner, Mr. Kola Olawoye, who said Akeredolu needs the support of Tinubu to win the governorship election.

“We are appealing on behalf of the Owo community, thank God you are at the palace of Owo and in a moment ago, Olowo addressed you. We are begging our leader, he should see whatever might have happen during the primary as exuberance of a young politician.

“We have confidence in him and we are begging him that

without him, the fatherly roles in winning Alagbaka will be lacking. This is what we want him to know. Owo community we are begging him to let bygone be bygone and whatever he must have in political fora, we cannot but have some other funny.

“Akeredolu has the highest regard and we are begging him to come, the battle has not been won. The general election is steering us at face. We knew and realised how much he spent on us in 2012 and we are grateful,” Olawoye stated.

Tinubu had not been in good terms with Akeredolu sequel to the disagreement that ensued between them during the preparation for the APC Primary Election over the endorsement of Dr. Olusegun Abraham by the National Leader.

Coincidentally, Akeredolu defeated Abraham in the primary election, which had been generating some controversies.

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TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016 • T H I S D AY

NEWS

Don’t Ignore Reports of the National Conference, Mbang Tells Buhari

Insists dialogue better than military in solving Niger Delta, others militancy problems

Okon Bassey in Uyo The Prelate Emeritus of the Methodist Church Nigeria, Dr. Sunday Mbang, has identified lack of continuity in ideas and execution of government projects and programmes by successive administrations as part of the problems facing the country.

In an interview with journalists at his country home in Eket Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom State at the weekend, Mbang also advised President Muhammadu Buhari not to completely ignore the resolutions of the National Conference in solving numerous problems of the nation.

Mbang who clocked 80 years on September 10, 2016, warned the current government against trying to run down its predecessor for the sake of change and advocated the use of dialogue

in settling issues with some of the militant groups across the country.

“Part of the problems in the country is that everybody comes and wants to do his own thing. There is little of continuity. A government comes and run down the former one and if you look at the change from the former, you don’t see so much change.

But they run down the former one.

“This is worst especially when another party comes to power. If there is that continuity in what the past government did we would not have this kind of problems we are experiencing now,” he stressed.

Mbang who opened up after years of being silent on national issues, recalled how one Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) governor told the government that “you have been talking too much

about the past government, do your own and leave the past government alone.

“I hope they will now do their own. I think they have finished one year, they should have finished about talking about former President Goodluck Jonathan.”

On the recession facing the nation, the former President of World Methodist Council Nigeria observed that the country has enough brains to tacking the economy problems of the nation but regretted that those brains are being ignored.

To put the country in progressive length, the octogenarian called on the federal government not to

consider political party affiliation in appointing competent people into specialised fields or sectors of the economic.

“Don’t look at anybody as your enemy, take everybody along without considering party affiliation. Nigeria has enough brains to manage the economy, use those brains. Put all the economists, experts together they will and other find the solution to the Nigeria problems.

“Believe me, I don’t know of any African country that has the kind of brains we have; but we are not using them because most of them don’t want to be politician. Use them and this country will

be okay.

“As a spiritual leader, that is my advice that Nigerians have the brains that can solve the country’s problems. Let them forget about party and invite all the people. Look round for all the best brains who may not be party people but bring them together to solve the Nigeria problems.”

On Niger Delta issue, he said he was really disappointed with the use of military as a way of quelling the grievances in the region.

“The truth is that you cannot use both military and dialogue to resolve the crisis in the Niger Delta. I would have preferred dialogue. When you are talking

about dialogue then you use military, you defeat the purpose of dialogue.

“I must be sincere; the trouble in Niger Delta is not today’s trouble. It is a problem that has gone on for very long time and I am sure people know the solution but they decide to be dancing around what they know,” Mbang said.

He insisted that the grievances of Boko Haram is not the same thing with that of the Niger Delta militants and the Biafra, saying while the Niger Delta militants and Biafra have reasons for their actions, the reasons for Boko Haram are not known to Nigerians.

Plateau Police Place Worship Centres Under Surveillance Seriki Adinoyi in Jos The Plateau State Police Command has placed worship centres under 24hour surveillance ahead of the E-d-el-Kabir celebration.

The newly-posted state Commissioner of Police, Mr. Peter Ogunyanwo, made the disclosure in his maiden press conference in Jos. He said: “The police in Plateau State is not leaving anything to chance in its determination to ensure that this Sallah celebration

is observed in an atmosphere devoid of violence or terrorist attacks.

“As part of the partnership with communities and other stakeholders, the police in Plateau have initiated opinion boxes to be placed within communities as a strategy to get information that will ensure a more secured society.”

He called on the people to go about their lawful businesses as men of the force would be on ground to protect lives and properties.

EXECUTIVE CELEBRATION

L-R: Wife of Lagos State Governor, Mrs. Bolanle Ambode; her husband, Governor Akinwunmi Ambode; Vice President Yemi Osinbajo; National Leader, All Progressives Congess (APC), Senator Bola Tinubu; and his wife, Oluremi, during the Eid-el-Kabir celebration at Tinubu’s Bourdillon residence in Lagos....yesterday

Recession: Don’t Take Nigerians for Granted, FG Orders Navy to Investigate Ladoja Tells Buhari, Govs Influx of Foreign Trawlers into Niger Delta Waters

The federal government has ordered the Nigerian Navy to investigate and stop the increasing influx of foreign trawlers into the nation’s territorial waters for indiscriminate fishing.

The Minister of State for Agriculture and Rural Development, Senator Heineken Lokpobiri, disclosed this while addressing some issues raised during the interactive session held with farmers in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital.

Lokpobiri said the influx of foreign trawlers into Nigerian territorial waters through the coast to fish without the permission of the federal government would no longer be tolerated.

He said the presidency had directed the Chief of Naval Staff to look into the matter with immediate

effect.

Lokpobiri also enjoined the indigenes of Bayelsa and other states of the region to embrace peace while the federal government would continue to provide ways of boosting the economy.

He expressed concern about pipeline vandalism by youths in the region, urging them to go into agriculture.

Lokpobiri also advised the people of the Niger Delta region to invest in farming as loans would be provided for them by Bank of Industry and Agricultural Development Bank in the state.

Commenting on the interactive session, the President of the Ijaw Youth Council, Mr. Udeng Eradiri, said the Niger Delta region and youths had to key into agriculture to create wealth.

Ademola Babalola in Ibadan A former Governor of Oyo State and national leader of Accord Party, (AP), Senator Rashidi Ladoja, has advised President Muhammadu Buhari and state governors across the country not to task the patience of Nigerians in view of the citizens’ endurance of the current economic hardship.

Ladoja, who spoke while fielding questions from journalists in Ibadan after the Eid-el-Kabir prayer, said Nigerians were generally good people who reposed confidence in God and showed understanding with the leadership, despite the hardship they are going through.

“We should continue to pray we don’t fall into the same situation as countries that experienced the Arab Spring. Anybody who saw Syria before and now will know that something has happened.

Egypt before the Arab Spring and Egypt of today are not the same. The same thing goes for Libya and Iraq. And these are

areas where civilisation was already advanced.

“We should continue praying that the type of revolution people talk about does not happen in Nigeria. Generally, Nigerians are very good people who believe in God. In Nigeria, someone who has not eaten for a long time will tell you that God will do it. We should not task their patience,” he said.

On the ‘change-begins-withme’ slogan meant to drive an attitudinal change among the citizenry and launched

by President Buhari recently, Ladoja said the change should begin with the president, his cabinet since he rode to power on the change sloganeering.

He said a man who earns N18,000 as minimum wage would not be receptive to any change campaign as long as he continues to live on the margins of existence and his take home pay cannot take him anywhere.

“The leadership is too far from the people they are leading. Nigerians don’t need more than the basic things to live. How do we explain a

situation where workers have not got salaries for months and governments expect them to be coming to work and if they fail to come, they will be threatened with sack?

“Maybe the workers, particularly those in Yorubaland, are coping because of our Yoruba-ness which makes us our brother’s keeper. If someone has plenty garri, he will share it with others. Perhaps this is why workers still go to work without salary,” he added.

The Osi Olubadan of Ibadanland and industrial farmer-cum-engineer described the diversification programme of government at all levels, particularly on agriculture, as mere lip service, saying nobody has actually sat down to count the cost and put in place a coherent policy to that effect.

“The government is talking about agriculture and diversification of the economy from crude oil. But we have not moved away from the artisanal method of agriculture to industrial and commercial one. In some places, 300 hectares

of land can be cultivated by three or four people.

“Nowadays, where do people even get the money to procure the equipment because they can’t go and borrow money with the level of interest as high as 22 per cent? I don’t know how many farmers have borrowed money at a single digit interest rate being talked about by the government. I have talked to farmers and they said they have not got it.

“How many of our young people, particularly in Ibadan or Oyo State in general are interested in agriculture? Those into real farming, especially in the state are people from Benue State, Togo, Benin Republic.

“Things are going to be tougher than government has told us because the psyche of our people needs to be reoriented. I only hope that we will be able to survive this hardship that we are all going through.

“I am affected too. I have not been buying vegetables from the market. I have been farming it myself,” he said.

T H I S D AY TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

COMMENT

Editor, Editorial Page PETER ISHAKA Email peter.ishaka@thisdaylive.com

THE PERILS OF NEGLECTING AGRICULTURE

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Odunayo Joseph argues the country has a promising future if attempts to diversify the economy are sustained

here is no doubt that our nation’s overdependence on food importation despite the availability of large cultivable land spread across the 36 states and Abuja, has not only punctured the genuiness of our country’s sovereignty as a truly independent state, but the development has further put a big question mark on the claim of Nigeria as the giant of African. In addition, the orchestrated and politicised sponsored moaning over the outright ban, by the Buhari administration, on rice importation is nothing short of sending a wrong signal to the public on the need for them to face the reality that a nation that is unable to feed her citizens is not worthy of existence in the first place.

Unfortunately the situation is not being helped through the feeding of the public with biased and politically motivated comments by highly placed persons in the society during which emphasis had been only on the hardship being experienced in the country arising from the federal government’s ban of some food items, notably rice, rather and the necessary and welcome stance of the Buhari administration in ending the era of free-for-all spending of the nation’s reserves on food items and unworthy products such as toothpicks, fruits and other several items which can justifiably be produced in adequate quantities not only for local consumption but also for export which will culminate in strengthening of our local currency against other foreign currencies such as the dollar, the pound sterling and the Euro, rather than tell the populace the home truth on the bandwagon effects of not giving maximum attention to agriculture. According to the Minister of State for Agriculture and Rural Development, Heineken Lokpobiri, Nigeria’s spends a ludicrous $22b yearly on food imports.

The million naira question we should be asking ourselves as a sovereign nation is: Don’t we have all it takes to stop the unnecessary wastage of foreign reserves on food imports in the face of the present era of economic recession and can’t we sufficiently feed ourselves without dependence on food importation? To be sincere to ourselves, the answer should be an emphatic Yes. Nigeria, as revealed in a programme on agriculture on the Channels TV, is blessed with 98,000 hectares of cultivable fertile lands but out of this figure, the entire cultivated land is around 30,000 hectares leaving a balance of a whopping 68,000 hectares lying fallow. This apart, from findings, the total length of the 10 longest rivers in Nigeria is put

THE ONGOING ATTENTION BEING PAID TO AGRICULTURE AS A MEANS OF DIVERSIFICATION FROM THE NATION’S MONO PRODUCT, OIL AND THE IMPORT- DEPENDENT ECONOMY REMAINS THE PANACEA TO A STABLE AND ROBUST ECONOMY

at 5,759.2 kilometres, broken down is as follows: Niger, 1174.6; Benue, 796; Sokoto, 627.5; Kaduna, 547; Cross River, 539; Gongola, 530.9; Komadugu Yobe, 466.6; Ka 378; Yedseram, 353.9 and Katsina-Ala, 345.7. Mention must be made that outside these 10 rivers, there is hardly any state where a river does not pass through with examples such as Ogun River in Ogun State, Osun River in Osun State, just to mention a few. But the extent to which all rivers in the country have been put to effective use for development of agriculture is an area that calls for examination and frank evaluation by the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and all the agriculture ministries in all the states of the federation.

In an article written by the music maestro, Bongos Ikwue and published in The Punch on January 2, 2013, while x-raying the efficacy of prayers in solving our self-inflicted problems in Nigeria, bemoaned a situation where we always pray to God to give us this day and our daily bread, an act which could be rightly considered as tantamount to insulting God. Explaining this further, he argued that God had already offered everyone daily bread by giving us the intellect to create ideas and work but rather we often believed in too much talking instead of working. To further buttress his argument, he said that “If it rains, you don’t go to the farm but only continue praying to God Who has often expressed Himself clearly by not failing to give us rain and sunshine when necessary”. It would be recalled that the palm kernel seeds that turned Malaysia today as the world’s largest producer and exporter of palm oil were taken away from Nigeria but today Nigeria is one of the countries importing palm oil from Malaysia for survival. What an irony!

Without mincing words, the ongoing attention being paid to agriculture as a means of diversification from the nation’s mono product, oil and import dependent economy, remains the panacea to a stable and robust economy. To this end, there is need to acknowledge a good number of visionary state governors who have taken the development of agriculture with seriousness all in a bid at ensuring adequate provision of food in the country. A good example among them is Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State who was reported to have declared four consecutive Fridays as work-free days for all civil servants in his state to enable them tend to their farms during the 2016 planting season.

Joseph wrote from Mopa, Kogi State

GIANTS IN COMBAT

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Oshiomhole’s allegations against the Rivers State Government are false, writes Simeon Nwakaudu

he fear of defeat is one of the worst forms of phobias that can possess a man. It makes him to act irrationally, forgetting the rules of social and official conduct. That is the position that the outgoing governor of Edo State has found himself.

Mr Adams Oshiomhole is fond of raising false allegations. At the commencement of this administration, he made several allegations that are yet to be substantiated. He falsely accused the former Minister of Finance, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala of many unprintable things, accusations that have not been proven till now. Also recall that Oshiomhole’s false allegations were exposed when he conducted the governorship primary of his rejected political party in Bayelsa State. The party’s candidate in Bayelsa State, Timipre Sylva allegedly described Oshiomhole with unflattering words.

Therefore, there is no reason to take Oshiomhole seriously when he makes allegations out of political phobia. However, it is necessary to set the records straight.

Secondly, the position of the Rivers State Government has been well-articulated by the State Information Commissioner, Dr Austin Tam-George. Dr Tam-George said in a statement in Port Harcourt that claims

by Gov. Adams Oshiomhole of Edo that the two governors donated N2 billion to rig the election in favour of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) were false. Wike

never made such financial donation.

“Governor Wike has no links with militants in the region and anywhere in the country,” he said.

Tam-George said that the governor gave moral support to the PDP candidate in Edo to win the election. He stated that Wike would continue to give moral support to democratic forces, not just in the region, but across the country, to bring better life to Nigerians.

Outgoing Governor of Edo State, Mr Adams Oshiomhole made one of the most outlandish allegations ahead of the forthcoming Edo State Governorship Election when he told the leadership of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) that Nyesom Ezenwo Wike, Governor of Rivers State and his Delta State counterpart, Senator Ifeanyi Okowa were exporting militants to Edo State for the purpose of disrupting the scheduled poll.

Without equivocation, this allegation is false and an attempt by Mr Oshiomhole to divert attention from his unpopularity and rejection by the good people of Edo State.

It is regrettable that the outgoing Edo State Governor would choose to make false and unfounded allegations against his colleagues from the PDP, simply because they were in Edo State to campaign for their party on the day when the president and 12 APC governors also visited Edo State for campaigns.

Oshiomhole is the architect of the rejection of APC in Edo State and there is

no reason why he should pass the buck to other South-South governors campaigning for the PDP. Was Oshiomhole expecting the Rivers State Governor to campaign for the APC? This subtle blackmail of using deliberate falsehood against the person of Governor Wike to divert attention from his political failure will not yield electoral dividends for Oshiomhole. During the 2015 General Elections, the PDP won the presidential election in Edo State as well as majority of the National Assembly seats. It goes without saying that Edo State is PDP. Just like the other states of the South-South.

Furthermore, it is untrue that Governor Wike contributed to N2 billion to the campaigns to ensure the defeat of APC in Edo State.

For the avoidance of doubt, Rivers State is one of the few states where salaries have been paid up to date. As at today, civil servants in the state have received their August 2016 salaries. It is necessary to inform the outgoing governor that the Wike administration inherited fourmonths unpaid salaries and eight months unpaid pension from the immediate past APC administration in the state, which it has settled.

Governor Wike is a testimony of good governance and the judicious application of resources. In about 15 months, his achievements in Rivers State outweigh Oshiomhole’s eight years in Edo State.

There is no basis for comparison. If

Oshiomhole had utilised the Edo State resources judiciously, the people of the state wouldn’t have been angling for PDP and chanting ‘Change the Change’ everywhere.

Mr Oshiomhole’s political misfortune is entirely his own making. There is no reason why he should attempt to rope in others .At this stage of the nation’s political journey, Mr Adams Oshiomhole must be told that his false allegations can no longer attract political benefits for him in the Niger Delta. He has mismanaged the financial and human capital of his state.

The people of the Niger Delta cannot be deceived. They know their leader and that is why they listen to Governor Wike.

Since assuming leadership in Rivers State, Governor Wike has redefined governance in the region, transforming the lives of the people through meaningful application of resources.

That is why in Edo State and other South-South States his voice is respected.

That is why across the country, he is regarded as a true voice of development.

In this dispensation when the party Oshiomhole promoted has failed Nigerians, the people are confident of the patriotism and candour of Governor Wike. They are prepared to stand with him every step of the way.

Nwakaudu is Special Assistant to the Rivers State Governor on Electronic Media

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

EDITORIAL THE UGLY SITUATION IN IDP CAMPS It is high time government took concrete steps to stop the misery in the camps by reforming its intervention strategy

A

fter a recent visit to the camps of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Maiduguri, Borno State, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of internally displaced persons, Professor Beyani Chaloka, had this to say: “Food is scarce and many survive on one basic meal per day, while medical care is insufficient.

Civilians also require urgent protection, psychosocial support and counselling. Camps should offer protection. Yet I am alarmed to learn that many are in fact exploiting and abusing the most vulnerable. Reports indicate that women and girls face demands for sex to access food or to leave the camps. Early pregnancy and marriage are commonplace while many do not report abuse due to stigmatisation, cultural factors and the knowledge that perpetrators can abuse with impunity. Protection measures must be stepped up and camps must quickly come under trained civilian management to prevent abuses.”

No perceptive observer of the grave humanitarian situation in the North- east of Nigeria would be surprised by the report of the UNLESS GOVERNMENT UN special rapporteur BRINGS TO JUSTICE because the shameful THOSE WHO CHOSE TO issues that he spoke ABUSE THEIR OFFICE about have been comAND PROFIT FROM THE mon place in the last 12 MISERY OF THE HAPLESS months or so. Indeed, the federal governIDPS, IMPUNITY WOULD ment is aware of the NOT ONLY PERSIST BUT WOULD ALSO BE SEEN AS deteriorated conditions of the about 2.2 million A REWARDING CULTURE internally displaced persons scattered around the troubled region and Abuja, the federal capital territory. More important is the fact that government is acutely aware that those conditions had been worsened by the unwholesome activities of its officials saddled with the responsibility of ameliorating the sufferings of the people who had been displaced from their normal places of abode by Boko Haram insurgents and terrorists.

Letters to the Editor

Only last week, President Muhammadu Buhari condemned the criminal activities of officials who not only embezzled funds meant for providing succour to the displaced but also stole and sold food and provisions donated by foreign and local aids agencies for the upkeep of IDPs. He asked the security agencies to immediately apprehend the criminal officials and prosecute them. President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki, had made a similar charge months ago after a visit to the camps revealed to him the level of human deprivation the IDPs were subjected. So moved was he that he called for an urgent probe into the abject condition of the IDPs.

W

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UNTANGLING EDO ELECTION STALEMATE

O

e think it is high time government took more concrete steps to stop the misery of the IDPs by swiftly reforming its intervention strategy to ensure that funds, foods and other provisions are utilised strictly for that purpose. Perhaps it may help to streamline the agencies and processes for the management of the camps that had become a den of corruption. A starting point is the audit of all agencies, committees and task forces of government with a view to harmonising their operations and removing the overlaps that create confusion and encourage corrupt practices.

The case has also been variously made for a more professional approach to the handling of the situation. Internal displacement is not specific to Nigeria which means that there are global best practices for dealing with such a phenomenon. We recommend that Nigeria taps into that in the interest of its suffering citizens even as we call for the immediate arrests and prosecution of all officials and their collaborators who divert funds, foods and other provisions for IDPs into private use.

Unless government brings to justice those who chose to abuse their office and profit from the misery of the hapless IDPs, impunity would not only persist but would also be seen as a rewarding culture, which many others might wish to imbibe. That certainly cannot be acceptable to any decent society. Meanwhile, all critical stakeholders in our country must rise up to join the efforts to rehabilitate our compatriots who have been displaced and are in distress as a result of the Boko Haram insurgency.

n September 8, 2016, I started putting my thoughts on paper on a post-election Edo State. My organisation ANEEJ had been involved only at the point where we tried to clear a field and let all the governorship candidates have their say. We made a big success at our interactive session with the governorship aspirants, and so we waited with bated breath to see if the political higgledypiggledy (apologies to Obayagbon) we met on ground would get some order and point us to a direction which the pendulum would swing eventually. My first sentence which was: by the time you are reading this, the election in Edo state would have been held, won and lost – lost its zip just a few hours after I started to write. The gist in the air was that INEC would be postponing the Edo governorship elections. A postponement? Damn it. Wasn’t that what Goodluck Jonathan tried to do before April 2015 and he lost the election after all? Wasn’t that what the military under IBB attempted to do again and again with a so-called politburo in the election in 1993 until we eventually had the June 12 watershed?

The wahala which had enveloped the city of Benin when the rumour spread that the elections were not going to hold any more was something to behold. Friends were no longer friends. Acquaintances were at daggers drawn and markets close abruptly. In the buses, APC and PDP supporters hold one another from slapping a fellow commuter running their mouth. Ahh…election in Nigeria and Africa is do or die, and a short cut to conquer poverty. Some politicians are like vampires and mosquitoes – they would feed on people to survive. They would kill, maim, impugn the character of their opponents and even prefer to die in the process.

But the gist came much later that night of September 8, that indeed the elections had been postponed. First there was numbness, and before I allowed the info sink in, I decided to gaze at my oracle, my wassap talisman – this is my coterie, my classmates from my first university.

In that virtual classroom, we are blessed with our died-hard APC and PDP aficionadas and some of us who usually sit on the fence, sit on the fence to enjoy their political differences and jibes. Our Prof, the PDP juggernaut is always on hand to take on the APC firebrand. We love the banters. But on this one – on the postponement of an election which local and international observers have invested concern and in a state in Nigeria with perceived egalitarianism – party differences gave way to a collective condemnation of the shift in the election goalpost.

In postponing the elections, INEC cited questions and challenges related to advice from security agencies. Prior to the postponement as well, candidates registered to sit Mathematics at the General Certificate of Education (GCE) on the same day of the September 10 governorship elections staged a protest march to government House in Benin to protest the plan to move them out of Edo State for the exams, resulting in their possible disenfranchisement.

For me, the postponement of this crucial election clearly indicated that INEC did not properly monitor and evaluate the political and social calendar of this nation before scheduling that date. Coming on the heels of a recession, this lapse is one which Nigeria cannot afford at this stage of her existence, particularly as organisations like ours, together with other stakeholders had painstakingly spent funds to organise an interactive session with governorship aspirants to prepare the minds of voters for September 10, 2016.

MajiriOghene Etemiku, Benin City

BE CAREFUL, MR. PRESIDENT

I

am a card-carrying member of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Edo State.

I must confess that I campaigned and voted for you. In all honesty, I admire your long-suffering attitude, having attempted three times, through the ballot box, to become president and only getting it the fourth time last year.

Globally, there is a recession of which our great country, Nigeria is not excluded. I strongly believe your sincerity and simplicity will surely help us to recover.

However, you may be unaware that there are some officials of your cabinet, unknowingly to you, who are ganged up to ensure that your first term, will not only be a disaster, but are also hell-bent in tarnishing your reputation on the anti-corruption stance.

Your effort at giving Nigeria electricity will never see the light of the day going by the conversation going on in beer parlours, but the ridiculous amount being requested from prospective contract seekers on the Manitoba Power Contract in Taraba State.

The only reason why the papers have not been brought to the floor of the Federal Executive Council is the unwillingness of the bidders to play ball even where your name is being peddled.

The secretariat managing appointments is also a minus to your integrity. I want to plead with you, sir, to send your independent eyes to these ministries and locations. You will be shocked about those you have placed the burden of governance in their hands. They are working against your interest everywhere.

A word is enough for the wise, sir.

Babatola Michael, Lagos

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

POLITICS

Group Politics Editor Olawale Olaleye Email wale.olaleye@thisdaylive.com 08116759819 SMS ONLY

EXECUTIVE BRIEFING

A Regressing Police Regime There are grounds for many to believe that the reason given by the Department of State Security and the police for the postponement of the Edo State governorship election is both flawed and deficient in logic. This is thinking is further given fillip to by the seeming ineptitude of the new police leadership under the Inspector-General, Ibrahim Kpotun Idris. Davidson Iriekpen writes

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he people of Edo State and Nigerians in general woke up last Wednesday to shocking news that the governorship election they had been preparing for last weekend, September 10, had been postponed.

The Department of State Services (DSS) and Nigerian Police, which mooted the idea were said to have advised the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) against conducting the election following alleged terror threat. The decision to postpone the election, it was learnt, was taken after a closed-door meeting when the Inspector General of Police (IG), Ibrahim Idris, visited his DSS counterpart, Mr. Lawal Musa Daura in his office in Abuja.

A joint statement by the Force Public Relations Officer (PRO), Don Awunah, and spokesman of the DSS, Mr. Garba Abdullahi, alleged that credible intelligence availed the agencies indicated plans by insurgent and extremist elements to attack vulnerable communities and soft targets with high population during the Sallah celebrations between today, September 12 and tomorrow, 13, 2016. They noted that Edo State was among the states being earmarked for the attacks by the extremist elements.

Part of the statement read: “The public would recall that similar threats were issued during the May Labour Day and Democracy Day celebrations as well as the Ed-el-Fitr holidays in July, 2016. However, the security agencies were able to decisively disrupt and thwart the insurgents’ plan.

There is no doubting the fact that security will be some huge luxury under Idris’ leadership of the police. Nigerians must therefore buckle up and brace the challenge. Not only has he shown to be incapable of providing basic security, he does not seem to have the capacity to think through ingenious ideas capable of advancing an effective policing of the nation.

He clearly does not understand what it takes to lead a cracking police force much less, effectively deploy them for result. Unfortunately, Nigerians might have to deal with this human misfortune for a much longer time

President Muhammadu Buhari and Idris on his appointment...Can he do the job

“In the same vein, while election is important, the security agencies cannot allow the peace of the country to be disrupted, and we will continue to remain vigilant and ensure consolidation of the successes gained in the current counterinsurgency fight.

“It is in regard of these that we are appealing to INEC which has the legal duty to regulate elections in the country and consider the need for possible postponement of the date of the election in Edo State in order to enable security agencies deal decisively with the envisaged terrorist threats.” Though THISDAY gathered that the postponement of the poll was instigated by the IG, many Nigerians believe that the reasons given by the two security chiefs were one of the biggest lies they would tell this year especially against the backdrop of the fact that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu, had predicted almost a month ago that the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led federal and state government were making frantic efforts to postpone the election to enable them perfect their hidden agenda for the election.

To them, the actions of the two security chiefs amounted to gross incompetence, which should have led to their dismissal or resignation were Nigeria a serious country, where things are done properly. Otherwise, could they justify a situation where just four days to the postponement of the election, the police IG had told the world that he would meet with the two leading governorship candidates in the state, Godwin Obaseki of the APC and Ize-Iyamu of the PDP, INEC officials, election observers and candidates of the other political parties in the election to adopt strategic measures aimed at ensuring free and fair polls?

In a statement by the Force Public Relations Officer (FPRO), Awunah, Idris said he was committed to ensuring that the election was conducted in accordance to the Electoral Law and in the atmosphere of peace of peace and security. To bring this to fruition, he said the Force had deployed a Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Police, an Assistant Inspector General of Police and three Commissioners of Police, to coordinate the security operations, supervise the deployment of security personnel and facilitate

the electoral process throughout the state.

“In order to ensure safety of life and property before, during and after the election, we are deploying additional 25,000 police personnel, comprising the Police Mobile Force (PMF) the Counter Terrorism Units (CTU), the antibomb squad, the marine police, conventional policemen, the armament units, personnel from force Criminal Intelligence and Investigation Department (FCIID), Force Intelligence Bureau (FIB) and the Sniffer Dog Section.

“In addition, the Police Aerial Surveillance Helicopters and Gun Boats, 10 additional armoured personnel carriers and 5,000 patrol vehicles will be deployed, to cover all the polling units across the state,” he said. Further to this, he said, “All police personnel and other complementing sister security agencies are under strict instructions to be professionally polite and civil but firm in the discharge of their statutory duties. They are to provide adequate security for the electorate, INEC officials, electoral materials, election observers and all stakeholders throughout the period of the election.

“For the avoidance of doubt, political parties and their leaders, traditional rulers, parents are advised to warn and prevail on their members, supporters, subjects, wards to be law-abiding and not allow themselves to be used as canon fodders to cause disturbance of the peace or the electoral process.”

To think that the 25,000 deployed police officers were to complement the thousands of regular police officers, men of the DSS and the Nigerian Civil Defence and Security Corps (NCDSC) on the ground in the state and yet, Idris suggested a postponement of the election on the grounds that he could not guaranty peace, is to say the least, the height of incompetence and lack of capacity. Moreover, long before the day of the botched election, soldiers from the 4 Mechanised Brigade of the Nigerian Army in Benin-City had embarked on several demonstrations to ward off potential trouble makers in the state with a stern warning that they would deal decisively with them should they breach the peace in the state during the poll.

For the same IG to mastermind the post-

ponement of the poll he was believed to have laboured so hard to provide logistics for was simply unbelievable to many. To many observers, therefore, the mere fact that the police and other agencies could not guarantee security in a small and peaceful state like Edo for 24 hours with all the logistics put in place is both sad and sickening, and goes a long way to reveal the trauma that Nigerians face on daily basis with a disoriented security architecture.

The same reservation was expressed by Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State, who in his reaction to the postponement of the election, said “The questions Nigerians must ask the APC-led federal government are: what security threat can overcome over 50,000 security personnel in an election holding in just one out of the 36 states in Nigeria? If election must be postponed in just one state because of security threat, what will then happen in 2019, when elections will be conducted in the entire country?

“Another question is: were they unaware of the security challenge when President Muhammadu Buhari went to Edo State to campaign for the APC yesterday? No doubt, this is a game being played by the APC because it has become so imminent that the party cannot win the election if it is held on Saturday as scheduled. The postponement is obviously meant to give room for the APC to perfect a new rigging strategy and lovers of democracy in Nigeria should begin to see how the APC aims at perpetuating itself in power beyond 2019 even now that the party has been rejected by Nigerians.”

There is, therefore, no debating the fact that the new IG is wont to act on impulse, at the risk of thorough thought process on mild issues let alone one as serious as an election. Isn’t it the same Idris, who had gone public to embarrass his predecessor over alleged theft of cars without properly checking the inventory, only to discover his alarm was false?

The same police under Idris now see the Bring Back Our Girls campaigners as pain the butt of the government when indeed they provided the grounds for the victory of the new government by constantly harassing the Goodluck Jonathan administration.

17

T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

ONTHEWATCH

A New Thinking Births in Kogi Governorship In interpreting the current political scenario in Kogi State, where Governor Yahaya Bello is benefiting from votes cast for the late Alhaji Abubakar Audu, could it be said that the Court of Appeal preserved the sanctity of the office of deputy governor and vice president in its judgment? Shola Oyeyipo writes

F

or a very long time, Kogi State has always been embroiled in various political logjams, most of them subjects of judicial interpretations before they were laid to rest. But the latest squabble – the issue of how Governor Yahya Bello attained the seat has remained a topic which legal interpretation has not done justice to as an aggrieved section of the state is still unable to comprehend how the governor could benefit from an election he was not part of.

The running mate to the late All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate, former governor Abubakar Audu, in the November 21, 2015 governorship election, Hon. James Faleke, who along with the deceased polled the highest votes, had argued that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) acted unconstitutionally by declaring the said election inconclusive and that he, being the running mate, ought to have been declared winner of the election or be the candidate to substitute the late Audu.

But in its wisdom, the Kogi State Governorship Election Tribunal first ruled in favour of Governor Bello and at the Court of Appeal, except Justice Obande Ogbuinya, who dissented in his minority judgment and held that the Kogi election tribunal was wrong in upholding the election of Mr. Bello since he did not partake fully in the entire election process, ordering the electoral umpire to conduct fresh election within 90 days, the four other judges of the appellate court also ruled in favour of the governor.

The Court of Appeal affirmed that INEC was right in declaring the election inconclusive and that the APC could substitute Audu with anybody – that it was not automatic that Faleke replaces his principal in the circumstance.

While Faleke and his supporters had resolved to pursue his case to the Supreme Court, the subtle question in the minds of some people in the state, particularly members of the Kogi State Concerned Group, has been that the decision of the Court of Appeal seems to render the office of the deputy governor, vice president and or running mates useless in Nigeria, a position they believe is against the letters and spirit of the Nigerian Constitution.

Not only does such verdict have the potential of making political parties more tyrannical, it reduces the office of the deputy chief executive to a level of irrelevance in the Nigerian political framework, whereas, the Constitution provides that the vice president or the deputy governor is an assistant to his principal. Both have a joint ticket and if anything befalls the principal, his partner should replace him, hence, the perception that the Court of Appeal contravenes the spirit of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999.

The unfortunate scenario started with Audu’s sudden death at the tail end of the election and the APC decision to substitute Audu with Alhaji Yahaya Bello, who had come second in the party primary that threw the deceased up as candidate. But Falake refused, claiming that he had a joint ticket with his principal and should step into the shoes since the election had already satisfied the provisions of Section 179 (2) of the Constitution. But the party thought otherwise on the grounds that Bello participated in the primary while Faleke did not, and as a result, Bello was allowed to sit on a mandate he did not work for.

It is therefore pertinent to ask if the Nigerian Constitution provides that the candidate for vice president or deputy governor must participate in primary election before they are nominated for the position because Section 187(1) of the Constitution of Federal Republic of Nigeria, provides that the nomination of running mate is the duty of the candidate with the highest votes at the party primary.

One issue that was well established in the Kogi State gubernatorial appeal was that the candidate and his running mate have a joint ticket, which implies that if anything happens

Bello...one more hurdle to cross

to the candidate, his running mate would be allowed to conclude the race in his stead and pick a running mate in consonance with the Constitution.

This principle can be seen in the Constitution in at least three (3) instances. The Instances are :(1) Death of President/Governor before taking oath of Allegiance and Oath of office

Many analysts and Jurists have argued that it would seem the provisions cited above, that is, Sections 181, 191 of the Constitution are inapplicable to the Faleke scenario because the election had not been declared conclusive at the time of the death of the late Audu and as such, Faleke cannot benefit from the demise of his principal. But truth is that even where there is a lacuna in the Constitution, it is elementary law that other provisions having a relationship with the one sought to be determined should be considered

Faleke...counting on the Supreme Court

Sections 136 and 181 CFRN 1999; (2) Removal of President or Governor by Parliament whilst in office provided for in sections 143 and 188 of the Constitution and (3) Resignation or permanent incapacity of governor.

The spirit of the Constitution is that the governor and the deputy are in a holy political matrimony. Until there is a divorce, they both steer the affairs of the state together.

Section 181 of the same Constitution provides for death of governor-elect before taking oath of allegiance and oath of office; the person elected with him as deputy governor shall be sworn-in as governor and he shall in turn nominate a new deputy governor, who shall be appointed by the approval of the simple majority of the House of Assembly. Thus, from the letters and spirit of section 181, once an election is concluded and winner declared and the governor-elect dies before swearing-in, his deputy steps in his shoes as governor.

To some people in the state, these provisions cover the field of what happened in Kogi State on November 21, 2015 because going by all indices, the election was 99 per cent concluded and if there were no political undertones, the late Audu/Falake had polled overwhelming majority of votes and 25 per cent of votes cast in all the local governments in the state, so why plunge the state into crisis?

Even if there must be a supplementary election, Falake should have been the standard bearer or be allowed to continue the election process because supplementary election is not a fresh election requiring a fresh nomination, it is a continuity of the original election, and there is no need to substitute candidates, going by the spirit of 181 and 191 CFRN 1999.

It is on this basis that those opposed to Bello’s emergence consider the process as “preposterous and unfortunate that it obtained judicial assent” because the late Audu was duly nominated in accordance with sections 85 and 87 Electoral Act 2010, and he nominated Faleke as his co-standard bearer. The gubernatorial primary election had become spent and its result useless, so it was out of place for the APC to reactivate the used primary election as the basis for Bello’s emergence.

Section 188 of the Constitution also shows the joint ticket and partnership between the governor and his deputy. It provides for the procedure for removal of the governor or his deputy and it goes ahead to refer either of them in the following sub-sections as “the holder of

the office” and it can be reasonably inferred that the governor can be removed by the State House of Assembly independent of the deputy and where the governor is so removed, he is automatically replaced by his deputy (see section 191 of the same Constitution). The party is not allowed to superimpose any candidate alien to the joint ticket to appoint as governor in the place of the removed Governor.

Section 190 of the Constitution provides for Acting Governor during temporary absence of the governor. It provides that whenever the governor is proceeding on vacation or is unable to discharge the functions of his office, he shall transmit a written declaration to the Speaker to that effect, and until he transmits to the Speaker of the House of Assembly, a written declaration to the contrary, the deputy governor shall perform the functions of the governor as acting governor.

Many analysts and Jurists have argued that it would seem the provisions cited above, that is, Sections 181, 191 of the Constitution are inapplicable to the Faleke scenario because the election had not been declared conclusive at the time of the death of the late Audu and as such, Faleke cannot benefit from the demise of his principal. But truth is that even where there is a lacuna in the Constitution, it is elementary law that other provisions having a relationship with the one sought to be determined should be considered.

Simply put, the complimentary role of the deputy governor in the 1999 Constitution indicates what the spirit of the grundnorm is saying in a scenario as the Audu/Faleke in Kogi State.

As at today, those opposing Bello’s emergence as governor of Kogi State are comparing the situation to a two by 200 meters relay race, where one of the two athletes fell and died at the finishing line and “an intruder” from the crowd jumped into the track at the finishing line, pushing away the running mate, who is still alive and the intruder went home with two medals and later gave one out to his friend, because to them, Bello and his running mate did not sow any seed to inherit the hard labour of 240,867 votes scored by the late Audu/Falake, but now preside over the affairs of Kogi State.

These are some of the implications of the previous judgments that the people are hoping the Supreme Court will consider in reversing the misplacement of the will of the majority of electorate in Kogi State.

18

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016 • T H I S D AY

FEATURES

Acting Features Editor Charles Ajunwa Email charles.ajunwa@thisdaylive.com

A Tough Route to School In Bassan Jiwa, a rustic hamlet on the fringes of Abuja’s Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, children of school age make tough choices to getting education. Chineme Okafor writes

A route for most to school

“

We follow this road to school, through this water and it is not good because we have to swim inside the water,” said 15-year-old Blessing David, a class five female student of the Government Secondary School.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of International Literacy Day and the UNESCO is celebrating it under the banner, ‘Reading the Past, Writing the Future’.

But what exactly does the theme mean? It means in very simple terms, societies looking back to their past actions and mistakes on educating their people to pick lessons that could advise their future actions on educating their people.

In the context of reading the past, has Blessing’s experience always been the case in Bassan Jiwa?

“During my time, that stream was the only route to school, we either swam past or forgot going to school, not now that they have the choice of bike and a dry road,” affirmed Gomina Ayuba: A young Bassan Jiwa community leader, who led THISDAY through Bassan Jiwa’s nooks and crannies, patiently explaining how community folks contend with their livelihood challenges. He said he passed through the same route to school before he graduated in 2003 Situated on the periphery of Abuja’s International Airport, Bassan Jiwa has over 300 households living in it. Even though it is reportedly a legitimate settlement, it has no single infrastructure to indicate that it is within or part of the opulent Abuja. Its only primary school is glorified and offers very little in value to its attendees.

Bassan Jiwa is divided into two - upland and lowland, with residents on the lowland apparently fortunate to be closer to this only ill-equipped primary school, as well as a poorly structured government secondary school located right within the airport compound. It is on these two schools that the community rely to educate its children.

As told to THISDAY by her pupils, getting to school on school days for those of them in

Getting to school on school days for those of them in the secondary school – Government Secondary School Airforce Base, involves two things – a swim through a narrow flowing brook, or a minimum trek time of 35 minutes from their homes through a dry route…

Blessing David and others including male students have to swim because there is no bridge across the water. Going through this route every day to school, they face real risks. These risks include drowning, disease infection, and possible reptile and insect attacks

Minister of FCT, Muhammad Musa Bello...should intervene urgently by providing the children with school bus

the secondary school – Government Secondary School Airforce Base, involves two things – a swim through a narrow flowing brook, or a minimum trek time of 35 minutes from their homes through a dry route. Either choices, they said come with its consequences, and all of which make education not so handy for them.

“We either follow this route or go through the main road with bike. But going through the main road means that you have to pay for bike and if we don’t have money to pay for bike, it is compulsory we have to follow here and it is closer too.

“We walk inside when the water is not much, but when it is much we swim through it. At that time, it can get to above my belly area

and even up further, but when that happens, we have to pull our skirts, fold them into our bags and swim across.

“It is closer and we have to follow this route, but I don’t go through it when I’m in my monthly cycle,” Blessing added.

Blessing David and others including male students have to swim because there is no bridge across the water. Going through this route every day to school, they face real risks. These risks include drowning, disease infection, and possible reptile and insect attacks.

Along the water route is a thick sugarcane plantation and shrubs that extend into the stream, these could harbor dangerous reptiles and insects such as snakes, scorpions and other stinging insects.

The students said they’ve never been attacked by reptiles on their swim across to school but that three young pupils had in the past drowned in the river when they attempted to swim across on a day it had very high flows.

When it rains or shines, pupils whose primary option to school is the stream, have to go in or take other options which include trekking through the longer dry route or forfeit school totally for that day.

For some students, they are either provided bike fare or made to wake up very early to do their morning chores before setting off to school. This option, one of such ‘privileged’ pupils, Basirat, said has also not come with ease.

“When the bike drops me, I have to walk small to get to school. Maybe seven or 10 minutes, I have not calculated it but then I have to be fast or I will still not meet up with the beginning of the first period,” Basirat explained.

She said if she hopped on the bike, it costs her parents N100 each time but that such luxury does not come every day, hence the inevitability of her missing at least an early morning period in school each time

19

• T H I S D AY TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

FEATURES

Same route, high waterflows make it challenging fo students to cross

Complaints about schools in Bassan Jiwa, 26 per cent of respondents complained about lack of teaching materials, 28 per cent of respondents say the schools lack toilets, 26 per cent of respondents complain about water and sanitation and 26 per cent complain about sexual harassment and bullying. These are some of the most striking data that came out of the Gender Needs Assessment (GNA) we conducted

All skirts up

she trekked.

Basirat said her home was quite some distance away from the stream, which makes it quite unreasonable to go through the stream. She added that it would amount to almost the same time walking through the dry main road to school and using the stream path.

She told THISDAY though that she has never used the stream route to school and that she either walked or go on bikes to school. According to Basirat, it take her 25 minutes on the minimum to walk to school from her home, while a ride on bikes to school do not absolutely guarantee her early attendance to classes given that she also has to make the short walk to school from the cutoff point that bikes are allowed to get to at the airport.

It is in knowing that these factors could have negative impacts on the literacy ability

of Bassan Jiwa’s children and against the particular context of working closely with the Centre for Media Information and Narrative Development (MIND), a non-profit organisation that pushes to strengthen the public voices of groups who rarely have a chance to air their views in public - including women and girls, that THISDAY is putting the challenge of access to literacy in Bassan Jiwa on the front burner on this occasion of 2016 International Literacy Day. “Bassan Jiwa is quite peculiar, the mothers complain that their children have health issues which are traceable to the stream.

They complained that they have rashes or pee blood and when they go to hospitals, the doctors relate these to the water, that is something that is unique to Bassan Jiwa in all the communities we have worked,” said Ummi Bukar, a project manager in MIND. Bukar further said that for grown up

school girls who are on their monthly cycle, their chances of missing school for that period was quite high.

“They cannot go through that stream if they are in their periods because the school does not even have water for them to wash with, and so I can imagine two things happening, it is either they miss out on school at that time or use the alternative route. “Some of the mothers admitted that their girls don’t go to school at that period because they are not adequately prepared,” she added. Bukar also shared some of the striking data MIND got from its Gender Needs Assessment (GNA) survey in Bassa, which buttressed claims that it could be difficult for community folks getting education for their children.

“Of the respondents in Bassan Jiwa, 55 per cent dropped out of school, 23 per cent dropped out because they cannot afford the

school fees, 15 per cent are out of school because of the distance to the school, 21 per cent dropped out because of high cost of materials and 15 per cent because of money requests by staff.

“Complaints about schools in Bassan Jiwa, 26 per cent of respondents complained about lack of teaching materials, 28 per cent of respondents say the schools lack toilets, 26 per cent of respondents complain about water and sanitation and 26 per cent complain about sexual harassment and bullying.

These are some of the most striking data that came out of the GNA we conducted,” Bukar explained.

Against the backdrop of these realities of urban poverty in Bassan Jiwa, it becomes pertinent to ask how much of its feature can urban poor communities write as the world celebrates International Literacy Day 2016.

20

IMAGES

L-R: Representative of Managing Director, ARM Pensions, Mr. Tunji Olabode; Head, Third Party, Integrated Personnel Payroll Instruction System, (IPPIS) Hajiya Asamaíau Mustapha; Head, Research Unit, National Pension Commission, Abuja, Dr. Farouk Aminu; and a representative of the Compliance Department, ARM Pensions, Mr. Shola Akiola, during ARM Pensions desk officers’ forum in Abuja...recently KINGSLEY ADEBOYE

L-R: Gen. Alani Akinrinade; guest speaker, Dr.Tunji Olaopa; and Chairman of Development Policy Centre (DPC), Prof. Bimpe Aboyade, at the 2016 Founderís Day of DPC at Oba Akinyele DPC Road, GRA, Ibadan, Oyo State...recently Felix Ademola

T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

Photo Editor Abiodun Ajala Email abiodun.ajala@thisdaylive.com

L-R: Deputy Corps Marshall, Motor Vehicle Administration, Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC), Mr. Charles Theophillus, Corps Marshall, FRSC, Mr. Boboye Oyeyemi; Assistant Corps Marshall, Personnel, Mr. Godwin Ogagaoghene; and the Head, Media Relations, Bisi Kazeem, during a press conference on the Eidel-Kabir celebration, at the FRSC headquarters, Abuja...recently

L-R: Acting Director, PRS NPHCDA, Dr Abdullahi Garba; Executive Secretary, PMG-MAN, Dr Obi Adigwe; Minister of State for Health, Dr Osagie Ehanire; and the Indian Minister for Health and Family Welfare, Shri J.P. Nadda, during the India-Africa Health Sciences meeting in New Delhi, India...recently

L-R: Supervisor, Abia State Environmental Protection Agency (ASEPA), Chief Otah Odim Ukariwo; Abia State Governor, Dr. Okezie Ikpoeazu; and Chief Erondu Erondu, during the evacuation of refuse dumps at Isi-gate in Umuanhia...recently Govt. House Press

L-R: Deputy Governor of Kaduna State, Mr. Bala Bantex; Minister of Mines and Steel Development, Dr. Kayode Fayemi; Director of Comet Resources, Mr. Hugh Morgan; and General Manager Corporate, Symbol Base Metals, Mr. Carmie Olowoyo, during the ‘Mining in Nigeria Investment’ seminar at the Africa Down Under (ADU) Conference in Perth, Western Australia...recently

L-R: Senior Special Adviser to the President on National Assembly Matters and chairman of the occasion, Senator Ita Enang; Founder, Youth Reformation and Awareness Centre (author of the books), Mrs. Margaret Udoh; her husband, Mr. Jackson Udoh; and Director Medical Service, National Hospital (book reviewer), Dr. Oluseyi Oniyangi, at the inauguration of Youth Reformation Centre and public presentation of the books ìParenting Bedrockîand ìBeyond Sojournerî in Abuja...recently ENOCK REUBEN

L-R: Kwara State Governor, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed; Secretary to Kwara State Government, Alhaji Isiaka Gold; Commissioner for Sport, Kale Ayo; and Captain of Maigida Team, Ola Olorunnisomo, during the presentation of trophy to the winners of the first edition of Maigida 9-Aside football competition at Government House, IlorinÖrecently

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

BUSINESSWORLD NIBOR OVERNIGHT 1-MONTH

R A T E S 18.5083 16.6507

A S

3-MONTH 6-MONTH

A T

17.7268 20.3556

Group Business Editor ChikaAmanze-Nwachuku Email: chika.amanzenwachukwu@thisdaylive.com 08033294157, 08057161321

S E P T E M B E R

NITTY 1-MONTH 2-MONTH 3-MONTH

15.4261 15.7513 16.1576

6-MONTH 9-MONTH 12-MONTH

9 , 9.2703 20.6120 22.3006

2 0 1 6

EXCHANGE RATE N314.77/1USDOLLAR AS AT LAST FRIDAY

Quick Takes US Oil Rigs Hit Five-year Record

TOWARDS CREDIBLE CREDIT SYSTEM

L-R: Deputy Chairman, Banking and Currency, National Assembly, Hon. Salisu Zakari Ningi; Chairman, Credit Bureau Association of Nigeria (CBAN), Jameelah Sharrieff-Ayedun; Chairman, Senate Committee on Banking, Insurance and other Financial Institutions, Senator Rafiu Ibrahim; Vice Chairman, Senate Committee Banking, Insurance and Financial Institutions, Senator Umaru Kurfi; at the 3rd National Credit Reporting Conference organised by CBAN in Lagos…recently

FG to Reconcile MDAs’ Huge Debts to 11 Discos Chineme Okafor in Abuja The federal government has said that it will review the huge debts owed the 11 electricity distribution companies (Discos) by its ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) with a view to paying them off once their statuses are ascertained.

The Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola disclosed this when he hosted the new Managing Director of Abuja Electricity Distribution Company (AEDC), Mr. Ernest Mupwaya in his office in Abuja.

Fashola said: “We need to

ENERGY verify some of the debts and stratify who owes what and who is owed what.”

He also urged AEDC to provide the government with helpful information to speed up the reconciliation of its debt.

In June, Fashola said the Debt Management Office (DMO) had initiated a financial plan to pay off the huge debt.

He had said that with the DMO’s plan which was in response to a letter he wrote to it requesting for alternative means of settling the debt, it will be paid off before the year

runs out.

As at May, the Discos through their network - the Association of Nigerian Electricity Distributors (ANED), put the MDAs debt at about N78.7 billion, with the Nigerian Army as the single largest debtor to the Discos, having consumed without paying N38.75 billion worth of electricity overtime.

Also on the inglorious list is the Nigerian Airforce with N3.09 billion, Navy - 3.3 billion, Police - N4.66 billion, Customs - 528.78 million, Prisons - N895.6 million and Immigration - N47.8 million.

A further breakdown of the

debt indicated that federal ministries and parastatals across the country owed the Discos N9.98 billion in unpaid electricity bills.

State governments also owed the Discos N16.21 billion while local government owed N1.16 billion.

The record equally showed that of the 11 Discos, Abuja is owed N18.6 billion, Benin - N5.9 billion, Eko - N8.6 billion, Enugu - N7.2 billion, Ibadan - N6.8 billion and Ikeja - N5.9 billion.

Others such as Jos is owed N6.5 billion, while Kaduna, Kano, Port Harcourt and Yola Discos are owed N8.2 billion, Continued on page 24

Nigeria Loses $3bn to Attack on Forcados Pipeline Ejiofor Alike The federal government and the oil and gas-producing companies operating in the country may have lost about $3billion to the bombing of Forcados pipeline that conveys Forcados grade of crude oil to the 400,000 barrels per day Forcados Export Terminal, THISDAY’s investigation has revealed.

Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) and other upstream companies operating in the western Niger Delta evacuate crude oil and condensates through the 48-inch subsea Forcados pipeline to the export terminal.

Following a spill that occurred on February 14, 2016 on the subsea crude oil export

ENERGY pipeline, Shell had on February 21, 2016 declared force majeure on Forcados liftings effective 1500hrs (Nigerian time), due to the disruption in production.

The company had also intensified efforts on containment and oil recovery, while also finalising repair plans, which the Minister of State for Petroleum, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, had initially said could be completed by May 29.

A new militant group, the Niger Delta Avengers (NDA) had claimed responsibility for the attack. However, a fresh threat by the NDA to attack oil workers and contractors involved in the repairs, had frustrated efforts to meet the

May 29 initial target.

A source close to one of the companies that utilises the pipeline told THISDAY at the weekend that all the companies and the federal government might have lost an estimated $3 billion to the militant attack. “If we talk about crude oil and gas, the companies and the government may have lost $3 billion revenue, based on the average oil price within this period. Collectively, 250,000 barrels per day – 300,000 barrels per day were shut-in and this represents the average daily loss and this has persisted for seven months at average oil price of $45. Assuming the pipeline is repaired this month, the loss may have lasted for seven months. We can’t quantify the loss by households and

businesses as a result of power failure. Industries depend on gas also,” he said.

“Throughout this period, there is no gas for power generation. So, homes are in darkness and businesses depend on diesel generators.

Industries are also short of gas and this increases operating costs. The total cost will be enormous when quantified,” he explained.

“Some of the companies using the pipeline have recorded zero production due to the attack,” he added.

From a peak of $115 per barrel in June 2014, crude oil price, which hovered around $49 per barrel last week, had dropped to $27 per barrel in Continued on page 22

US drillers last week added oil rigs for a tenth week in the past 11, according to a closely followed report on Friday, the longest streak of not cutting rigs since 2011, as the rig count recovered to February levels.

After falling 206 rigs in the first half of the year, the rig count has increased or held steady every week so far this quarter. The rig count plunged from a high in October 2014 after crude prices collapsed in the biggest price rout in a generation.

Drillers added seven oil rigs in the week to Sept. 9, bringing the total rig count up to 414, the most since February, energy services firm Baker Hughes Inc said.

That is well below the 652 oil rigs active during the same week a year ago, but is up from the recent bottom of 316 rigs seen in May. All of the rigs added this week were those units located offshore in Louisiana that returned to service after shutting last week due to Tropical Storm Hermine, analysts said.

Drillers removed seven offshore rigs during the week ended Sept. 2 and added eight back during the week ended Sept. 9.

US crude futures were on course to rise about 4 per cent this week on hopes for a global deal on stabilising crude output after Saudi Arabia, the leading oil producer inside OPEC, and Russia, the biggest producer outside the group, agreed on Monday to cooperate in oversupplied markets.

On Friday, US crude was trading at above $46 a barrel, close to the $50-mark that analysts and drillers say makes drilling more viable. Futures for calendar 2017 were trading over $50.

“We anticipate slow rig growth with all of the usual price caveats,” said James Williams, president of energy consultant WTRG Economics in Arkansas.

“If oil prices continue to rise, the rig count will continue to rise and U.S. production will stop declining and start to increase,” Williams said, noting there is typically a two-month lag between prices increasing and rigs entering service.

More than two-thirds of rigs added over the past two months were located in the Permian basin in west Texas and eastern New Mexico.

EU to Seek Cut in Energy Use

EU regulators are poised to propose a binding target to cut energy use by 30 percent by 2030, a more ambitious goal than previously discussed, according to a draft document seen by Reuters.

The draft law, which the European Commission is expected to publish next month, is part of a set of proposals to implement 2030 goals on cutting emissions, increasing renewable energy use and preventing energy waste.

A preliminary agreement was reached in October 2014 when the 28 member states agreed to increase energy savings by at least 27 percent compared with business as usual.

Since then, political momentum for a deeper cut has grown as using less energy curbs dependency on imports from nations such as Russia, while creating jobs in construction and insulation.

Following Britain’s vote in June to leave the European Union, the EU executive has also been keen to promote the social benefits of its policies.

Climate and Energy Commissioner Miguel Arias Canete has said every 1 percent improvement in energy efficiency could lift 7 million people out of energy poverty because their homes would be better insulated with lower energy bills. A draft seen by Reuters refers to a 2030 30 percent binding headline target on energy efficiency. The document has yet to be agreed formally by the EU Commissioners.

The 30 percent compares with an existing target of 20 percent for 2020, which initially was not binding and the bloc was far from achieving until a law in 2012 forced progress.

“It is NIMASA’s responsibility to oversight stevedoring functions in our ports, terminals and jetties and we will not abdicate that function to anybody” Director General, NIMASA, Dr. Dakuku Peterside

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

BUSINESSWORLD FG TO RECONCILE MDAS’ HUGE DEBTS TO 11 DISCOS

N1.2 billion, N6.88 billion and N2.46 billion respectively.

ANED’s Executive Director, Research and Advocacy, Mr. Sunday Oduntan stated then that the debt was impacting on the Discos’ operations, with their liquidity levels becoming tight.

Meanwhile, Mupwaya disclosed to Fashola that Abuja Disco has been unable to meet the request for a Letter of Credit (LC) to the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading Plc (NBET) and equally participate in the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) market support fund due to the huge debt owed it by the MDAs. Mupwaya who highlighted the liquidity challenges of the Disco, said the Disco was already in negotiation with one of its debtors, the Federal Capital Development Authority (FCDA), which has agreed to pay it N500 million as part of the settlement process.

He also said the Disco would want Fashola to approve that it convert parts of the debt owed to it by the MDAs to a collateral for the LC it is required to post to the NBET. NIGERIA LOSES $3BN TO ATTACK ON FORCADOS PIPELINE

January before it rose to 2016 peak of $52 per barrel in June.

Trans-Forcados Pipeline, which is operated by SPDC, belongs to the Nigerian Petroleum Development Company (NPDC), a subsidiary of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).

Companies hit by the attack include: Shell, Seplat Petroleum Development Company Plc, Shoreline Resources Limited, Neconde, First Hydrocarbon Nigeria (FHN) and NPDC. Some marginal field producers such as Pillar Oil, Midwestern Oil and Gas, Platform Petroleum and Energia also convey their crude oil through the pipeline.

However, some of these marginal field producers have another alternative route through the pipelines operated by the Nigerian Agip Oil Company (NAOC) to carry their crude oil to Brass Export Terminal.

Group Business Editor

Chika Amanze-Nwachuku AgriBusiness/Industry Editor

Crusoe Osagie

Comms/e-Business Editor

Emma Okonji

Capital Market Editor

Goddy Egene

Senior Correspondent

Raheem Akingbolu (Advertising) Correspondents

Chinedu Eze (Aviation) Linda Eroke (Labour) Eromosele Abiodun (Maritime) Ejiofor Alike (Energy) James Emejo (Nation’s Capital) Obinna Chima (Money Mkt) Reporters

Nume Ekeghe (Money Market) Nosa Alekhuogie (Cap Mkt)

NEWS

Bulk Trader, Kingline Sign PPA for 550MW Ondo IPP Chineme Okafor in Abuja The Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading Company Plc (NBET), otherwise known as the Bulk Trader, has signed a power purchase agreement (PPA) that will enable the 550 megawatts (MW) Ondo open cycle independent power project (IPP) to achieve a financial close.

The PPA was jointly signed in Abuja by the Managing Director of NBET, Dr. Marilyn Amobi and Managing Director of Kingline Development Nigeria Limited, Mr. Akinnola Fola.

The agreement will offer the project’s promoters, the opportunity to negotiate their put-call option agreement (PCOA) with the government, take a final investment decision (FID) and begin construction.

Amobi said shortly after signing the PPA, that the development was good for Nigeria’s quest to improve her power generation capacity.

She explained that the NBET would expect Kingline to quickly move to site.

“For NBET, we are working assiduously every day to see that people who have to sign PPAs, the agencies they have to interact with and the foundations they need to continue to develop their project is strengthened.

I hope that this is the baseline you need to move quickly to complete this project,” said Amobi.

Fola, in his remarks, said that an Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) contract with South Korean

firm, POSCO E&C has been signed and that construction work at the site will last for 24 months once a FID is achieved.

He also said the company was talking with Seplat for gas supply to the plant which he said will also share existing gas and transmission infrastructure with the Omotosho power plant in Ondo.

“It is a major step forward for the project, you know the PPA is a major component in this sort of project. What this

indicates is that we can move to the next stage of finalising commercial discussions with our lenders and other investor because without the PPA, nobody will be willing to put down anything,” said Fola.

He further explained: “This signifies that NBET the off-taker is ready to take the power from us when we come on stream.

We have secured the other heads of agreements needed and one of the last pieces of developmental activities on

this is the PPA which we have initialled today.

“We intend to achieve financial close in the next four or five months and from then we can issue the notice to proceed to the contractor. The construction period will take 24 months from the time of the financial close and once that is completed we will have 550 megawatts put in the national grid.”

He said the plant will cost the promoters $550 million to

build and that he expects the PCOA to be signed soon to give comfort to the lender.

“The ministry of finance is handling that (PCOA) in conjunction with the NBET. That also has to be in place and I am confident it will happen soon.

“We have practically done all we have to do and we appeal to the agencies of government to expedite action on the PCOA because it could be a major holdback,” he added.

SEALED AND SIGNED

L-R: Government and Industry Relations, Ericsson sub-Saharan Africa, Shiletsi Makofhane; Managing Director and Head of Ericsson Nigeria, Johan Jemdahl; Company Secretary/General Counsel Galaxy Backbone Limited, David Lanre-Leke and Managing Director/ CEO, Galaxy Backbone Limited, Yusuf Kazaure, at the signing of an MoU between Ericsson and Galaxy Backbone in Abuja...recently

Puma Energy Delivers First Bitumen to Nigeria

Omotowa Hands over Symbolic NLNG Key to Attah

Ejiofor Alike

Ejiofor Alike and Chineme Okafor in Abuja

Puma Energy, a global mid and downstream energy company, has announced the delivery of its first cargo of bitumen to its terminal located in Calabar, Cross River State, under a joint venture with WABECO Petroleum Ltd, registered as P.E. Bitumen Resources (Nigeria) Limited.

According to a weekend statement by Puma Energy, the cargo was delivered by MT Acacia Rubra, which completed discharge early this month.

According to the statement, the delivery comes at a critical time to assist the federal government’s effort in rebuilding its road infrastructure which is a catalyst for the country’s economic development.

Puma Energy’s Global Head of Bitumen, Olof Klintholm, said the feat was a very important milestone for Puma Energy Bitumen.

“Nigeria is a key focus market for us as we keep building our global presence and it shows we can deliver Bitumen on specification and on time anywhere across the world,” Klintholm added.

According to Klintholm, Puma Energy looks forward to working with construction companies in delivering high quality bitumen to their projects around Nigeria.

Puma Energy has the world’s largest system of Bitumen ships and terminals, offering customers globally a wide range of products that meet local specification requirements at a competitive price.

The company has also helped to deliver new and safer roads in many countries around the world by assisting governments, highway agencies and construction companies in sourcing and supplying the bitumen they need for major construction works.

The company recently announced results for the first quarter of 2016 where it recorded 21 per cent increase in sales volumes supporting gross profit growth, while earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, depletion, amortization and exploration expenses (EBITDAX) rose by 19 per cent, with contained operating expenses.

It also recorded solid operating cash flows of $ 487million, reflecting good performance and disciplined working capital management with capital expenditure (Capex) of $326 million, financed by operating cash flows.

Net debt decreased, reducing leverage multiple to 2.9 times, in line with stated capital structure, while in May 2016, refinanced and increased the revolving credit facility to $1.55 billion.

The former Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Nigeria LNG Limited, Mr. Babs Omotowa has handed over the symbolic NLNG Key to his successor, Tony Attah, thus ending the leadership transition at the company.

A statement by the company quoted Omotowa as saying in his farewell remarks that “NLNG is an inspiration and it is changing the narrative about Nigeria; same as Daewoo in South Korea, Mercedes in Germany, Toyota in Japan”, stressing that all hands must be together to protect this jewel.

“It has been an amazing five years that I have been privileged to occupy the position,” he added.

Omotowa lauded President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo for leadership and support to NLNG. “We met with the president last year and he gave us tremendous support. He was really concerned about the growth of the company.

I wished we implemented the growth programme with a Train 7 in play now. The increased in volume by 40 per cent would have counteracted the 60 per cent decline in crude

oil price,” he said.

Receiving the NLNG Key, Attah said the company was committed to the construction of Train 7, saying that with the instability in the industry, the company has no choice but to grow value and competitiveness in the global LNG market.

“Our reality today, is that as a business, we are again faced with significant challenge from within and without.

Fuelled mainly by oversupply and underperforming global economies, international energy prices are once more travelling southwards. While domestically, the insecurity which bedevilled our industry and others several years ago will appear to be unfortunately returning to the headlines,” Attah said.

“Today’s reality means that as a company which wants to continue being successful, we will most definitely have to think and act differently going forward. And I strongly believe-because I have seen it- that at Nigeria LNG we have the talent, the resources and most importantly, the will to continue to be successful and extraordinary. Successful entrepreneurs go above and beyond in everything that they do. They, more than anyone else know, that without the right skills and will to achieve their goals, there won’t be any

‘extra’ in their ‘ordinary’. That is what today holds for us all - the opportunity to do better than we did yesterday and the day before that.

I believe that this is why today is called ‘the present’; it is a gift, and we must accept it with equal quantities of grace, appetite and commitment,” he said.

He commended the NLNG Board of Directors, led by its chairman, Chief Dr LongJohn, for the continuing support, describing the directors as “leaders whose relentless creativity, commitment and zeal have served us tremendously well over the years, and whose qualities we look forward to benefitting from, well into the future.”

On his predecessor, he said “anything other than success in Bab’s assignment five years ago would perhaps have meant that Nigeria would return to the top of the international gas flaring table. It would have meant that at NLNG, we would be wondering about who we are, corporate culture-wise.

It would have meant that NNPC and other shareholders would have to look elsewhere for several billions of dollars in revenues over the years.

It would have left Nigeria without approximately $6 billion in much needed taxes.”

23

T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

BUSINESSWORLD

ENERGY

Deepening the Usage of Gas as a Vehicular Fuel As a N145 per-litre petrol has the same calorific value of energy with a N90 per-standard cubic metre of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG), Ejiofor Alike suggests that the federal government should boost the usage of gas as a vehicular fuel to save foreign exchange used in massive importation of petrol A recent statistics by the World Health Organisation (WHO) revealed rising levels of air pollution in many of the world’s poorest cities, with more than 80 per cent of people living in urban areas exposed to air quality levels that exceed WHO limits.

According to WHO’s latest urban air quality database, 98 per cent of cities in low- and middle income countries with more than 100,000 inhabitants do not meet WHO air quality guidelines.

However, in high-income countries, that percentage decreases to 56 per cent.

The world body also made a startling revelation that as urban air quality declines, the risk of stroke, heart disease, lung cancer, and chronic and acute respiratory diseases, including asthma, increases for the people who live in them.

By reducing air pollution levels, countries can reduce the burden of disease from stroke, heart disease, lung cancer, and both chronic and acute respiratory diseases, including asthma.

Available statistics showed that ambient (outdoor air pollution) in both cities and rural areas was estimated to cause 3.7 million premature deaths worldwide in 2012.

Global efforts to reduce pollution Through air pollution, Carbon Dioxide (CO2) and short-lived climate pollutants such as black carbon particles and methane are emitted into the environment, thus contributing to the near- and long-term mitigation of climate change.

A major international effort towards combating air pollution was the Kyoto Protocol, an international agreement linked to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC).

The Kyoto Protocol, which commits its signatories by setting internationally binding emission reduction targets, was adopted in Kyoto, Japan, on December 11, 1997 and entered into force on 16 February 2005, after years of negotiations.

It was the first agreement between nations to mandate country-by-country reductions in greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions. Kyoto emerged from the UNFCCC, which was signed by nearly all countries at the 1992 mega-meeting popularly known as the Earth Summit.

The framework targets to stabilise greenhousegas concentrations “at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system”.

The targets for the first commitment period (COP 1) of the Kyoto Protocol cover emissions of the six main greenhouse gases - Carbon dioxide (CO2); Methane (CH4); Nitrous oxide (N2O); Hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs); Perfluorocarbons (PFCs); and Sulphur hexafluoride (SF6).

Role of compressed natural gas To curb outdoor air pollution, WHO has recommended “policies and investments supporting cleaner transport, energy-efficient housing, power generation, industry and better municipal waste management would reduce key sources of urban outdoor air pollution”.

The use of compressed natural gas as vehicular fuel is one of the many examples of successful policies in transport, urban planning, power generation and industry introduced in advanced countries to reduce air pollution due to the attendant low emissions and reduced sulfur content, which enhance air quality.

With Nigeria’s abundant gas resources, coupled with relatively high cost of petrol (N145 per litre), CNG is a viable alternative to reduce cost incurred on vehicular fuel and curb GHG emissions.

CNG represents the smart and affordable choice for fleet vehicles, transit buses, school buses, waste disposal trucks, delivery vehicles, and others.

According to statistics by the United Statesbased CNG-ONE, LLC, natural gas offers many advantages over conventional petroleum products.

With the pump price of petrol at N145 per litre in Nigeria, motorists save 40 per cent cost on fuel, apart from reducing emission levels,

Gas Filling Station and extending the life of the vehicle.

In the United States where the average price per gallon of gasoline is as high as $3.60, CNG represents almost a 50 per cent savings over petroleum products such as gasoline and diesel fuel.

A key advantage of CNG is that it is produced locally, thus reducing cost and guaranteeing cheaper price than petrol, which is largely imported. Also, any investment to harness Nigeria’s huge gas resources for use as vehicular fuel will create many job opportunities locally.

CNG is the cleanest burning transportation fuel in the market globally. It burns cleaner than petroleum based products because of its lower carbon content.

It, thus produces the fewest emissions of all other fuels, containing significantly less pollutants than gasoline.

Studies have shown that CNG produces 20-30 per cent fewer greenhouse gas emissions and 95 per cent fewer tailpipe emissions than petroleum products.

Again, because CNG fuel systems are completely sealed, CNG vehicles produce no evaporative emissions.

In terms of cost of maintenance of vehicle, the use of CNG as fuel reduces maintenance costs while extending the overall life of the engine.

CNG does not contain lead, thus extending the life of the spark plug because of absence of fouling.

Research also shows that CNG does not dilute or contaminate crankcase oil, thus also extending the“intervals between oil changes and tune-ups”.

CNG also extends the life of pipes and mufflers as it does not react to the metals.

With its Octane Rating of about 130, CNG also has performance advantages because of its superiority to petroleum-based products and with this advantage, “CNG vehicles experience less knocking, and no vapor locking.”

Again, since natural gas is already in gaseous state, CNG vehicles have superior starting even under severe cold or hot weather conditions.

CNG also has safety advantage as its fuel storage tanks are stronger and safer than gasoline or diesel tanks, thus reducing the likelihood of accidental release.

While CNG gives off little to no emissions during refueling, petrol emits gases during refueling of vehicles.

Unlike petrol, which has high risks of catching fire when it drops on the ground from vehicles, CNG disperses quickly into the air instead of

on the ground, reducing the risk of fire and ground contamination.

NIPCO’s pioneering efforts Nigeria is one of the worst polluters of the environment, both in terms of flaring natural gas and emitting dangerous gases into the environment, with her lack of facilities to harness gas for domestic uses.

The federal government had wasted trillions of Naira between 2010 and 2015 in the ineffective petrol subsidy regime, when there was a more efficient means of fueling vehicles in Nigeria at cheaper cost and less negative impact on health, safety and environment.

It is also ironical that the country wastes scarce foreign exchange in the massive importation of petrol, while gases, which can be compressed into CNG to run vehicles at cheaper cost, are abundant locally.

While a well-established pipeline infrastructure exists in other countries to deliver natural gas to the areas of need, Nigeria lacks infrastructure to deliver her abundant gas resources estimated at over 183 trillion cubic feet for domestic uses.

The federal government had taken deliberate steps to encourage investors to harness the country’s gas resources to boost economic activities but government did not put teeth to drive the implementation of those commitments by boosting investor confidence.

For instance, of the three companies licensed by the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo to pioneer CNG revolution in 2007, only NIPCO Plc showed enough commitment to invest in CNG, while government’s lip service, which created unfavourable environment in the gas business, scared the other companies.

Despite the challenges of lack infrastructure to deliver natural gas for compression into CNG, NIPCO invested billions of Naira to partner the Nigerian Gas Company (NGC), a subsidiary of Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), to establish the Green Gas limited (GGL), as a joint venture company, to promote the use of CNG in the country.

Some CNG stations have been completed, while others are being constructed in over 10 different locations along the Benin- Warri expressway, Benin- Abuja expressway, BeninLagos expressway, and in Warri metropolis, all in a bid to ensure that motorists have access to CNG, which is a safer, cheaper, cleaner, and more efficient auto- fuel and than other conventional liquid fuels.

The impact of GGL on the auto industry in

the Benin, Edo State, where over 3,000 vehicles have converted, is enormous, as 40 per cent cost is being saved on fuel by these motorists.

At the former pump price of N97 per litre of petrol, one standard cubic metre of CNG, which has the same calorific energy value with one litre of petrol, was sold at N55, thus saving huge cost for the motorists.

For instance, under the old price regime, N6, 208 was incurred on petrol in a journey from Lagos-Benin, covering 320 kilometres, while N2,933 was incurred on CNG to power vehicle for the same journey, thus saving N3,275.

However, when the federal government increased the pump price of petrol to N145 per litre in May this year, CNG price was adjusted upwards to N90 to maintain the same equivalent of saving on cost of fuel, thus ensuring that both the company and the motorists enjoy a fair deal.

Addressing the United Nations General Assembly on Climate Change in September 2015, President MuhammaduBuhari had said that as a party to its protocol, Nigeria was strongly committed to the adoption of a legally binding universal agreement to mitigate climate change.

Also on November 26, 2015, President Buhari approved the submission of Nigeria’s Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC) to address climate change to the UNFCCC, ahead of December 2015 UN Climate Change conference in Paris.

INDC is a yardstick for measuring the commitment of countries to the framework convention.

In the country’s INDC, the federal government committed to 20 per cent unconditional and 45 per cent conditional GHG emission reduction post 2020 and NIPCO’s CNG project is line with President Buhari’s aspiration.

To realise this administration’s aspiration, the federal government should encourage use of CNG as vehicular fuel.

CNG is the emerging alternative vehicular fuel worldwide and with Nigeria’s abundant gas resources, the country cannot be an exception.

The government, through the NGC, should make gas available domestically for NIPCO and other prospective investors in the CNG business.

Apart from reducing GHG emission, and saving fuel and maintenance costs for motorists, the use of CNG to power vehicles in Nigeria will reduce the current Dollar-Naira pressure and save the huge foreign exchange used in importation of petrol.

24

T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

BUSINESSWORLD

ENERGY

NCDMB Lauds Kaztec Facility, Urges Patronage of Local Fabrication Yards Chika Amanze-Nwachuku The Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB) has expressed optimism that the local content policy would be extended to other sectors of the economy.

Acting Executive Secretary, Mr. Patrick Obah made the remark during a facility visit of Kaztec Engineering fabrication yard at Snake Island, Apapa, Lagos.

Obah, who was accompanied by a team of oil industry and NCDMB officials, noted that the fabrication yard meets world class standard in oil and gas industry. He expressed concern that a lot of fabrication yards are lying fallow owing to dearth of jobs.

The NCDMB boss said the local content policy should not be limited to the oil and gas industry but should be extended to other sectors to

provide more jobs for the fabrication yards.

Ogor said: “The visit afforded us the opportunity to see what is on ground in those facilities. What we saw is a manifestation of what Nigerian companies can do in-country.

The fabrication is a testimony that Nigerians can really do a lot and meet world class standard in oil and gas industry.

From what we saw, the Kaztec fabrication yard can do things to world class specifications.’’

He added: “A lot of the fabrication yards are lying fallow, they are dying because of lack of jobs. We will ensure that the local content policy is not be limited to the oil and gas industry but should cover other sectors so that there will be more jobs. For instance, in the construction industry that makes use of a lot constructed products, you will now see that yards such as Kaztec yard

and other construction yards will be very busy because they don’t only need to do jobs for the oil and gas industry.’’

Speaking in the same vein, the Technical Adviser to the Chairman of Kaztec, Israel Nweke attributed the lack of jobs to low oil prices and the process in which jobs are awarded.

He said they only way government can help local companies get jobs is through concession.

He said: Concession is the anwer. For instance, if you come to the government now; you are an IOC, you need approval, you want to build four new platforms; the government can say okay, bid two out while the other two will be concession to established yards with this

kind of facilities.

According to him, the government can direct those companies that have established yards to negotiate with the company offering the job, adding, “If the government put them all out for bidding, it is going to be challenging, so the only way government can do that is to give concession.’’

He said because of the falling oil prices, the oil companies are cutting costs to minimise expenses.

“Before you do anything now, you need to check how much you are making visa-vis how much you are going to spend and I think that is one of the things that is making the oil companies not to spend much.’’

He said: ‘’Most of the Nigerian oil facilities are old and are

than 40years, they need to be revamped; when you are doing a revamp project, you need a facility like what you have in Kaztec.

But now the revamp activity is not as much as you would expect because the oil price, which is suppose to match that activity is not roboust enough to suck in that cost.

Nweke added: “For big yards like ours; in Singapore and other parts of the world, where we’ve seen capacity being grown, you identify yards liike this and then if you give them jobs, you don’t put them out there to bid; what they normally do is they sit down with you and negotiate the cost with you.

He said local firms are not getting enough support but only small jobs. “Most of the

jobs that are regular in the oil company are the fabrication of small items, we haven’t gotten the big ones. So if you really dont need the big yard, it just make sense to go to a small yard. With what we have, we should be getting patronage but we are not’’, he lamented.

He explained: ‘’When you talk about yards; yards come in different sizes, what KAZTEC has is a yard that can do almost anything. There are some kind of items you want to fabricate, that you can’t fabricate in a smaller yard, you need to come to a bigger yard to do do. The bigger yard can do both the small and the big, but the smaller yard can only do the small and cannot do the big. What Kaztec has can do everything.’’

BEDC Wins Africa Quality Achievement, 9ja Safety Awards Benin Electricity Distribution Plc. (BEDC) has again bagged two awards - African Quality Achievement Award as the Most Innovative Power Distribution Company in Africa in 2016 and the 9ja Safe Merit award, respectively.

The awards were in recognition of the company’s excellent commitment to quality improvement in electricity supply across the network and for actively promoting health, safety and environment as cornerstone of business performance.

According to a statement by the company, the African Quality Achievement Award (AQAA) is an annual event initiated at celebrating leadership innovation and creativity in quality management in Africa.

The quality award for instance, is aimed at identifying, recognizing and rewarding companies, personalities and products that apply quality culture and quality management best practices to the analysis, planning and implementation and control of policies designed to achieve corporate objectives in both profit and non-profit making organisations in Africa.

It was organised and supported by African Quality Institute (AQI), Chartered institute of Quality Management of Nigeria (CIQM) and African Quality Organization (AQO).

The award advisory Board members include Prof. Pat Utomi of the Lagos Business School (LBS), and Dr John Ndanusa Akanya, former Director General, Standards Organization of Nigeria (SON), among other eminent technocrats in corporate Africa.

The 9jaSafe Award is the most prestigious and respected award for safety professionals / practitioners across Nigeria.

Its objective is to recognize outstanding performances and laudable initiatives of companies and individuals, to foster and promote Health, Safety, and Environment (HSE)

best practices in the workplace and in the nation.

According to the organisers of the African Quality award, the criteria used in selecting nominees include ; compliance, reliability, quality awareness drive, ethical standard and policies, service delivery, resilience, value and operational excellence The two awards which were bestowed on BEDC in Lagos over the weekend respectively, reflected series of efforts put in place by BEDC to boost access to electricity and improved services to customers in its franchise, in addition to pushing safety both at the workplace and on the network including occupational health, safety and environment initiatives.

The company’s initiatives in this regard include procurement of personal protective wears, distribution substations fencing, and safety jingles.

As part of the process to improve quality of power supply, the company has commenced the installation and activation of approximately 2000 transformers across its network.

In addition, some BEDC network lines which were initially mainly on Low Voltage Distribution Systems (LVDS), has been upgraded to the High Voltage Distribution System (HVDS) due to low customer satisfaction arising from the adoption of the latter, with a view to improve the quality of power and significantly reduce technical and commercial losses.

The major advantages of the new initiative include: elimination of power theft, and voltage drop/fluctuations and provision of more reliable supply.

BEDC has also earmarked the distribution of 100,000 meters for customers across the coverage states of Edo, Delta, Ondo and Ekiti states for the remainder of this year, to bridge metering gaps amongst its customers.

SUPPORT FOR CULTURAL HERITAGE

L-R: Vice Chairman, Ojude Oba 2016 Festival Committee, Chief Olu Okuboyejo; Chairman of the Committee, Otunba Wahab Osinusi; Commercial Coordinator, Business Enterprise, Globacom, Mr. Folu Aderibigbe and member of the committee, Chief (Mrs.) Bisi Osibogun, at a press conference held in Ijebu Ode, Ogun State to announce this year’s Ojude Oba Festival...recently

How Niger Delta Militancy Erodes Seven Energy’s Earnings Ejiofor Alike The renewed attacks on oil facilities in the Niger Delta by the Niger Delta Avengers (NDA) have eroded the earnings of Seven Energy International Limited as Fitch Ratings has downgraded the company’s Issuer Default Rating (IDR) to ‘CC’ from ‘B-’ as a result of the impact of militant attacks on the company’s oil and gas facilities.

The rating agency blamed Seven Energy’s poor performance on the attack of the 48-inch Forcados pipeline, which was carried out by the Niger Delta Avengers in February this year.

A‘CC’ rating is an indication that the company is at a great risk to default in its financial obligations to actual and prospective creditors.

Fitch has also downgraded the senior secured rating of wholly-owned subsidiary, Seven Energy Finance Limited’s 10.25 per cent $300 million secured notes due for maturity in 2021 to ‘C’ from ‘CCC’.

According to a statement

by Fitch, the Recovery Rating

on the notes remains at ‘RR6’.

“The IDR downgrade reflects our re-assessment of the significant ongoing liquidity, security and execution risks that Seven Energy continues to face,” said the rating agency.

Fitch noted that while the company is making progress in its negotiations with lenders to defer repayments under the $377 million Accugas IV facility, which when completed should improve its short-term liquidity, the rating agency insisted that liquidity over the medium-term is likely to remain very tight and will remain largely determined by external developments.

“The external developments include a ramp-up in natural gas sales to around 150 million cubic feet per day (MMcfpd) by end-2016, from 95MMcfpd in 1H16 (first half of 2016; the Forcados oil terminal re-opening in 4Q16 (fourth quarter 2016) following its closure since February 2016; and a reduction of the oil under-lift position under the Strategic Alliance Agreement (SAA) with Nigerian Petroleum Development Company

(NPDC) that reached $312 million as at 30 June 2016,” Fitch said.

“If any of these developments fail to materialise by end-2016, we believe that Seven Energy may be forced to start re-negotiations with all its creditors, including the bondholders,” Fitch added.

Describing Nigeria’s onshorebased Seven Energy as a small oil and gas production and gas processing, distribution and marketing company with a complex structure, Fitch said the company’s oil business in the Nigeria’s North West had been hampered by NPDC’s weak financial position and security issues leading to the prolonged shutdown at the Forcados oil terminal.

In the first half of 2016, Fitch stated that Seven Energy’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, depletion, amortization and exploration expenses (EBITDAX), which is an indicator of a company’s financial performance, was $66 million, and its free cash flow (FCF) was a negative $81 million.

According to the rating

agency, Seven Energy’s equity-raising of $100 million in February 2016 allowed the company to continue making interest and principal payments in the first half of 2016 of $50 million and $14 million, respectively. However, absent another equity raise or debt restructuring Seven Energy may run out of cash by end-2016.

Highlighting the key rating drivers, Fitch stated that the deteriorating liquidity led to downgrade Seven Energy’s cash on hand at June 30, 2016 to $33 million, well below the company’s short-term debt of $97 million. In addition, the company reclassified $303 million of long-term debt as short-term at end-June 2016 after it failed to comply with financial covenants.

Fitch further stated that the company is actively working to improve its liquidity, citing the plan to extend the Accugas IV maturity profile and to replace a portion of the Accugas IV facility with longer tenor debt following ongoing discussions with various development finance institutions (DFIs).

A

13.09.2016

WEEKLY PULL-OUT

‘GAS SHOULD BE GIVEN EQUAL PROMINENCE WITH OIL TO ENSURE GROWTH IN THE SECTOR’

Soji Awogbade

2/DASHBOARD

13.09.2016

An Arbitral Tribunal Does Not Have Jurisdiction to Adjudicate Over Tax Disputes PAGE 4

Osinbajo Launches Africa’s First Legal Analytics Software

by Lawpavilion PAGE 5

Titilayo Osagie, Kabir Adeleke Emerge Winners of Lawyers Table Tennis Open (Mfon Usoro Cup) 2016 PAGE 5

‘A Lawyer Must Have an Inclination for Identifying Issues and Solving Problems’ PAGE 6

QUOTABLES 'An efficient justice delivery system is not a thing only an arm of the government can achieve. The performance of the executive and the legislature must enhance its achievement. The Judiciary, Legislature and Executives have their distinct roles to ensure a speedy and efficient justice delivery.'

– Chief Judge of High Court of Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, Justice Ishaq Bello 'We probably will have ups and down in the whole process of the fight against corruption. But at the moment, I will tell you, honestly, I think we are doing very well. We are almost getting back on track. If you see the volume of work taking place, you will also appreciate the fact that things are on the right track.'

– Former Chairman, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu

Lagos State Properties Protection Law: An Overdue Statutory Intervention PAGE 7

A Tribute to William Leon Richey PAGE 10

Reforms, Revolutions and the Ministry of Trade & Investment: Amendment of the Companies and Allied Matters Act PAGE 12

COLUMNISTS SANDRA OKE Pearls of Law A pearl is revered for its purity, elegance and beauty. Similarly, Pearls of the law will address an assortment of legal issues ranging from trending matters to matters that will shape our future as lawyers. It will also consider the time-honoured principles and traditions of the law with a view to restoring the purity, elegance and beauty to the practice of law.

Sandra Oke is a graduate of the University of Lagos and obtained her LLM from Queen Mary University London and an MBA from Liverpool John Moores University. She is a Counsel at Norfolk Partners.

IDOWU OLOFINMOYIN The ‘White wing-tipped Collar’ is synonymous with the Advocate and the Advocate with oratory on what is pertinent, significant and what is poignant to contemporary life.

And that is what The WhiteCollar column is, a variety column that discusses, by various written mediums, the legal issues that affect contemporary Nigeria, and hopes to inform meaningful discourse toward the ideal of our national community.

Idowu is Counsel with Norfolk Partners, and as well as expertise in Law and Litigation, he has interests in Culture, Sports and Entertainment. He obtained a B.A. in Business Law and Marketing (Joint Hons.) from London Metropolitan University before his Post-Graduate Diploma in Law, Professional Training for the Bar and qualifying as a Barrister in England and Wales. He has an L.L.M from BPP University London.

MAY AGBAMUCHE-MBU EDITOR JUDE IGBANOI DEPUTY EDITOR TOBI SONIYI ASSISTANT EDITOR AKINWALE AKINTUDE REPORTER TUNDE BUSARI GROUP HEAD OCHI OGBUAKU II ART DIRECTOR

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PPPs Key to Our Desired Infrastructure Development

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few weeks ago President Muhammadu Buhari was in Nairobi Kenya to attend the Tokyo International Conference on African Development, ‘TICAD 6’ along with a good number of African Presidents, Ministers and the Japanese President Shinzo Abe who was the co-convener.

TICAD was launched in 1993 by the Government of Japan, to promote Africa’s development, peace and security, through the strengthening of relations by way of multilateral cooperation and partnerships. There are five co-organisers of TICAD, the Government of Japan, The African Union Commission (AUC), The World Bank and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). TICAD has always emphasised the importance of ‘ownership’ and ‘partnership’. The government of Japan is assisting Japanese companies to invest more in Africa, it intends to spend $30 billion in the next three years on infrastructural projects such as roads, energy, ports, hospitals and training institutions.

This therefore is a wake-up call for African countries especially Nigeria to get its house in order to attract this much needed funding.

On any cursory look at our country’s needs, infrastructure comes up high on the list. The current Administration has indicated that according to the National Integrated Infrastructure Master Plan (NIIMP) - Nigeria’s national roadmap for building world class infrastructure that will guarantee sustainable economic growth and development in the future - Nigeria will require $3 trillion over the next 30 years to achieve an ideal global benchmark of a core infrastructure that is 70% of Nigeria’s GDP. Where therefore will the revenue for infrastructure come from? Clearly the Government alone cannot sustain such a huge investment. Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) between government at various levels and private sector entities have now become a viable option for generating these much needed funds and are looking more and more attractive as well as becoming an increasingly veritable source of economic activity for Private operators. Anyone who has had to travel in and out of the Murtala Mohammed International airport will attest to the fact that it is indeed a major national disgrace as it stands today. Compare it for example with the Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris which in the last five years has been undergoing nonstop expansion to cater for the ever increasing volume of air traffic with its ever increasing size of jumbo planes. This necessary and equally forward thinking development can also be seen in a good number of other world class airports.

We all acknowledge the infrastructural gaps in the country, the Director-General, Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) Mr. Aminu Diko has been quoted as saying that ‘in the next five years, just on transport alone (excluding aviation) the government will require at least $11 billion and another $5 billion is required in Aviation to bridge the infrastructure gap. This is a large sum of money that government obviously does not have. So we are left to look at other sources and PPP is one of those sources. If you look at our airports in the country they need improvement and this can be done through PPPs. Whether it is operating and managing them or expanding them.’

The term PPP has been described as ‘a long-term contract between a private party and a government entity, for providing a public asset or service, in which the private party bears significant risk and management responsibility, and remuneration is linked to performance’ (World Bank PPP Knowledge Lab). The need for modern infrastructure and government’s limited financial resources for its construction and maintenance underscores the use of PPPs in developing countries.

Essentially with PPP arrangements the Public sector usually determines the services it requires and provides specific benchmarks. Furthermore, the private sector bears the risk of determining the particular assets that will be required for the project and takes charge of managing and operating the assets. The private sector bears the financial burden of the project unless the public sector takes equity with a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV). Finally, the public sector transfers control of the asset to the private sector, it only reverts to the public sector if there is no extension of the concession period.

Various forms of concession models for PPPs exist the most popular model is the Build, Operate, Transfer (BOT). Others include Build, Operate, Own (BOO), Design, Build, Operate (DBO) Joint Ventures (JV), and various forms of public-private cooperation.

There are also Build, Lease, and Transfer (BLT), Build, Own, Operate, Remove (BOOR) and various leasing, contracting out and other concessionary agreements.

To drive economic development it is crucial for the government to review the legal framework for PPPs. The relevant laws applicable to PPPs are the Infrastructure Regulatory Commission Establishment Act 2005, the Federal Highways Act, the Companies Income Tax Act, National Inland Waterways Authority Act, the Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission Act, all of 2004, CBN Regulations and Policies, Public Enterprises (Privatisation and Commercialisation) Act 1999 and the Public Procurement Act 2007.

The Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission Act 2005 is the principal statute dealing with PPPs in Nigeria. The Act states that it is an Act ‘to provide for private sector participation in the development financing, construction, operation or maintenance of federal infrastructure or development projects (by whatever name called) through concessions and contractual arrangements.’

Section 36 defines Concessions as ‘a contractual arrangement whereby the project proponent or contractor undertakes the construction, including financing of any infrastructure or facility and the operation and maintenance thereof and shall include the supply of any equipment and machinery for any infrastructure and the provision of any services.’

Section 2 of the Act states that (1) Every federal government ministry, agency, corporation or body shall prioritise its infrastructure projects and such priority projects may be qualified for concession under this Act. (2) The projects mentioned in subsection (1) of this section shall be submitted to the Federal Executive Council for approval on the recommendation of the relevant sector, ministry or agency prior to entering into any contract under Section 1 of this Act. Section 2 (3) provides that for any private investor ‘entering into any contract or granting any concession under section 1 of this Act, the federal government ministry, agency, corporation or body shall ensure that the project proponent possesses the financial capacity, relevant expertise and experience in undertaking such infrastructure development or maintenance.’

Notably, the Act prohibits the arbitrary suspension and cancellation of concession agreements by government and empowers the commission to act as mediator in disputes arising from PPP projects.

The Act also establishes the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) to exercise oversight functions over the implementation of PPPs in Nigeria. The Act empowers the Commission to retain concession agreements and monitor compliance with the terms and conditions of agreements, ensure effective execution of such agreements and compliance with the Act. The commission is to monitor the implementation of projects according to global best practice.

The Commission is therefore mandated to manage the entire PPP process and build the capacity of MDAs to handle such arrangements in the future.

Yet, in spite of the innovativeness introduced by the ICRC Act, there are a few areas of the law that need to be reassessed and amended to promote the participation of private investors in the PPP process.

Firstly and foremost, the Act fails to provide a detailed set of regulations for the PPP project approval process and the procedure for the grant of a Concession under the Act. Secondly, the powers granted to the commission are limited to keeping the signed concession agreements and monitoring their implementation whereas its powers could be gainfully expanded to include overseeing the evaluation and tendering process for PPP projects. The Act could also be amended to grant the Commission enforcement powers.

Our health sector is yet another area that needs to be highlighted, especially in the fields of cardiology, orthopaedics, renal dialysis (kidney), and oncology(cancer). Government should devise a strategy to address our infrastructural deficits in these areas by following the example of other African countries such as Kenya where last year the First Lady Margaret Kenyatta launched a Public Private Partnership initiative to boost screening, treatment and management of breast cancer during the 9th ‘Stop Cervical, Breast and Prostate Cancer in Africa’ Conference in Nairobi. Mrs Kenyatta explained that the launch was imperative due to the rising number of cases of breast cancer in the country, where it kills about 2000 women in the country annually.

She therefore emphasised the need for investment in infrastructure, research and personnel to help contain the cancer and on this Kenya’s Ministry of Health is currently working with Roche Industries, a British pharmaceutical company. According to Kenyatta ‘we are committed to expanding access

to prevention and treatment services for women with breast cancer. A partnership between government and industry is critical to ensure diagnostic services and medicine, are available to patients at an affordable cost. The partnership involves organising breast cancer awareness programmes, upgrading diagnostic equipment and training more oncologists as part of the initiative.’ Cabinet Secretary for Health, Cleopa Mailu, said the initiative will necessitate a significant reduction in the cost of drugs for treating breast cancer patients. Both the Ministry of Health and Roche Industries have settled on a formula of ensuring all breast cancer patients in the country access quality medicine at minimal cost in public health facilities,’ Mailu remarked.

There is a National Policy on Public Private Partnerships which was introduced by the Yar’ Adua government in 2009 to ensure the ‘emergence of a robust, and competitive environment conducive to private sector investment and, therefore, facilitate the rapid and qualitative expansion of infrastructure services in Nigeria.’ It aims to provide a framework for PPPs to leverage on private investment to close infrastructural gaps in the country and guide the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission in the transfer of obligations to private sector participants.

Government’s key economic objectives for Public Private Partnerships are as follows: “To accelerate investment in new infrastructure and ensure that existing infrastructure is upgraded to a satisfactory standard that meets the needs and aspirations of the public; To ensure that all investment projects provide value for money and that the costs to government are affordable; To improve the availability, quality and efficiency of power, water, transport and other public services in order to increase economic growth, productivity, competitiveness, and access to markets; to increase the capacity and diversity of the private sector by providing opportunities for Nigerian and international investors and contractors in the provision of public infrastructure, encouraging efficiency, innovation, and flexibility; To ensure that infrastructure projects are planned, prioritised, and managed to maximise economic returns and are delivered in a timely, efficient, and cost effective manner; To manage the fiscal risks created under PPP contracts within the Government’s overall financial and budgetary framework; To utilise federal and state assets efficiently for the benefit of all users of public services.”

Furthermore, the National Policy seeks to adopt public private partnerships where it would result in better value and more affordable services. All procurement decisions are to be based on merit and all proposals are to be subjected to economic and financial cost - benefit analysis. According to the Policy directive ‘value for money is a combination of the service outcome to be delivered by the private sector, together with the value of risks transferred to the private contractor and direct costs to government and users.’ The key principles for determining if a specific procurement option is suitable for government are value for money, public interest, risk allocation and output requirements, competition, capacity to deliver and engaging with the market.

The World Bank has identified that the decisionmaking process for investment in infrastructure is particularly complex for policy makers because of the abundance of potential infrastructural projects that compete for the limited amount of capital resources. In regions where there is a dire need for infrastructural development and limited resources for these developments the World Bank believes that the importance of good decision making tools can enhance the investment/development process.

To this end they have designed an Infrastructure Prioritisation Framework (IPF)- an analytical decision making tool to be institutionalised by the policy makers and used to make infrastructural investment decisions.

The IPF has evolved through piloting programs in Vietnam and Panama where the World Bank has conducted extensive analysis to create the tool as it currently exists.

On the home front I read an excellent paper by Mr. Opuiyo Oforiokuma, Managing Director/CEO, ARM-Harith Infrastructure Fund titled Bridging Nigeria’s Transport Infrastructure in which he stated that ‘money is not the only thing required to make Nigerian PPPs an attractive option for the public sector and for the private investors

MAY AGBAMUCHE-MBU

LEGAL EAGLE may.mbu@thisdaylive.com partnering with them. Other key ingredients should include: putting the necessary legal, regulatory and institutional frameworks in place; transparent procurement processes; affordable tariff structures that enable investors to recoup costs and make a reasonable return; proper allocation of contractual risks between the public and private sector parties; government support where required (including guarantees, grants and other incentives); and the political will on the part of government to see the PPPs through to the end.’

He further noted that ‘legal and regulatory frameworks underpinning PPPs are necessary for a number of reasons among which are that private investors will want to see enabling legislation in place that clearly defines and protects their rights as investors. They will also want to know that government respects the sanctity of PPP agreements executed between them, and that such agreements are legally enforceable. Regulation will need to clearly define the ‘rules of the game’. Regulators will be expected to transparently, consistently, fairly, and apolitically apply those rules in a way that ensures long-term economic equilibrium between the interests of end users and private investors.’

With PPPs and most other Government projects one area I believe we must improve on that is fundamental in the process is communication.

The Nigerian public is understandably generally sceptical of government’s intentions and will need to be better informed and educated on projects, so if tolls for example are required they will have a better understanding of why. With Japan looking to invest in Africa I see no reason why we cannot get a good slice of these funds through well defined PPPs. On this note I would like to say a final farewell to our THISDAY LAWYER readers, columnists and all those who sent in articles from all over world.

I could never have accomplished the task before me without your support, which is most deeply appreciated.

I am forever grateful to the Lord for his Grace in the editorial role he thrusted upon me. To the formidable and indefatigable Nduka Obaigbena THISDAY Editor-in-Chief and Chairman, I owe much gratitude to for finding me worthy to be Editor of THISDAY LAWYER. To Mrs. Hairat Ade-Balogun former Attorney General of Lagos State and Life Bencher, I thank whole heartedly for her tireless support and encouragement: a truly phenomenal and graceful woman, mentor and role model who for almost 3 years, without fail, every Tuesday read THISDAY LAWYER and e-mailed a comprehensive review irrespective of where she was, home or abroad.

To my family, especially my husband Patrick Mbu who was my able co-traveller and supported my busy schedule with patience and devotion, I am humbled and truly grateful. To Sandra Oke and Idowu Olofinmoyin, remarkable and brilliant young lawyers and THISDAY LAWYER columnists, we had a fabulous time on this legal beat, I am indeed fortunate and thankful to be working with you both.

To the conscientious and dedicated staff of THISDAY in Lagos, Abuja and Kaduna and in particular my Team who come rain or shine gave their best, I respect and admire each and every one of you.

Thank you again and again. I am honoured to have served the legal profession. Now I have been called upon by President Muhammadu Buhari to serve my country as an INEC National Commissioner, I am most humbled and move on with faith, so help me God. May Agbamuche-Mbu has dropped the mic and left the building!

4/LAW REPORT

13.09.2016

An Arbitral Tribunal Does Not Have Jurisdiction to Adjudicate Over Tax Disputes

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t is an established principle of law that an arbitral tribunal has no jurisdiction to adjudicate over tax disputes and if it arbitrates over such a dispute, its award will be liable to be set aside. The Court of Appeal in applying this principle severed the contractual disputes in the award from the tax disputes and set aside parts of the award that related to tax disputes, on the grounds that said disputes were not within the tribunal’s jurisdiction.

FACTS On 21st May 1993, the respondent and the 1st appellant entered into a Production Sharing Contract ("PSC") to conduct Petroleum operations in the area known as offshore Oil Prospecting License 209 ("OPL 209") or Oil Mining Lease 133 ("OML 133") in ultra-deep waters off the coast of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. The Respondent was the lease holder while the 1st appellant as the contractor was to fully bear the costs of the operations. The 1st appellant, at various times, assigned part of its working interest under the PSC to the 2nd appellant, making the appellants the contractor in the PSC. Under the PSC, the lifting allocation of available crude oil was to be determined by the contractor in accordance with the terms of the PSC and the respondent's lifting nomination was not to exceed the estimated lifting allocation determined by the contractor. The lifting entitlements were shared by reference to four tranches of oil: royalty oil, cost oil, tax oil and profit oil. The contractor was also to prepare Petroleum Profit Tax (PPT) returns on behalf of the parties to the PSC for filing with the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS).

The appellants contended that the respondent unilaterally nominated to lift more cargoes of available crude oil than it was entitled to lift under the lifting allocations prepared by the appellants. It was also contended, inter alia, that the respondent unilaterally altered or submitted to the Federal Inland Revenue Service (“FIRS”), PPT returns that it prepared unilaterally which consequently fixed the PPT due on OML 133 contract area way above that contained in their returns.

Consequently, the appellants commenced arbitral proceedings against the respondent. The arbitral tribunal published an award on the 24th October 2011, in favour of the appellants. The Respondent being dissatisfied with the award filed an application seeking to set aside the award at the Federal High Court, Abuja Judicial Division (“trial court”). The trial court, in delivering its Ruling, held that the arbitrators had misconducted themselves and acted without jurisdiction in making an award in a dispute that was inarbitrable being a tax matter.

The appellants being dissatisfied with the decision of the trial court filed an appeal at the Court of Appeal, Abuja Judicial Division.

The respondent filed a respondent's notice for the affirmation of the decision of the trial court on grounds other than those relied on by the trial court Two issues were formulated in the appellant’s brief of argument as follows: 1. Whether the dispute that was submitted to arbitration was a tax dispute and was therefore not arbitrable? ("Tax Dispute Issue")?

2. Whether the failure of the learned trial Judge to consider and decide relevant issues submitted for his decision by the Appellants was a breach of the Appellants' right to fair hearing ("Fair Hearing Issue") The respondent formulated three issues for the determination of the appeal, with the first two issues being substantially the same as the appellant’s issues and the third formulated thus: 3. Whether the judgment of Honourable Justice Auta C. J. delivered on 8th May, 2012 can be upheld on the grounds contained in the Respondent's Notice dated and filed 8th October, 2014.

These three issues were adopted by the Court in determining the Appeal.

On Issue 1, the Appellant argued that contrary to the finding of the trial court, the lifting entitlement claim was not tax related but was a contractual dispute regarding the allocation of crude oil under the PSC and not just the "Tax Oil" tranche. He classified the dispute submitted to arbitration into three broad categories namely: (i) the lifting entitlement dispute (ii) the preparation of PPT returns claim; and (iii) the stabilisation claim and stated that none of the stated categories challenged the actual taxation of the parties by the FIRS. He further contended that the core of the contractual dispute was that the respondent unilaterally nominated to lift more cargoes of available crude oil than it was entitled to lift under the allocation prepared by the appellants contrary to the PSC. In respect of PPT returns, the Appellant submitted that tax on petroleum operations in a PSC is charged on the contract area itself and is split between the corporation or holder (the respondent) and the contractor (the appellants) in the same ratio as the split of the profit oil and as such the parties to a PSC are required to file a single or joint PPT return. The appellant further submitted that while the appellant has the responsibility of preparing the PPT returns, the respondent unilaterally prepared and filed the returns with the FIRS in contravention of the appellants’ contractual rights.

As regards the stabilisation claim, he submitted that it was made pursuant to clause 19 of the PSC and is therefore contractual. He further submitted that the reliefs sought at the tribunal were contractual

of the arbitrators by making an inconsistent award in holding that dispute was contractual but proceeding to make award in respect of quantum of PPT which may be paid by the appellant; and the stabilisation claim awarded by the tribunal was not contained in appellant’s points of claim.

The appellant/Cross respondent submitted that the award did not contravene public policy as it did not direct the appellant to submit inaccurate PPT Returns. With regards to the stabilisation claim, he submitted that arbitral tribunals are flexible and not posited to strict rules of pleadings in regular courts. He further submitted that the respondent was given a right to fair hearing as both parties were given equal opportunities to present their case.

In the Court of Appeal Abuja Judicial Division Holden at Abuja On Friday the 22nd Day of july, 2016 Before Their Lordships Abubakar Datti Yahaya Joseph E. Ekanem Mohammed Mustapha Justices, Court of Appeal CA/JA/50712012 Between 1. Esso Exploration and Production Nigeria Limited 2. Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company Limited .... Appellant And Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation.......Respondent (Judgment Delivered by Joseph E. Ekanem, JCA)

and do not approximate to a tax dispute as a tax dispute must arise out of an assessment, demand notice, action and/or decision of the FIRS which a tax payer is aggrieved with.

The respondent in response submitted that the dispute submitted to the arbitral tribunal consisting largely of tax and royalty issues governed by the Petroleum Profit Tax Act (“PPTA”), the Deep Offshore Inland Basin Production Sharing Contracts Act and the Federal Inland Revenue (Establishment) Act which are inarbitrable. He thereafter referred to section 35 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act (“ACA”) which he stated recognises that certain disputes are inarbitratble in deference to other legislations which excludes certain matters from being settled by arbitration. The respondent further submitted that there is no provision in the PPTA for the resolution of any dispute, claim, objection etc arising out of the PPTA by arbitration and so matters under the PPTA have been removed from the purview of arbitration. The respondent concluded that the arbitral tribunal acted without jurisdiction in adjudicating over the dispute and so the award was liable to be set aside in accordance with sections 29 and 30 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act. He relied on the Ugandan case of HERITAGE OIL AND GAS LIMITED v UGANDAN REVENUE AUTHORITY civil appeal (no. 14 07 2011) On Issue 2, the appellant submitted that the trial court erred in law in relying solely on the decision of Adamu Bello J in Suit No. FHC/ABJ/CS/764/11 – FIRS v NNPC as there were distinctions between the proceedings leading to the present appeal and Suit No. FHC/ABJ/CS/764/11. He further submitted that the trial court must dispassionately consider all issues raised in a case and make findings on them and that failure to consider the vital issues raised by the appellants was an infringement of his right to fair hearing, Thereafter he submitted that if the trial court had considered all the vital issues it would have severed the arbitral award in order to preserve aspects which the respondent admitted were contractual and therefore within the jurisdiction of the tribunal. Additionally he submitted that the case of 7-UP BOTTLING COMPANY v ABIOLA & SONS (2001) 13 NWLR (Pt. 730) 469 was distinguishable from the present appeal as the appeal in 7 Up Bottling arose from an interlocutory decision while in this appeal the trial court dealt with the substantial issues.

The respondent in response submitted that where the consideration of one appeal will lead to disposal of all other issues, the Court may dispose with the necessity of considering argument on all issues before it. He further submitted that the issue of jurisdiction falls within the aforementioned category and relied on 7 Up Bottling Company (supra). Additionally he submitted that the arguments at the trial court as to whether lifting entitlement claims, alteration of PPT Returns claim and stabilisation claim were tax or contractual disputes were subsumed in the courts decision that the dispute was a tax dispute.

On Issue 3, the respondent/Cross appellant submitted that; the award was contrary to public policy; as it affects the interest of the FIRS who was not a party to the arbitration; there was misconduct

Court’s Judgment and Rationale On Issue 1, the Court stated that there was common ground between the parties that tax disputes are not subject to arbitration and rightly so in accordance with section 35 of the ACA and moreover, the PPTA provides for the procedure for the resolution of any claim, objection, appeal, representation or the like made by any person under the provisions of the Act or of any subsidiary legislation made thereunder. The court further stated that in addition, section 251(1)(b) of the 1999 Constitution as amended gives exclusive jurisdiction to the Federal High Court in civil causes and matters connected with or pertaining to the taxation of companies established or carrying on business in Nigeria and all other persons subject to Federal taxation.

Based on the foregoing, the Court held that an arbitral tribunal has no jurisdiction over such matters and if it arbitrates such disputes, its award will be liable to be set aside.

With respect to whether the dispute submitted to the tribunal was a contractual or tax dispute, the Court stated that contractual dispute is a conflict or controversy relating to a contract especially one which has given rise to a law suit while a tax dispute is a conflict or controversy relating to tax especially one which has given rise to a legal process as set out in the relevant laws of the land. The court further stated that to determine the nature of the dispute before the arbitral tribunal and therefore its arbitrability, recourse must be had to the claim of the appellants before that tribunal by reference to the notice of arbitration and statement of claim or points of claim filed thereat. Based on the following, the court held that the dispute that was submitted to the arbitral tribunal was in essence a tax dispute in the garb of a commercial dispute and that since the PPTA has set out the procedure for settling tax disputes, such a dispute ought not to have been submitted to arbitration. The Court thereafter held that the trial court was right in setting aside the arbitral award particularly to the extent of the tax aspect of it especially the sum of US $1,799,000,000.00.

On Issue 2, the Court held that the trial Court has a duty to dispassionately consider all issues that are submitted to it for consideration.

In disagreeing with the respondent, the Court held that the issues are not subsumed in the only issue decided by the trial court and that the decision of the trial court on jurisdiction did not lead to the disposal of the issues. The Court further held that the trial court ought to have pronounced on the appellant’s contention that the trial court should have severed the contractual dispute from the tax aspect of the dispute. Thereafter the Court held that the claims before the arbitral tribunal as to the PPT preparations and calculation of lifting allocations can be severed from tax disputes because they are strictly based on the PSC and the trial court ought to have severed them in setting aside the award.

The Court dismissed the appeal except in respect of the aspect of the award that were contractual and affirmed the decision of the trial court with the exception that the tax aspect of the final award be restored in respect of PPT Returns preparations and calculations of lifting allocation by the appellant.

On Issue 3, the Court held that the FIRS are empowered to verify by tax audit or investigate or make its own assessment of the Returns filed by the appellant pursuant to the PSC. The Court held that based on the following, no issue of public policy under attack arose.

The Court thereafter held that the sum awarded by the tribunal consisted of PPT paid to the FIRS and therefore attracted interest of a third party (the FIRS) who was not a party to the arbitration and was therefore liable to be set aside.

Thereafter the Court held that arbitral proceedings are not subject to the strict rules of pleadings applicable to regular courts. The Court further stated that arbitral tribunals are governed by the ACA Rules and in accordance with Section 18(2) of the ACA rules, claims must be stated in the Statement of Claim. Based on this, the Court held that the stabilisation claim failed as it was not stated in the appellants SOC and set aside the stabilisation claim for being outside the scope of the tribunal.

The Court set aside the cross appeal except in regard to the stabilisation claim and award.

REPRESENTATION For the Appellant – Adewale Atake Esq, Abimbola Atiteba Esq, Arnold Usiadi Esq, Chidebere Ejiofor Esq, Moses Pila Wse. For the Respondents – Etugue Uwah SAN, Michael Munachisi Esq, Miss Oluwafemi Okute.

Reported by Oladimeji Sofowora, Aluko & Oyebode, Lagos.

13.09.2016

NEWS/5

L-R: Hon. Justice Habeeb Abiru of the Court of Appeal, Kaduna Division, Principal Partner, Libra Law Chambers, Mrs. Hairat Ade-Balogun, Mr. Olalekan Yusuf SAN, Editor-in-Chief, “Judgments of Appeal Cases of Nigeria”, Mr. Adeyinka Kotoye and Co-author, “Practice Digest for Legal Practitioners”, Mr. Babatunde Adebayo at the public presentation of the two legal books in Lagos, recently

L-R: Kabir Adeleke (2016 Male Champion), Anthony Atata (Promoter,Lawyers Games), Titilayo Osagie (2016 Female Champion) and Munirudeen Laide (Partner Paul Usoro and Co.)

Osinbajo Launches Africa’s First Legal Analytics Software by Lawpavilion Jude Igbanoi With a penchant for spearheading innovations in the legal technologies industry in Nigeria and Africa, LawPavilion has unveiled a brand new Legal Analytics software dubbed “LawPavilion Prime” at the recently concluded Annual General Conference of the Nigerian Bar Association in Port Harcourt.

According to the CEO of the electronic law reporting company, Mr. Ope Olugasa, ‘Times are changing, technology is impacting human interaction and businesses in more ways than one, and legal practice is evolving amidst all of these advancements. Ope Olugasa, Managing Director of LawPavilion went on to formally launch the innovative software during his presentation at the Session on “Setting Standards: The Future of the Legal Profession” at the Nigerian Bar Association’s 56th Annual General Conference in Port Harcourt, Rivers State. In his speech, he stated thus: “History has shown that the practice of law has evolved with changing trends and technology over the centuries. When man was in the cave, tribal rules and regulations were written upon tablets of stones, not electronic tablets. In 4,000 B.C. Ancient Egyptians invented the first substance like paper from papyrus, and legal practitioners moved to write the laws on rolls.

When in 1440, the printing press was invented by the German Johannes Gutenberg, based on

existing screw presses, the legal profession moved into books. But the first computer resembling today's modern machines was the Analytical Engine, a device conceived and designed by British mathematician Charles Babbage between 1833 and 1871.Consequently the world moved the law into an e-library.

‘This 2016 and this day, we unveil to you new technology in Africa, that will enable our legal practice catch up with the rest of the world. We are introducing the next era, the future of law practice, which has come upon all of us. Welcome to the Age of Legal Analytics.

‘Before now, when there were questions of law and justice, such answers and legal authorities were tediously sought, leafing through volumes of law books and case indexes.

But poring through a law book doesn’t readily divulge how many authorities are contained in one principle; likewise having an e-Library doesn’t tell you how valid or relevant such authorities are, though it may tell you how many authorities exist. Law books store legal authorities/answers but until you look closely enough and often beneath the surface, a legal practitioner risks not finding the hidden authorities. All of those headaches are by gone in the age of legal analytics. Legal Analytics doesn’t just provide you with search results, it gives you correct answers.”

LawPavilion Prime was

first unveiled at the “Words in Gold” Judicial Awards in Abuja – organised by LawPavilion to honour Nigeria’s Judiciary and their contribution to national development. LawPavilion Prime comes to enhance legal practice in Nigeria and beyond.

Speaking about the software, His Excellency, Professor Yemi Osinbajo SAN, GCON, The Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria said, “Things have changed dramatically, but I think that what LawPavilion has done is to take this a notch higher with Legal Analytics. As it is pointed out, Legal Analytics is not the same with electronic law reporting because what Legal Analytics does is that it helps lawyers to actually derive legal opinion. In the past, of course, if you are researching a point you’ll have to find out for yourself whether there were conflicts in the cases or conflicts in the authorities; that was up to you to find out, or you had to go and look for it in a textbook if there was any. But now, just by using this particular software, it will tell you if there have been conflicts in the cases, how many there have been historically, so you can actually have a historical statement of all of the different twists and turns in a particular legal topic so you can tell what the High Court said, what the Court of Appeal said, what the Supreme Court said at various times on the same point.”

According to Ope Olugasa, with LawPavilion Prime’s legal analytics, a lawyer is provided

with a plethora of search results and is actually given the correct answers every time! The software calculates the law with predictive analysis. It gives you in-depth analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of legal positions and authorities by generating a never-beforeseen statistical analysis, historical data, precedential value ratings, conflicting judgments, locus classicus, statutory or literary authorities and opinions, judicial standpoints of presiding judges, and computer generated intelligent information on such authorities.

Amongst other features, LawPavilion Prime’s Personalised Subject Matter Index for each Appellate Court Judge lays before the legal industry a history of every position taken by a particular judge on any matter or principle of law, analysing its consistency so they can present same before such a judge, eruditely propounding the compelling reasons to remain consistent in their matter judging from their past judicial pronouncements.

The new software contains the Laws of the Federation, annotated with cases. It boasts of a world class e-book reader that allows users to highlight texts, bookmark pages and even write their Practice notes that can be synchronised across multiple devices. The software’s robust cloud backup ensures availability and easy recovery even in the case of device malfunction or theft.

Titilayo Osagie, Kabir Adeleke Emerge Winners of Lawyers Table Tennis Open (Mfon Usoro Cup) 2016 The finals of the Lawyers Table Tennis Open (Mfon Usoro cup) 2016 held on Saturday 3rd September at the National stadium, Surulere, Lagos.

Titilayo Osagie emerged the Winner of the female category for the 7th time beating Yetunde Martins. While Kabir Adeleke emerged the winner of

PENCOM Sanctions Defaulters Tobi Soniyi in Abuja The National Pension Commission (PENCOM) has commenced prosecution of defaulters as a member of staff of a Pension Funds Administrator (PFA) was charged before a Chief Magistrate Court in Abuja.

The Commissioner of Police, FCT Command charged Chukwuemeka Timothy, a member of staff of Investment One Pension Ltd with criminal conspiracy, cheating and forgery before the court.

His alleged accomplice, one Jeff Abdullahi is said to be at large.

According to the prosecuting officer, Blessing Ezeala, a Superintendent of Police, the offences are contrary to sections 97, 322 and 364 of the Penal

Maimuna the Child Bride in Katsina Finally Released from Death Row Jude igbanoi After spending three years on Death Row, Maimuna Abdulmumini has now been released from Katsina Prison after several legal battles at the national and regional courts to enforce her rights and to secure her freedom.

Maimuna’s path to liberty was a protracted and onerous one. She was sentenced to death

by a High Court in Katsina state on 6 December 2012 for allegedly killing her husband at the age of 13.

Avocats Sans Frontières (Lawyers Without Borders) France, had maintained its ground in ensuring that justice is obtained for the helpless child bride who was sentenced to death in contravention of national, regional and international human rights laws.

Indeed international human rights standards state clearly that a minor below the age of 18 cannot be sentenced to death.

It would be recalled that in a bid to enforce Maimuna’s rights and secure her release, Avocats Sans Frontières France had filed and won a case at the ECOWAS Community Court of justice on her behalf. The ECOWAS Court had in its final judgement delivered on June 10th, 2014 in

suit no: ECW/CCJ/APP/15/13 declared that the death sentence passed on Maimuna for an offence she committed as a minor amounted to an infringement of her right to life. The Court awarded N5 million damages to be paid to her by the Nigerian Government as compensation for the said infringement and N1 million as costs. More than two years after the delivery of

the male Category defeating the Defending Champion, Tunji Abdulhameed.

The Lawyers Table Tennis open which was founded in 2009 by Anthony Atata, is in its 8th year. About 52 Lawyers participated in this year's event cutting across different ages and Law firms.

that landmark judgment, the Nigerian Government is yet to comply with the decision of the ECOWAS Court. This case was handled on the platform of the SAVING LIVES (SALI) project of ASF France (a project against the death penalty).

In another welcome development in June 2015, the Court of Appeal, Kaduna division set

CONTINUED ON PAGE 6

Code law.

Timothy was alleged to have in March, 2016 procured a forged ‘Certificate of Compliance’ of the pension deduction and remittance requirement for Utsola Energy Ltd, Abuja after collecting the sum of N300, 000.

According to the First information Report (FIR), the certificate with number 1092665 would expire on January 10, 2018.The said certificate has a life span that exceeded the statutory one year.

The defendant was however absent on the day slated for his arraignment.

Consequently, the counsel to PENCOM, Elendu Ezeala informed the court that the prosecutor had sent a letter seeking an adjournment. He asked the court to issue a bench warrant against the defendant.

Magistrate Usman Shuaibu yesterday ruled that the prosecution should “make the application for a bench warrant any time.”

The case was adjourned to October 13 for hearing.

Meanwhile, Emeka Onuora, head of communication for PENCOM, has stated that the commission in collaboration with the EFCC is compiling the list of employers who have not been remitting deducted pension contributions.

He further stated that over N9.38 billion has been recovered from firms who deducted pension from the salaries of their staff under the Compulsory Pension Scheme but failed to remit same, describing it as criminal.

6/

13.09.2016

A New Tide: Lagos State Enacts Law to Prohibit Land Related Exploitations And Potential Violence Michael Adeniyi Abiiba

T

he challenges that come with buying or selling landed property are now well known in our society.

In fact, scarcely will a landed property transaction or construction thereupon go on without one dispute or the other.

It has become customary to find more than one person buying or purchasing property from one or more conflicting sources.

It is not strange anymore to be evicted from lawfully purchased property where your ejectors are armed and portend imminent violence. One may not live to tell the tale if one is adamant.

Perhaps, your experience is milder, you have paid heavily to secure possession of a lawfully purchased property and still need to pay through your nose upon recurrent demands by the popular land owners (Omo-Oniles) for other aspects of developing your property (i.e money for foundation, “german” flooring, fencing, decking, roofing, etc.). It is more than unbearable, you will hear many say.

The bane of this menace has been the subtle thriving and unconscious institutionalisation of the role of land grabbers and Omo-Oniles

in the scheme of things. If you ask me, I will say they are not to blame. It is commonly said that the society without laws cannot have or punish any offender (ilu ti o sofin, ese o si nibe).

In Lagos State, the tide has changed and many can nurse the hope of relief as a new law emerged to ensure the protection of lawful purchasers and occupants of landed property from land related exploitations within the State. The Lagos State Properties Protection Law (“the Law”) became operative on August 15, 2016.

The fifteen (15) section Law covers a wide range of concerns that have been identified earlier above and decisively stipulates punitive sanctions for offenders.

Section 2 of the Law criminalises the use of self-help by any person or group of persons in taking over any landed property in Lagos State. In fact, the said section covers cases where such forceful take-over had occurred before the commencement of the Law and continues three (3) months after the commencement of the Law. Where an offender is found guilty under this section, such an offender is liable to ten (10) years imprisonment.

Also, under Section 3 of the Law, it is now an offence to, without lawful authority, use or threaten violence for the purpose of securing entry into any landed property either for oneself or on behalf of another.

The offence carries a ten (10) year imprison-

ment sanction upon conviction. The section also prohibits forceful entry with firearms, offensive weapons or any obnoxious or chemical materials. It is equally punishable to accompany such armed person into unlawful entry of a landed property or cause the injury or violation of any person in connection with the unlawful entry.

While Section 4 prohibits encroachment of a landed property and punishes same with a fine of N5,000,000.00 (Five Million Naira) or to five (5) years imprisonment or both fine and imprisonment, Section 5 prohibits the use of land agents and/or any person on a landed property for the purpose of forcefully taking over a property.

An encroacher on a landed property who is in possession of firearms, dangerous weapons thereupon is liable to ten (10) years imprisonment upon conviction under Section 7.

It is criminally punishable under Section 8 to offer for sale any landed property in which the seller has no lawful title or authority to sell. A convicted offender will be punished with a fine of N500,000.00 (Five Hundred Thousand Naira) or six (6) months imprisonment or both.

Also, under Section 8, it is now an offence to sell a property to more than one buyer by the same seller/privies or to sell a land entrusted to you without the authorisation of the owner. A convicted offender is liable to punishment by fine not exceeding 100% of the value of the property or to imprisonment

MAIMUNA THE CHILD BRIDE IN KATSINA FINALLY RELEASED FROM DEATH ROW aside the death sentence passed on Maimuna Abdulmumini and ordered that she should be held at the pleasure of the Governor.

Reacting to her release, Angela Uwandu the Head of Office of Avocats Sans Frontières France said, “Although the road to Justice for Maimuna, a victim of early forced marriage, has been long and excruciating, justice has

been served nonetheless. We are extremely glad that Maimuna has now been reunited with her family”.

Maimuna’s release shows how influential the decisions of a regional court such as the ECOWAS court can be when it comes to enforcing the right standards for fundamental rights. This is an encouragement for ASF France to pursue

for five (5) years or both. It should be noted that the property in this case will revert to the original owner.

Furthermore, Section 8 prohibits the sale of a family land without the concurrence of the family head and principal family members.

Equally, it is unlawful to sell a government land or property without State consent. Also, it is illegal to resell landed property, without a Court judgment nullifying an earlier sale.

A convicted offender under these acts will be liable to twenty (21) years imprisonment.

Section 11 criminalises the act of demanding for fees or levy prior to undertaking a construction activity (i.e money for foundation, german flooring, fencing, decking, roofing, etc.) on a lawfully purchased landed property.

Any such person, agent or land owning family found culpable under this section will be punished by a fine of N1,000,000.00 (One Million Naira) or two (2) years imprisonment or both.

Indeed, this Law is a right step in the right direction and an answer to the cry of many.

What must be hoped for is a conscious and sincere enforcement of the Law in Lagos State (the Task Force Unit and other Law Enforcement Agencies in the State have been saddled with the enforcement duties under Sections 12 & 13) and where other States of the Country take a cue and emulate this laudable idea, our society will sure be a better place for it.

Michael Adeniyi Abiiba is a Lagos based Legal Practitioner.

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strategic litigation and generate a dialogue between domestic and regional courts” said Cécile Ostier and Jean-Sébastien Mariez, co-team leaders of the SALI project.

The death sentence passed on Maimuna as a minor reveals the inherent weakness and absence of respect for judicial safeguards protecting minors in conflict with the law in Nigeria. Maimuna’s

case also readily brings to mind the case of Wasila Umar, another child bride accused of killing her husband in Kano state in 2014. With these developments, it becomes imperative for the government to pay attention to the early forced marriage phenomenon and its attendant consequences and the administration of justice protecting the rights of minors in Nigeria.

Legal Personality of the Week Anthony Nwaochei

‘A Lawyer Must Have an Inclination for Identifying Issues and Solving Problems’ I am Anthony Nwaochei, Managing Partner of The Law Crest LLP, a commercial law firm practicing in Nigeria. I was called to the Nigerian Bar 23 years ago.

Have you had any challenges in your career as a lawyer and if so what were the main challenges?

The main challenge I have faced and continue to face as a commercial lawyer in Nigeria is the uncertainty in regulations and the unhelpful attitude of our regulatory bodies in ensuring the ease of doing business.

What was your worst day as a lawyer?

My worst day as a lawyer was the day I discovered that a junior lawyer had commenced the perfection of a mortgage of federal land (which should have been done with the Federal Ministry of Housing/Federal Lands Registry), at the Lagos State Lands Registry and had in fact procured drafts for the statutory fees from the financial institution and paid them to the Lagos State Government.

Unfortunately, the financial institution also did not detect the anomaly in the request by the junior counsel for bank drafts to be made out to Lagos State. I discovered this subsequently in the course of reviewing the counsel's work. Fortunately although the value of the drafts at the time were quite substantial, we were able to apply the drafts to the perfection of another client's

Anthony Nwaochei

work and re-commenced the perfection of the mortgage at the Federal level and finished it in record time. This was in the very early days of my transition from an in-house counsel to an external counsel but this incidence quickly taught me that out here, you do not take it for granted that a young wig knows what you expect them to know and supervision can never be over-emphasised.

What was your most memorable

experience?

My most memorable experience was the day I was appointed the substantive Company Secretary/Legal Adviser of the Merchant Bank where I worked at the time at a reasonably young age of 25. I had found myself being the only person left in the legal department after the Company Secretary/Legal Adviser had resigned to take up an appointment with another bank and my other superiors in the department had either resigned or been relieved of their employments within a short space of each other under an on-going reorganisation. I was thus forced to run the department solely under very challenging circumstances at the time while the re-organisation was on-going. To my pleasant surprise, the board and the CEO were impressed with my work during the period I was thrust with the responsibility of running the department and decided to appoint me the substantive Company Secretary/ Legal Adviser after the re-organisation.

I was thus involved in recruiting other members of the team.

Who has been most influential in your life?

My parents, Dr and Mrs Ben Nwaochei and my mentor in the legal profession, Ken Mozia SAN. Why did you become a lawyer?

Apart from the fact that English

Language and Government were my favourite subjects as a student, I will say largely because of Ken Mozia, SAN. I was star struck at the time by the way Mr. Mozia comported himself, his analysis of issues, impeccable dress sense and I must add, the fact that he actually appeared financially stable and had earned the respect of people who knew him even as a young lawyer at the time.

What would your advice be to anyone wanting a career in law?

The person should be clear in his or her mind about a genuine passion for law because you will need a lot of self-motivation to put in the long hours required to be successful particularly when the financial reward is just trickling in at the beginning. You must also have an inclination for identifying issues and very importantly, solving problems.

There is a misrepresentation that if you are argumentative, you would make a good lawyer.

If you had not become a lawyer, what would you have chosen?

I would have been a theatre artist.

Where do you see yourself in ten years?

Hopefully, still actively engaged in legal practice and nurturing the next generation of legal practitioners.

13.09.2016

/7

Lagos State Properties Protection Law: An Overdue Statutory Intervention Kemi Pinheiro “Law is the cement of the society and an essential medium of change” Glanville Williams in Learning the Law

O

ver the decades, land owners in Lagos State have been faced with the scourge of thugs purporting to be members of land owning families and claiming several benefits as accruable to them from the land owners. These thugs who are popularly termed or called “omonile”, “ajagungbales” or “land grabbers” go as far as denying land owners access to their land and limiting their use of same. In fact, these thugs are known to, in certain cases, forcefully take over the land and resell them to unsuspecting members of the public who are then confronted with the arduous task of litigating against the original owner or engage in inelegant fisticuffs.

This situation has often caused a breach of peace, damage to property and loss of lives. More pertinent to the legal profession, is the singular fact that the activities of such land grabbers has led to the congestion of the court docket with puerile land matters.

In response to this menace, the Lagos State Government recently passed into law the Lagos State Properties Protection Law, 2016 (“LSPPL”).

The essence of the law as captured by its long title is “to prohibit forceful entry and illegal occupation of landed properties, violent and fraudulent conducts in relation to landed properties in Lagos State and for connected purposes”. The law which comprises 15 sections was assented to by the Governor of Lagos State- Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode on 15th August, 2016.

At the signing ceremony of the law, the Lagos State Governor is noted to have stated as follows: “The Properties Law will eliminate the activities of persons or corporate entities who use force and intimidation to dispossess or prevent any person or entity from acquiring legitimate interest and possession of property…”

The Law by its nature is a Penal Law enacted to out-law and criminalise specific activities of the land-grabbers and their agents; and like any other penal statute, the Law is expected to be expressed with clarity, devoid of doubt or ambiguity as to its application and intent. This is so because the principle applied in construing a penal enactment is that if, in construing the relevant provisions, there appears to be any reasonable doubt or ambiguity, it will be resolved in favour of the person who would be liable to the penalty. See LORD ESHER M.R IN TUCK v PRIESTER (1887) 19. A.D. 629 at 638 and NIGERIAN CASES OF OKEKE v STATE (2016) LPELR-40024 (CA), AHMED v THE STATE (1999) 7 NWLR Pt. 612 Pg. 641.

Salutary as the efforts of the State Government are in promulgating this Law, there appears to be a number of shortcomings and loopholes in the Law requiring urgent amendments in order for the Law to effectively meet its desired purpose. Some of the provisions of the Law, which are intended to be discussed in this Article, as they presently stand, are riddled with one defect or the other, sufficient for one to conclude that the intendment of the Law is not sufficiently expressed by the letters of the Law. The focus of this paper is to review the provisions of the LSPPL vis-à-vis other existing laws and its legal implications in respect of land transactions in Lagos State with a view to ascertain its virility or otherwise and then proffer possible amendments.

Commendation must be afforded the Lagos State Government for this timeous piece of legislative intervention.

Prohibition of Self-help: Section 2 (1) of the LSPPL, provides: “As from the commencement of this law, a person or group of persons shall not use force or self-help to take over any landed property or engage in any act inconsistent with the proprietary rights of the owner in the state.”

A jail term of 10 (ten) years is prescribed in subsection 3 of this section as the punishment for any person found guilty of being in breach of the above provision.

As can be gleaned from the provision of section 2 (1) of the LSPPL there are three disjunctive acts constituting the offence created under the section to wit; (a.) Use of force to take over landed property; (b.) Use of self-help to take over landed property; and (c.) Engaging in acts inconsistent with the proprietary rights of the owner Whilst the prohibition of the first two acts is aimed at protecting a person in possession of a property from a forceful or otherwise resisted takeover of the property from him, the third act may not necessarily be associated with actual possession.

I dare say that this provision of the law is the first attempt by any legislature (whether Federal or State) in the country to make resort to self-help an offence. It accords clearly with common sense and the Supreme Court decision in the case of Mr. Christian Spiess v. Mr. Job Oni (2016) LPELR40502(SC) to the effect that: “...Law is meant to provide peace, security, protection concord and purposeful co-existence amongst citizens. No reasonable society will encourage resort to self-help for whatever reason.”

However, laudable as the provision of section 2(1) of the LSPPL is, there are inherent defects in the provision. A major defect readily identifiable is the failure to define the vital terms used in the provision such as “force”, “self-help”, and “owner” anywhere in the body of the entire law.

This obvious lacuna has a devastating effect on the enforcement of the law. This is because whilst the term “force” as used in the provision may be clear and incapable of having more than one meaning, the term “self-help” and “owner” as used in the section are very complex, ambiguous and at large.

Self-help includes a wide range of actions that may or may not warrant judicial repercussions.

For instance, consider a situation where a party to a pending litigation acts in breach of a court order restraining him from carrying out construction activities on a land by doing same. As well as being an act of self-help, it also constitutes an act of contempt of court for which ample penal provisions have been made in the Sheriffs and Civil Process Act (SCPA). The question therefore is whether such an act which is already punishable under the SCPA as contempt part of the self-help conduct envisaged in section 2(1) of the LSPPL? Does self-help in the LSPPL have any relationship with pending court proceedings? Clearly, there is a need to delimit the scope of what amounts to self help under the LSPPL. “Owner” vs “Encroacher” in sections 2, 4 and 7 of the LSPPL The term “owner” as used in section 2(1) of the LSPPL is also very complex. This is so because there are situations where two persons may have competing claims of ownership over a property.

In that situation, the person in possession may not necessarily be the owner as it is settled in law that possession is not synonymous with ownership.

See the case of JIWUL v DIMLONG (2003) 9 (pt.824) pg.154.

What is more, one glaring intendment of the Law is protection of the proprietary rights of an owner of landed property. This is observable from the provision of Section 4 which seeks to recognise a distinction between “an owner” and “an encroacher” and it proceeds to create offences aimed at protecting the right of the owner against any trespass or invasion from an encroacher.

A similar provision is contained in Section 7 of the Law which provides: “A person who is on any property as an encroacher and having with him on the property any firearms, dangerous/offensive weapon(s) commits an offence and is liable on conviction to ten(10) years imprisonment.”

Inherent in the provision of Section 7 is a subtle distinction between an encroacher and an owner such that while it is not a crime for an owner to have with him on his land offensive weapons, it is a crime punishable with a 10-year jail term for an encroacher to have with him such weapons while on a property upon which he has “encroached”. No doubt, the need to check the dangerous activities of the land-grabbers/who often come upon people’s land, often armed with offensive weapons, must have necessitated the inclusion of this section.

However, as laudable as the intendment of the

Law in this regard is, its implementation will no doubt be mired in serious controversy. Since the Law protects the owner as against the encroacher, the almighty question of “who as between the rival claimants to the property is the owner to render the other party the encroacher?” would have to first and foremost be resolved before any criminal prosecution can be undertaken with respect to those offences; especially given that in most, if not all, of land disputes, contending rival claims of ownership are set up by both sides.

Unfortunately however the question of who is the owner is not one that can be determined by the Special Offences Court created under the Law but by the Lagos High Court by virtue of Section 272 of the Constitution. What naturally results is that in the determination of that question of ownership, one of the contending parties would have to institute a civil suit at the State High Court against the other party in assertion of his right of ownership; and until this is done and a verdict rendered by that court, the owner sought to be protected by the Law remains undeterminable and unknown.

As the relevant provisions of the Law stand, it remains a herculean task to have any person successfully prosecuted. It is an established rule of interpretation of statutes that the court must always see that the person to be penalised comes fairly and squarely within the plain words of the enactment.

It is not enough that what he has done comes substantially within the mischief aimed at by the statute. See I R C v DUKE OF WESTMINSTER {1936} A.C. p.1 and Nigerian case of UMOERA v C.O.P (1977) 7 S.C. 12.

A wholesome amendment of the Law is desirable with a view to shifting attention from protection of ownership of property to protection of possession of property; such that even when a potentially adjudged trespasser is in possession, it will still require a valid court order for the owner to dislodge him from possession. When eventually effected, the amendment will bring about a more orderly situation where it will be an offence for any person to forcefully wrestle possession from the occupant of the land regardless of who as between the aggressor and the occupant is the lawful owner or trespasser.

Duplication of existing laws Also, it is arguable that some aspects of the provision of section 2(1) of the LSPPL may in fact be a duplication of the offence already created in section 52 of the Lagos State Criminal Law (“LSCL”) which provides that: “Any person who, in a manner likely to cause a breach of the peace or reasonable apprehension of a breach of peace, enters on land which is in actual and peaceable possession of another, is guilty of a misdemeanour, and is liable to imprisonment for two(2) years.”

The strength of the argument that some aspects of the provision of section 2(1) of the LSPPL is a duplication of section 52 of the LSCL lies in the fact that the resultant effect of the use of force or self-help is a breach of peace or the reasonable apprehension of same which has been covered in the provision of section 52 of the LSCL. Consequently, the provision of the LSPPL can be considered a duplication of section 52 LSCL. That notwithstanding, this provision is commendable but an amendment of the provision of section 2(1) of the LSPPL is necessary to resolve all its inherent ambiguities.

Prohibition of the Use of Violence Section 3 of the LSPPL prohibits the use of violence to secure entry into a landed property.

This provision is clear and unambiguous being that it is aimed at an attempt to secure entry into a landed property with violence and therefore does not in any way prevent a person from acting under the defence of property to prevent takeover of his land as constitutionally recognised in section 33(2) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended). See OKONKWO v THE STATE (1998) 4 NWLR 143, AHMED v THE STATE (1998) 5 NWLR 493.

Prohibition of the Use of Agents (Ajagungbales), Ethnic Militia and uncertainty in Sections 5 and 6 LSPPL This is another notable provision of the LSPPL. Section 5 of the LSPPL, prohibits the use of land agents (which are otherwise called “ajagungbales”) to forcefully take over landed property. In the

Lagos State Governor, Akinwunmi Ambode

same vein, section 6 of the LSPPL prohibits the use of Law Enforcement Agents, Ethnic Militias and Vigilante Groups to execute judgment over landed properties in the state. Execution of judgments can only be carried out in compliance with the provisions of the Sheriffs and Civil Process Act. Sadly, as laudable as these provisions are, no penalty was prescribed for their breach. The implication of this failure is that no prosecution and/or conviction can arise from these sections of the LSPPL as the constitution which is the principal law by which all laws are measured has expressly provided in section 36(12) that “...a person shall not be convicted of a criminal offence unless that offence is defined and the penalty thereof is prescribed in a written law...”. see the cases of AOKO v FAGBEMI (1961)All NLR 400 and UDOKU v ONUGBA (1963) 2 All NLR 107.

The far reaching effect of this is that the rationale behind the law and the deterrent measure which the law is to serve has been totally defeated as agents can still be used to take over landed property without any fear of facing any prosecution. In fact if anything, agents are further encouraged to violate these provisions. This is a very serious lacuna which must be immediately addressed.

Viewed from the point of view of the mischief intended to be cured by the enactment of the Law, the temptation is high to conclude that Section 5 of the Law which “prohibits the placing on any landed property, of any land agent(s) for the purpose of forceful takeover of the said land” is the desired legislative intervention at curbing the menace of land-grabbing by prohibiting the deployment of land agents and their thugs on the land for the purpose of taking over same forcefully.

Unfortunately, Section 5 appears to be purposeless and meaningless, with due respect. If it is intended to prohibit and punish a situation of land-grabbing or forceful takeover, through the use of land agents such that the hirer of the agents is punished, then Section 2 of the Law has already taken care of the situation and has sufficiently covered the field.

Section 2 already constitutes “forceful take-over of land” by “a person or group of persons” into a crime punishable with a 10-year jail term. We fail to appreciate the rationale behind the promulgation of Section 5 because the hirer of the agents is already in the category of the persons or group of persons targeted by Section 2 of the Law. To the extent that the prohibition contemplated under Section 5 is covered by a more detailed Section 2, then Section 5 becomes unnecessary and ought to be expunged from the Law. Our call for removal of Section 5 is further hinged on our observation that no criminal offence known to and punishable by law has been created by that section. Mere prohibition of an act does not constitute an offence. No act is to be deemed criminal unless it is clearly made so by the words of the statute concerned. What is not criminalised cannot be punished. See PAULSON v THE STATE (2011) LPELR-4875 (CA) and Section 36(12) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999. In a related case of SALES–MATIC v HINCHLIFFE (1959) 1 WLR p. 1005 it was held that a mere declaration that “all lotteries are unlawful” does not create any offence on which a prosecution can be based.

To continue to retain Section 5 of the Law in its present wording may lead to the ugly consequence of providing the hirer of the agents for forceful take-over of land an escape route as he will be

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8/COVER

13.09.2016

‘Gas Should be Given Equal Prominence With Oil to Ensure Growth in the Sector’ In an environment where partnerships hardly survive, the Aelex Legal Partnership has thrived against all odds. It is one of the largest law firms in West Africa with offices in Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt and Accra, Ghana and its Annual Lecture Series has been well received by the legal community. May Agbamuche-Mbu, Jude Igbanoi and Tobi Soniyi interviewed its Managing Partner, Mr. Soji Awogbade. The oil & gas expert gave insights into a wide range of issues, including the nation’s present economic outlook and the urgent need for diversification.

Y

ou commenced your legal career as a Public Prosecutor before building a Civil Litigation practice for yourself.

Have your origins in prosecuting helped you hone your courtroom advocacy and general outlook on the practice

of the law?

Yes. My stint as a Youth Corper in Sokoto State was pretty much a self-starting experience where I broke the ice in what you could call a benign setting. The Judges were kind and sympathetic and I benefited greatly. They even considered retaining me at the Ministry of Justice but Sokoto was far from home (difficult to access and exit in those days) and the weather somewhat different to the South-West where I grew up.

Again, drawing from your experience as a Public Prosecutor what are your views on the recently constituted National Committee on Prosecution by the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice?

It is highly commendable in view of the fact that the current prosecutorial bodies have not displayed sufficient expertise in the prosecution of high-profile corruption cases. So I hope the National Prosecution Coordination Committee will assist in bringing closure to most high-profile corruption cases, aided by the brilliant provisions of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act. Hopefully, the committee will help recover some funds in line with the anti-corruption drive of this present administration.

I understand that during the course of the inauguration of the Committee, the Vice President of Nigeria observed that the Committee was established by the Attorney General of the Federation in pursuance of his powers to institute, take over and discontinue criminal proceedings under Section 174(1) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. It is not unlikely for the defence lawyers to argue that this section does not empower the Attorney General to set up a committee of this nature.

I think it is therefore necessary for there to be a legal instrument empowering the Attorney General to establish committees of this nature in order to clear such doubts, so that future Attorneys General can rely on such legal instruments to set-up similar committees that would assist them in the discharge of their constitutional functions.

In the face of the economic realities of dwindling oil prices with total global oil supply surpassing global demand by 1 million barrels, the economic outlook for a single product budget as ours is bleak. What advice would you give the Government to mitigate the impact of these developments in the oil sector on the Nigerian economy?

The obvious solution is to diversify our revenue streams and reduce the unhealthy overdependence on oil. Unfortunately, there is no quick fix in achieving diversification.

In the meantime, it is imperative to do a reality check on what we spend our scanty resources on, in order to ensure that government’s expenditure is focused and sustained on developing critical areas, i.e. infrastructure and education, as well as health and law and order, which will provide the enabling platforms for the diversification of our revenue streams in the long run.

The current level of core infrastructure i.e. power, roads, rail, seaports, airports, water and ICT, estimated to be 20-25% of GDP of $500billion is less than the level for any of the BRICS countries and grossly insufficient for Nigeria to break into the ranks of the top 20 economies in the world within a decade as expected.

It is reckoned that Nigeria would need to

Soji Awogbade PHOTOS: Sunday Adigun

invest about $3 trillion over the next 30 years for her core infrastructure to reach 7o% of GDP, which is the current international benchmark.

As government cannot achieve this alone, government must commit its own expenditure, whilst ensuring that the required legal and investment incentives framework are in place in order for the private sector to play its part.

In the interim however, there is a need for a massive re-orientation of our people on the need to pay taxes and contribute to government’s revenue, especially the majority of gainfully engaged Nigerians who are currently outside the tax bracket.

It is estimated that about 75% of SMEs are outside the tax bracket and this has led to tax contributing a negligible 7% of GDP compared to 30-50% amongst the top economies in the world.

Lastly, it is imperative that this economy be led away from its import predilection. Currently, as highlighted by our “new “President, Nigeria imports virtually everything! And produces little for export apart from primary commodities including the crude and gas.

What would be your advice to would-be investors in such an environment, reputed

for a harsh economic terrain and difficult conditions of business?

The oil and gas sector is a sector that is always quick to react to market conditions; so oil and gas investors and those who service the sector including even lawyers, know what to expect in a $100 price environment and when it becomes a $50 terrain.

For new players to enjoy the huge profit margin of the sector, they have to be very creative about the choices they make, be it of acreage, capital and recurrent spending, funding types

"THE OBVIOUS SOLUTION IS TO DIVERSIFY OUR REVENUE STREAMS AND REDUCE THE UNHEALTHY OVERDEPENDENCE ON OIL. UNFORTUNATELY, THERE IS NO QUICK FIX IN ACHIEVING DIVERSIFICATION"

and the expertise to be deployed. It goes without saying that certain fields will be cheaper to produce than others. New fields will predictably be more consuming than already producing fields because financing production is clearly easier than exploration.

To be successful new players must retain the services of seasoned experts who know the Nigerian terrain and who can show success already attained in this hydrocarbon district, in assisting similar operations.

According to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Nigeria's current undiscovered gas potential is 600 trillion Cubic Feet (TCF). Several experts have noted that Nigeria has the 9th largest proven gas reserves in the world and there is sufficient demand for natural gas locally as 80% of our electricity generation's stock feed is gas. However this potential remains largely untapped. In your opinion what urgent steps should the Government take to harness the country's natural gas resources?

Depending on your source of information, Nigeria has between 179 and 182 trillion scf of proven reserves with current daily production of around 8.2 billion scf.

13.09.2016 "SO I HOPE THE NATIONAL PROSECUTION COORDINATION COMMITTEE WILL ASSIST IN BRINGING CLOSURE TO MOST HIGHPROFILE CORRUPTION CASES, AIDED BY THE BRILLIANT PROVISIONS OF THE ADMINISTRATION OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE ACT" Gas is fast entering the fuel framework of power generation in Nigeria, no doubt a late arrival.

The legal and regulatory framework of the petroleum sector has largely been centered on oil with gas as an afterthought and this has caused the slow growth of the gas sector.

While recent power sector reforms have led to the increase in the number of players in the power sector, with over 50 licenses issued for the establishment of electricity generating plants with a substantial number of them from gas-fired plants, much of the anticipated improvement in power generation has not materialised. This is due in part to inadequate or no gas supply to the plants and other technical, logistic and security challenges.

Nigeria’s current gas production is grossly insufficient to meet the needs of generation, industrial and domestic usage. It is estimated that about $12 billion will be required over the next 5 years to increase current gas production to 11,000mcfpd.

As I have said earlier, the core infrastructure for increased gas development and production need to be in place before we can see an increased role for gas in this economy.

However, as government cannot on its own provide the required investment, it is critical that government should continuously review, harmonise and streamline the legal, regulatory and incentive framework governing the utilisation of gas in Nigeria in order to encourage continuous investment. This should be done in consultation with all the stakeholders of the gas industry.

It is also noteworthy that the roadmap for achieving these goals has been captured in the National Integrated Infrastructure Master Plan.

Unfortunately, implementation has been bogged down by a combination of factors which are common development obstacles to many sectors of the economy.

Numerous attempts at passing the Petroleum Industry Bill by successive governments is an indication of efforts to address these challenges.

It is hoped that the current government will finally get it done.

As for the security challenges, I believe government should identify and understand the underlining causes, if it is to pin them down with a view to addressing them or with a view to factoring the tough issues into its planning and implementation.

Under the new administration Nigeria’s Power Sector has not shed its reputation for poor infrastructure, limited investment, poor performance and poor service delivery.

As an expert in Foreign Direct Investment, what in your view are the major challenges to attracting the requisite investment by the power generating companies and distribution companies currently operating within the market?

It is clear that Nigeria needs both local and foreign investors to massively invest in its power sector. These players who do not necessarily have to undertake license play, provide an input which will be crucial to the sustenance of the sector.

Using international benchmarks, it is estimated that about $600 billion will be required over the next 30 years to develop the transmission and distribution infrastructure for the generation and effective distribution of 35,00oMW, which is the capacity required by Nigeria to significantly unleash her economic potential.

Investors are seldom charity organisations.

Pricing has been one of the main show-stoppers inhibiting investment. If we get to an equilibrium on an appropriate tariff that is cost reflective, the required investments will come.

The Nigerian power market has no unique feature which should recommend re-inventing the approach used by either developed or developing economies, to ensure adequate and reliable power generation, transmission and distribution. However, until we are honest about the interplay between power production,

COVER/9 its distribution and transmission and are weaned off the tendency to want to rob Peter to pay Paul on power matters, both the supply and demand side will continue to regard each other with suspicion, while the government remains a helpless onlooker. That is the current situation and it is hardly sustainable.

The privatisation of the power sector was largely successful with the transfer of distribution to private companies.

Notwithstanding this development the old problem of lack of supply of electricity has resurfaced. Being an energy expert what are your comments on the privatization process? Do our laws adequately protect consumers from exploitation by electricity distribution companies?

The best you can say about our privatisation process is that it was bold.

The success of any privatisation exercise is globally indexed on how much easier it is to access the commodity that is privatised; how much of a commercial freedom there is to transact business in the sector; and how much it frees up the divesting government to face other priorities.

You be the judge of all that for our experience of privatisation in this and other sectors.

On the protection of the environment, it should be said that for as long as the stakeholders do not exhibit an understanding of what it takes to have a sector that delivers to the expectation of all players in an economic mix that works for all stakeholders, some of the recent steps taken to ‘protect’ consumers without due regard to the economics or investment of the producer, may have provided no more than temporary respite.

Nonetheless, there are safeguards in the provisions of the Electricity Power Sector Reform Act (EPSRA) 2005 and the Consumer Protection Council Act, Chapter C25, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004 for consumer protection which are consistent with global requirements for the protection of the public for service delivery in the power sector.

Drawing from the experience of other countries such as Ghana that appear to have greater structural integrity or at least better certainty of electricity supply, what model would you advice be in the electricity market in Nigeria?

Ghana’s electricity sector, with which I am quite familiar, has its own struggles and they are by no means over. It is also a country of 27 million people. It is also a different political environment which is largely free of peculiar Nigerian issues.

Whilst I would recommend some aspects of the Ghana power programme, we have to exercise good judgment about what aspects of their programme to adopt. Electricity is by now almost a science, with many predictable outcomes depending on what you do; and there is already a lot of knowledge in Nigeria on the options.

Your passion for the environment is very well known and your work pioneering environmental law in Nigeria is well recognised. However apart from state-wide environmental laws in Lagos and other duplicating environmental regulatory agencies across Nigeria do you believe Nigeria has laws that are specific and effective in protecting the environment?

Thank you for the compliment.

The classical definition of the environment is that it consists of the air, land and water. From that definition alone, it is foreseeable that you can never have enough environmental law and guidelines so the quest should be for sufficient governance of the ever growing ramification of environmental media.

That said, we do have a plethora of environmental laws and various regulatory bodies charged with remit over segments of the environment.

We also have laws drawn from treaties and conventions.

For the oil and gas sector, which is the sector with arguably the most environmental impact, the Department of Petroleum Resources exercises primary control over the players in the sector, ably assisted by the Federal and State ministries of Environment; the Nigerian Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency; the National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency and the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency.

Some of these institutions are new; which points to the fact that we will always have room for more regulation and laws in the environmental sector.

Millions of barrels of oil have been spilled in the Niger Delta region since the beginning of oil exploratory activities there. The destruction is so great and unprecedented yet it was only on the 4th of August this year

the Buhari Administration established the Governing Council and the Board of Trustees of the Trust Fund for the Hydrocarbon Pollution Remediation Project (HYPREP) as recommended by the United Nations Environmental Report (UNEP). Being an international consultant, why do you think this clean-up has been so long in coming and how would you advice in the council in carrying out this crucial task?

Ultimately, what is pretty much an environmental affair became political football. Politics always elongates and usually exacerbates a problem and the issue of oil spillage is not an exception, particularly given the strategic importance of the sector. Turf wars amongst the various regulators leading to poor coordination and conflicting regulations have also not helped matters.

This phenomenon is however not alien to our system, as many institutions grapple with similar problems over time in situations, even when the solution would appear simple and obvious.

However, now that we are there, let’s do this one and make it a precedent to follow.

It is clear that the Buhari Administration is taking the unfortunate occurrence of Oil Spills and Pollution seriously, but one thing that is also clear is that it is a policy-led approach to dealing with the issue of environmental pollution. Conversely it has continued to prove incredibly difficult to prosecute polluters in Nigeria, for instance, a class action by Farmers and Fishermen devastated by oil spills in Bodo in the Niger Delta only successfully obtained a settlement in January 2015, reached in the UK. Why

"I THINK IT IS THEREFORE NECESSARY FOR THERE TO BE A LEGAL INSTRUMENT EMPOWERING THE ATTORNEY GENERAL TO ESTABLISH COMMITTEES OF THIS NATURE IN ORDER TO CLEAR SUCH DOUBTS, SO THAT FUTURE ATTORNEYS GENERAL CAN RELY ON SUCH LEGAL INSTRUMENTS TO SET-UP SIMILAR COMMITTEES THAT WOULD ASSIST THEM IN THE DISCHARGE OF THEIR CONSTITUTIONAL FUNCTIONS"

aren't investigations and claims against polluting IOCs successful here in Nigeria and how does this affect jurisprudence on the subject?

The legal requirements for proving damage are not different for environmental torts. However, by the peculiar nature of environmental damage, scientific and technical evidence may be required to pinpoint the polluter and the extent and magnitude of the damage.

Generally, environmental damage is more likely to affect a community than an individual. Sorting out these unusual issues usually delays access to the courts and may, in the final analysis, lead to prolongation of the matters, when eventually filed.

The next obstacle is the relative unfamiliarity of the judicial system with the themes and concepts on which sustainable development is predicated.

The award of sanctions and remedies is where these gaps most conspicuously manifest. This sees our courts awarding what amounts to measly damages for infractions that have wide and sometimes life-threatening implications for citizens.

In the fullness of time, the evolving landscape may include just and fair dispensation of justice on a scale comparable to other jurisdictions.

On 20th April 2010 one of the most publicized Marine Oil Spills of recent times began when a fire broke out on the oil rig that burned for 36 hours straight. The British Petroleum Deepwater Horizon Rig Oil Spill is estimated by the American Government to have leaked some 4.2 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico after taking 87 days before it was finally capped. Within 24 hours of the seal of the oil spill the US House of Representatives, began conducting enquiries with the BP Chief Executive. Given the far-reaching consequences of the subject why do successive Governments in Nigeria fail to understand the huge implications- socioculturally, economically and ecologically of oil spills and pollution in Nigeria?

It is probably not correct to say that government does not recognise the enormity of the implications.

What is probably in deficit is the ability and willingness to respond in the aftermath of an environmental disaster. The state of readiness is directly proportional to the size of the resources including infrastructure and equipment at the disposal of relevant agencies, the training and competence of their staff as well as location of the current problem.

Many of the regulatory parties are usually far from the theatre of environmental damage, so urgency of action is sometimes lacking. The departments of government who are responsible for matters of pollution including spillage have their regulations in place and there are prescribed interventions which should kick in once an incident occurs. The duties of the spillers are clear and those of the agencies are similarly spelt out.

It is worth mentioning that the oil and gas industry, realising its own potential loss from a cessation of operations, is perhaps more astute in reacting to these matters than government agencies.

The National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (Establishment) Act (NESREA Act) stipulates that Corporate entities who discharge harmful quantities of any hazardous substance into the air, the land or the waters are liable to a farcical sum of N 1,000,000 and a continuing penalty ofN50,000 per day. When we consider that the economic loss to Nigerian's livelihoods, the loss of sources of work, food, the biological effects of long-term exposure to pollutants and the loss to generations of Nigerians forced to live with the pollution is quite incalculable, should there not be greater penalties and mandatory polluter pay based restoration programs mandate at the initiation of such potentially harmful activities?

Again the rules are clear and very much in tandem with global standards. But as with prosecution of other infractions of laid down laws, please show me the record of enforcement that we can boast of across the board. I doubt it will be radically different to that of harmful waste discharge. The capacity of agencies charged with enforcement here again is suspect.

My view is that if agencies actually move to enforcement of the existing regulations, a jump in compliance will be noticed.

The Aelex Annual Lecture Series has continued to enjoy success as lawyers, businessmen, legislators, regulators and the Nigerian public attend these annual events.

What is this year's focus and what has been the sustaining power so far?

This year, we intend to bring diverse stakeholders together to discuss how to make state governments work, in view of the current reality.

10/TRIBUTE

13.09.2016

A Tribute to William Leon Richey Babajide O. Ogundipe

I

received the news of the death of Bill Richey, on the morning of August 23rd, with shock. I had been looking forward to meeting Bill in St. Lucia, where we were due to travel to celebrate the birthday of another of our Banco Noroeste team, Keith Oliver, in barely a week. Bill and I had exchanged emails about my plan to disturb his consumption of Jack Daniels to talk shop – I was confronting a practice issue that I knew Bill had dealt with in the past, and I wanted his advice and to generally discuss the matter with him. Alas, I now have to resolve it without the benefit of his advice, experience and wisdom.

I met Bill Richey in 2001. In 2000, I was invited to join a team, headed by Bill, instructed by the former majority shareholders of Brazilian bank Banco Noroeste S.A. During due diligence conducted by Spanish bank Banco Santander prior to the acquisition of Banco Noroeste, a $247 million hole was discovered in its books. This loss had been hidden by an employee of the bank, who had, over a number of years, been

stealing money from the bank and sending it to Nigerian 419 fraudsters, in the belief that the money was an “investment” in the Abuja airport. The scam was that there was an excess of $30 million due on the airport and, in return for an investment of a few hundred thousand dollars, a subsidiary of the bank would receive this money from Nigeria, share it with others, and take a significant percentage. Three years later, the employee (who did not take a cent for himself) had sent more than $190 million to the fraudsters. A classic case of 419.

When it became clear that the bulk of the stolen money had gone to Nigeria, Keith Oliver (who I had met playing football while I was a member of the International Association of Young Lawyers – AIJA) convinced Bill to overcome his reluctance to come to Nigeria and try to recover the money.

I started working with the team in 2000, and met Bill personally in 2001, during a holiday in Miami. Bill was then counsel to the Miami firm Merrell Schultz, whose offices remain one of the most impressive I have ever seen, with a fantastic view over Biscayne Bay, a cordon bleu chef and white gloved waiters serving an à la carte lunch.

Over time, and after the freezing and recovery of assets and monies in England, Switzerland,

California and Kentucky, the team’s attention turned to Nigeria where, against all odds, more than $100 million was recovered. The success of the team in Nigeria was attributable to a number of things, principal amongst which was the creation of the EFCC and the commitment of its first Chairman, Mr Nuhu Ribadu, its Director of Operations, Mr Ibrahim Lamorde and the head of the team that conducted the investigations in Nigeria, Mr Umar Sanda. However, without Bill having been convinced that the attempt should be made, bringing the team to Nigeria, meeting with the EFCC and generally coordinating things, the fraudsters, who were convicted on guilty pleas and surrendered assets to the complainants (resulting in the recovery in Nigeria, and remittance out, of more than US$100 million) would still be enjoying their ill-gotten wealth. Regrettably, more than ten years later, one of the fraudsters continues to pursue attempts to reverse the surrender of assets to which he agreed, and several cases continue in various courts around the country.

Bill taught me so many things during the period we worked together; not just about legal practice, but also about life in general. Despite the fact that when I met him, I had been a practitioner for more than twenty years, he was still able to

Back Row, L-R: investigator Wayne Black, Mr. Jide Ogundipe, Domingos Refinetti from Brazil and Mr. Atteh an EFCC prosecutor.

Front Row, L-R: Mr. Rotimi Jacobs SAN, Keith Oliver from Peters & Peters in London, Bill Richey, Mr. Ibrahim Lamorde, Mr Pierre Schifferli from Geneva and Mr. Umar Sanda

LAGOS STATE PROPERTIES PROTECTION LAW: AN OVERDUE STATUTORY INTERVENTION entitled to raise the defence that Section 5 (and not Section 2) specifically applies to his situation and that the prohibition in Section 5 does not amount to a punishable offence in respect of which he could be prosecuted.

However, if for any reason Section 5 should be retained, we suggest that the prohibition therein should be criminalised and punishable with the same 10-year jail term as it is contained in Section 2.

Our immediate foregoing view applies also to section 6 of the Law which prohibits the use of “Law Enforcement Agent, Vigilante Group, ethnic, cultural/traditional militia in execution of the judgment of a court in respect of any landed property”. While one appreciates the well-informed idea behind the promulgation of that Section of the Law, regrettably, no express words are contained in the section to render the violation of that prohibition a criminal offence.

What is not criminalised cannot be punished. See Section 36(12) of the Constitution. We strongly recommend that the prohibition in Section 6 of the Law should be criminalised and the penalty stipulated.

Until the recommended amendments are effected, it is much ado about nothing as far as the prohibitions in those Sections of the Law are concerned. The point must be emphasised that the law is a Penal Law intended to deal with a specific mischief; hence its provisions must be devoid of any ambiguity.

Provisions for Professional Misconduct Section 9 of the LSPPL addresses professionals who by their conduct facilitate the breach of the provisions of the LSPPL. Such professionals are by subsection (3) thereof said to have committed the offence of aiding and abetting which in essence makes them principal offenders liable to the

same punishment as the person who commits the offence. However, the law is silent on what constitutes “conduct to facilitate a breach” or conduct amounting to “aiding and abetting”. The danger apparent in this regard is that an adversary who is mischievous can write a petition against any lawyer who prepares in the comfort of his office a document of transfer of interest in land. Such a lawyer will then be subject to trial before the Special Offences Court and any other court in Lagos State as a principal offender.

Whilst it may appear on the face of it that this provision is commendable, a major problem associated with it is that the conduct of those professionals which is sought to be addressed is carried out in a professional capacity and ample provisions may have been made in the law regulating the practise of that profession to cater for such conduct.

For instance, for a legal practitioner who in his professional capacity misbehaves and carries out an unlawful act, section 10 (1) of the Legal Practitioners Act provides for where he is to be tried for such conduct as follows: “There shall be a committee to be known as the Legal Practitioners’ Disciplinary Committee (in this Act referred to as "the Disciplinary Committee") which shall be charged with the duty of considering and determining any case where it is alleged that a person whose name is on the roll has misbehaved in his capacity as a legal practitioner or should for any other reason be the subject of proceedings under this Act. “ Consequently, the Special Offences Court or any other court in the state cannot be the forum where such a legal practitioner’s conduct in his professional capacity will be tried. The draftsman of the LSPPL may have had this in mind when in subsection (4) of the law it was stated that such a professional who is “found guilty under the

William Leon Richey

teach me so much: from demonstrating great charm and control to the least deserving of people, so as to stay focused on the goal, to remaining steadfast in the face of apparent adversity. He had a great sense of humour and a vast array of war stories, with which he regularly entertained the team. He was not a tall man, but he was a giant in his field.

His death, in such tragic circumstances, shook me tremendously. I missed him in St. Lucia, and I will miss his regular emails, sending something humorous or thought provoking. I remember the last time I saw Bill, was at a conference in Miami in September 2014. The weekend before the conference, Keith Oliver and I had visited him in his Miami apartment to have a drink as we watched the sun set, had dinner at a nearby restaurant and caught a jazz show afterwards. I specifically remember asking Bill, a committed supporter of the right to bear arms, if he was armed while we were out and learning that, of course, he was.

My loss is insignificant in comparison to others who also loved Bill, not least his two daughters, Leeana and Lynnet (who I call my Nigerian daughter), and his wife Linda. Bill was buried in Palm City, Florida on September 3rd, and a memorial will be held in Miami on Monday September 19. I end this with Bill’s toast, which is a constant when the Noroeste team meet, was most fitting, and always comes to mind whenever Bill does: “CONFUSION TO THE ENEMY!” May he continue to rest in peace.

Babajide O. Ogundipe, is a Partner in Sofunde Osakwe Ogundipe & Belgore

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7

provisions of this law shall be reported to the relevant professional body for misconduct and necessary sanctions”. Again, I invite attention to section 36(12) of the 1999 Constitution to the effect that “...a person shall not be convicted of a criminal offence unless that offence is defined and the penalty thereof is prescribed in a written law”, can such a pronouncement of guilt be sustainable in law in the absence of an offence and/or penalty. See the case of IFEAGWU v FRN (2001) 47 WRN 86.

Another problem that arises at this point is that the finding of guilt is the precondition for reporting the professional to the relevant professional body.

Bearing in mind that such conduct is carried out in a professional capacity, who then determines the guilt of the professional? Is it the Special Task Force, the Special Offences Court or other courts in the state?

As earlier stated, for a legal practitioner whose conduct in a professional capacity is alleged to be unlawful, it is only the Disciplinary Committee established under section 10(1) of the Legal Practitioners Act that can make such a determination. The same position may likely apply to other professionals hence it is necessary that the laws regulating the practise of professionals be consulted and necessary amendments made in the LSPPL to accord with those laws.

Collection of Foundation levy Another major pitfall in the LSPPL is the provision of section 11 (1) which provides that: “A person shall not, whether for himself or acting as an agent demand for any fee or levy in respect of construction activities on any property, disrupt or obstruct construction works provided that the provision of this section shall not be interpreted to preclude land owning families under the authorisation of the family head to demand for

the customary fee for possession (in the name of foundation levy) from buyers or ratification fee pursuant to judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction” Whilst the provision above expressly outlaws demanding a fee or levy for construction works or obstructing construction activities, it allows land owning families to collect foundation levies from buyers. The relevant question here is; why should collection of a foundation levy be allowed to continue? Would the land owning families not be entitled to prevent construction works on account of non-payment of a foundation levy?

This again impacts negatively on the rationale behind the LSPPL because allowing foundation levies to be collected by land owning families will definitely encourage the scourge of “omoniles” who can now even argue that there is legal backing for their actions. This I dare say defeats the entire purpose of the law and brings the entire jurisprudence of same to nought.

It is recommended that if the LSPPL is anything to go by, an amendment must be speedily carried out to proscribe all forms of foundation levies or fees for construction works by land owning families.

Conclusion The LSPPL which is a much needed statutory intervention at this time needs to be reviewed urgently by the Lagos State House of Assembly and necessary amendments made to same in order to achieve the desired outcome as stated by the Governor during the signing ceremony.

Before I draw the curtain, I must commend the efforts of the Lagos State Government for the conception of this law; it is a timely response to the yearning of the people, and a true reflection of the spirit of the people which is what law should be.

Kemi Pinheiro, SAN, FCIArb.

13.09.2016

/11

Recent Decision On the Signing of Processes

by Legal Practitioners in Arbitral Proceedings Adedapo Tunde-Olowu and Adefolake Adewusi

I

Introduction n an unreported judgment delivered on 31st August 2016 in Appeal No. CA/A/208/2012: SHELL NIGERIA EXPLORATION AND PRODUCTION CO. LTD & 3 ORS v FEDERAL INLAND REVENUE SERVICE & ANOR, the Abuja Division of the Court of Appeal (Per Hon Justices A.D Yahaya, T.Y. Hassan and M. Mustapha) following the Supreme Court decision in OKAFOR & 2 ORS v NWEKE & 2 ORS (2007)10 NWLR (Pt. 1403) 521 held that a Notice of Arbitration and Statement of Claim by which a claimant commenced an arbitration were incompetent having been prepared and signed in the name of a law firm. The court also held that a non-party to instituted arbitral proceedings has the locus standi and can successfully challenge an award in such proceedings where the issues in dispute are essentially tax disputes and therefore not arbitrable.

On this basis the Court of Appeal held that the arbitral tribunal lacked the jurisdiction to entertain the issues in dispute and that the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) had the locus to challenge the proceedings.

Background Briefly, the Appellants, as Contractor, entered into a Production Sharing Contract with the 2nd Respondent (NNPC) in respect of Deep Offshore Oil Mining Lease 118 (OML 118 PSC), to explore oil in Nigeria’s deep-water acreages. Any crude oil discovered, was to be allocated between the parties in accordance with the lifting allocation contained in OML 118 Production Sharing Contract (PSC), on the basis of “Royalty Oil,” “Cost Oil,” “Tax Oil” and “Profit Oil.” Under the PSC, the Contractor (i.e. the Appellants) had the sole right and responsibility to compute the lifting allocation and parties were enjoined to respect their various obligations under the PSC. The Contractor alleged that the 2nd Respondent has been in breach of its obligations under the PSC since May 2007 and has continued to lift crude oil in excess of its entitlement.

Therefore, the Appellants as Claimants, subsequently commenced arbitration proceedings against the 2nd Respondents. The Appellants’ originating processes at the arbitral tribunal were signed by CLIFFORD CHANCE LLP and AELEX. When the 1st Respondent (FIRS) became aware of the arbitral proceedings, it filed an originating summons at the Abuja Division of the Federal High Court in Suit No: FHC/ABJ/CS/744/2011 challenging the arbitral proceedings. The FIRS’s position was that that the issues before the arbitral tribunal impinge on its statutory functions and that the issues before the tribunal were not arbitrable by virtue of Section 251(1)(a) and (b) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) which vests exclusive jurisdiction on matters pertaining to the revenue of the Government of the Federation or taxation of companies in the Federal High Court. The FIRS also argued that the arbitral tribunal lacked jurisdiction to hear the dispute on the ground that the Notice of Arbitration by which the Appellant initiated the arbitration and the Statement of Claim filed were signed in the names of law firms.

The Federal High Court on 29th February 2012 held that the claim before the arbitral tribunal had risen out of tax matters relating to the Federal Government revenue and was therefore not arbitrable before that tribunal.

Dissatisfied with this decision, the Appellants appealed to the Court of Appeal by a Notice of Appeal dated 24th May 2012. The FIRS and NNPC filed Respondent’s Notices contending that the decision of the trial court should be affirmed on the basis that the proceedings before the arbitral tribunal were incompetent and a nullity because the originating processes were signed by law firms rather than persons licenced to practice law or sign legal processes as legal practitioners in Nigeria.

At the Court of Appeal, the Appellants’ position was that the FIRS, not having been a party to the arbitral proceedings, lacked the locus to challenge the said proceedings especially the issue of the signing of the Notice of Arbitration and the Statement of Claim. The Appellants argued that the FIRS had not shown how its legal rights, powers or functions had been breached or threatened by the arbitration proceedings since it had the power to receive or refuse accounts or call for further returns under the Petroleum Profits Tax Act. The Appellants also argued that arbitral proceedings are different from judicial proceedings and the principle of either of these proceedings cannot be imported into the other. Furthermore, the Appellant also argued that the Arbitration Act does not make it mandatory for a Notice of Arbitration to be signed by a legal practitioner.

In arriving at a decision, the Court of Appeal identified three issues for determination, to wit: (i) Whether the Notice of Arbitration and Statement of Claim by which the Appellants as claimants commenced the arbitration exercise are competent having been prepared by law firms not recognised or licensed to practice law or sign legal processes as legal practitioners in the Federal Republic of Nigeria? (ii) Was the learned trial judge right in finding in favour of the Plaintiff/Respondent on the issue of locus standi? (iii) Are the claims submitted to arbitration contractual matters or tax matters?

The Court of Appeal considered the issue of locus and arbitrability of the issues submitted for arbitration together. On the issue of the signing of the originating processes at the arbitral tribunal by a non-legal practitioner, the Court of Appeal was of the view the proceedings before the arbitral tribunal were legal proceedings.

It observed that Article 4 of the First Schedule to the Arbitration and Conciliation Act gives the parties to an arbitration proceedings, the right to be represented or assisted by “legal practitioners” of their choice. In the words of the court, “By the provisions of Sections 2(1) and 24 of the Legal Practitioners Act 2004, a legal practitioner is a person entitled to practice as a barrister or as barrister and solicitor as his name is on the roll of such practitioners in Nigeria.” The court also observed that since the Appellants decided to be represented at the arbitral proceedings by legal practitioners, they had a duty “not only to communicate the names and addresses of their legal practitioners, but to have them sign the processes, as their representatives…” The court therefore held that since the originating processes filed at the arbitral tribunal had not been signed by a legal practitioner, they were incompetent, and the arbitral proceedings were therefore a nullity. Yahaya J.C.A. who delivered the leading judgment, stated at page 20 of the judgment as follows: “The Appellants decided to be represented by legal practitioners at the Tribunal. It behoves them, not only to communicate the names and addresses of the legal practitioners, but to have then sign the processes, as their representatives since they did not sign same, themselves.

So, for the Notice of Arbitration and consequently, the claim to be competent, recourse must be made to the Legal Practitioners Act 2004. Are CLIFFORD CHANCE LLP and AELEX legal practitioners? The only way to show they are, is by stating or showing that they are persons who have been enrolled. That has not been shown. They are therefore not competent to sign the initiating processes before the Tribunal, which no doubt, is a legal proceeding. OKETADE v ADEWUNMI (SUPRA) @ PAGE 70. Once the initiating process was invalid, null and void, the tribunal had no jurisdiction to act on it. All the proceedings before it are a nullity, and are hereby struck out.”

On the issue of locus and whether the dispute was arbitrable, the court held that when section 35 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act is read alongside with section 251(1)(a) and (b) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended), tax disputes are not arbitrable. The court also held that the issue of payment of petroleum profits tax was statutory not contractual. Therefore, the Appellants could not justify their argument that they had the right to determine issues relating to the payment of petroleum profits tax under the PSC. The Court of Appeal also held that by section 8(1)(a) and (b) of the Federal Inland Revenue

Service (Establishment) Act, the FIRS has the exclusive power to administer tax legislation including the Petroleum Profits Tax Act and to assess, collect, account and enforce payment of taxes due to the Government of Nigeria or any of its agencies from persons, including companies and enterprises chargeable with tax.

The Court of Appeal was of the opinion that since tax oil was the vehicle used in the payment of tax under the PSC, the method of estimating petroleum profits tax, its payment and timing of capital allowances, it was the FIRS’ duty to administer the said tax. Therefore, where there are any proceedings in which assessment, levying, payment, timing and returns were to be determined in accordance with the Petroleum Profits Tax Act, the duties, obligations and responsibilities of the FIRS would be called into question. Consequently, the FIRS will have standing in such proceeding. The Court of Appeal stated that since the FIRS’ obligations and duties were likely to be adversely affected, not being a party to the arbitration proceedings, it had the right to approach the trial court to protest the infringement of its interests and duties.

The Court of Appeal also held that the claims before the arbitral tribunal were effectively tax matters since the dispute involved an allegation that NNPC has breached the terms of the PSC by wrongly computing and over lifting tax oil to the detriment of the interest of the Appellants.

Comments The decision of the Court of Appeal is significant in many respects. Firstly, the decision underscores the fact that the determination of whether an issue is contractual and therefore arbitrable, is not always as clear-cut as it seems. It is important to remember that the contractual terms in this case were aimed essentially at determining the profits due to each party under the PSC but also had a bearing on their ultimate tax liability.

Secondly, the decision confirms the position that in certain instances, a non-party to an arbitral proceeding can challenge the jurisdiction of an arbitral tribunal’s proceedings, in court.

Thirdly, the most significant implication of this decision is the requirement that where a party elects to be represented by a legal practitioner in arbitral proceedings, the processes filed in such proceedings must be signed by a person whose name is on the roll of legal practitioners in Nigeria. This part of the decision will certainly be trailed by mixed reactions. Some will argue that this part of the judgment amounts to an importation of rules applicable to litigation to arbitral proceedings. In support of this position, reliance will be placed on the various high court rules applicable in Nigeria, which stipulate that pleadings shall be signed by a legal practitioner. On this basis, proponents of this view will posit that the decision in OKAFOR v NWEKE is limited to the competence of processes filed in a court and should not be extended to arbitral proceedings.

While some commentators may disagree with the Court of Appeal’s decision, the principle that legal processes must be signed by a legal practitioner whose name is on the roll has come to stay in Nigeria until overturned on further appeal. Therefore, every practitioner of arbitration will do well to be guided by the decision in SHELL NIGERIA EXPLORATION AND PRODUCTION CO. LTD & 3 ORS v FEDERAL INLAND REVENUE SERVICE & ANOR. Mr. Adedapo Tunde-Olowu, FCTI, FCIArb and Miss Adefolake Adewusi, ACTI, ACIArb are Partner and Associate respectively, in AELEX.

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13.09.2016

Reforms, Revolutions and the Ministry of Trade & Investment: Amendment of the Companies and Allied Matters Act Olubunmi Abayomi-Olukunle “In the sense that he tackled the stifling role of government in our economy, Bibi was not a reformer but a revolutionary. A reform happens when you change the policy of government; a revolution happens when you change the mindset of a country…” Ron Dermer speaking about the financial-sector reforms implemented by Benjamin “Bibi” Netahanyu in Israel in 2003. he decision by the Corporate Affairs Commission (Commission) to “review and to bring the Companies and Allied Matters Act (CAMA) in conformity with global trends” is definitely commendable. The CAMA in our view, is the most critical piece of legislation in the discourse around increasing FDI flows in Nigeria because of its primary relevance to the ease of doing business and ease of investing in Nigeria. It is refreshing to note that the Federal Government has also prioritised a possible review of the operations of the Commission as same forms part of the reasons for seeking emergency powers from the National Assembly. It certainly would not be an exaggeration to submit that the revival of our economy can depend, partly on the ongoing review of the CAMA. The approach adopted by the Commission in welcoming proposals from professional communities is also commendable and we hope that the collation of the proposals and the debate around the final amendments to the CAMA will be as robust and intellectually driven. Given the state of our economy and the need for economic revival, we affirm that the ongoing reforms must go beyond merely scratching the surface. We affirm that in reviewing certain legislations and policies, government must be open to the level of innovation necessary to leapfrog economic revival. If that means yanking off all that we have been used to and starting on a new note then so be it. Government must not shy away from doing what is best in the interest of our dear country.

A review of some of the changes that have already been proposed by the Commission, confirms clearly that the Commission is positioning itself to be a more efficient regulator. One of the proposals that we consider very strategic to the growth of entrepreneurial activity, is our proposal for a separate legal structure (typically referred to as the ‘One-Man Company’) that comes with the full complement of a lower tax rate relative to the prevailing income tax rate, lesser compliance requirements and the benefit of limited liability and separate legal personality.

The One-Man Company essentially combines some of the benefits of a sole proprietorship and that of a limited liability company and has been adopted in varying forms in various jurisdictions, from the UK, to US and to India as a strategy for promoting the growth of small and medium scale enterprises and driving growth in the venture capital/private equity space. Some of the other proposals which we consider strategic at a time of economic revival as this include (a) clarification of the rules around ‘doing business’ in Nigeria, a principle which has been the subject of litigation in a number of cases; (b) the denomination of share capital in currencies other than the Naira; (c) review/abolishment of rules around non-voting/non weighted shares; (d) review/ abolishment of the rules around financial assistance by a company for the purchase of the company’s own shares; and (e) a creation of a framework for valuation of sweat equity.

Beyond the substantive legal issues that are the subject of ongoing reforms, what is far more concerning to us is the administrative machinery/structure for the implementation of the CAMA, as reviewed. Legal and policy reforms can hardly achieve desired objectives where there is no corresponding innovation around the administrative machinery for implementing reforms. A number of proposals have been put forward by the Commission to its administrative structure. Currently, it is being proposed that there should be a board for the Commission and also that nominations to the board should be accepted from the Accounting profession and from the Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators of Nigeria (ICSAN). However, the question that we ask is: should there not be a more elaborate debate around the administrative/implementation structure of the Commission?

We answer this question in the affirmative, especially in the light of developments in other jurisdictions. Here are some possible legal structures:

T

Trading Fund Status A Trading Fund is essentially a financial and account-

Minister of Trade and Investment, Okechukwu Enelamah

ing framework established by law to enable a government ministry, agency or department (MDA), or part of an MDA, to adopt certain accounting and management practices that are adopted in the private sector. A number of attributes differentiate a Trading Fund from a typical MDA. These include (a) A Trading Fund operates on a self-financing basis and does not thrive on subvention or funding from the legislature to finance its daily operations. Consequently, staff cost and other expenses are paid out of the revenues of the Trading Funds (b) A Trading Fund does not normally aim to make a ‘profit’ and the fees charged by a Trading Fund are usually for the full cost of services provided or on a cost recovery basis. A Trading Fund will usually fix its fees and charges in accordance with its own financial target, which is normally to earn an average rate of return on capital employed at a pre-agreed, often regulated percentage, the primary objective being the need to achieve a reasonable rate of return based on the fixed assets employed. (c) As opposed to the practice whereby operating surpluses are remitted to the Government, surpluses are retained as reserves and can be re-invested to enhance existing services and explore new business opportunities (d) A Trading Fund has significant flexibility in human resources and staffing.

It is important to note that a Trading Fund remains part of the Government in the sense that its assets would remain government assets and its staff would remain civil servants. The underlying philosophy of a Trading Fund is that an institutional change would provide the appropriate flexibility in management of resources and help nurture a new working culture that will improve services in terms of both quality and cost-effectiveness. A number of jurisdictions have introduced the concept of trading funds as part of public service reforms aimed at driving a more customer-focused service culture and achieving sustainable improvements in efficiency, cost effectiveness and in developing new services. The trading fund model has been used with considerable success in a number of jurisdictions and across a number of traditional government agencies including immigrations, post offices, and corporate and public registries, The Companies House in the UK is organised as a Trading Fund. Without a doubt, the Trading Fund structure can be used for other government MDAs as part of ongoing economic reforms.

From a structural standpoint, the implementation of a Trading Fund will require passing a bill into law and the execution of the requisite framework and service level agreements between the relevant MDA, here the Ministry of Trade and Investment and the Commission Registry Operator Licensing It is also possible to restructure the Commission in such a way as to decouple the ‘registry’ function of the Commission from its core regulatory functions. This structure has the potential of making the Commission a more efficient regulator as it will enable the Commission to focus more on its core function of administering the Act and also strengthening its capabilities to conduct investigations into the affairs of any company where the interests of the shareholders and the public so demand.

Under this structure, the Commission will grant a Registry Operator’s License, (either on a regional basis or

a unitised basis) to a private information technology/ data company, seeing that the operation of a registry is increasingly a technology/digitisation-based function.

This is usually by way of a long term contract with a negotiated service level functionality based on predefined/ objective criteria. The model shares some of the contracting features of the standard public-private partnership model but will require a number of legal innovations to make the model sustainable. Key considerations include data ownership, data retention and data privacy rights, retention of critical functions by the government, management of intellectual property rights, and management of software rights. It is also possible to implement a state-backed guarantee as a security option in the event of a default in the integrity of the companies’ register.

This model will not only generate significant revenue for the Commission through royalties and/or sign-on payments, as the case may be, but also improve the delivery of services to Nigerian businesses, whilst also ensuring that the Commission is re-engineered to effectively carry out its core statutory responsibilities.

The argument that privatisation will lead to unemployment is in our view, mostly, a failure of contract and negotiation. An Operator’s License will typically be structured in such a way as to make extensive provisions for employee training and employee retention based on objective re-certifications, with a clear positioning that work is available for members of staff who are ready to adapt to changing circumstances and meet the new demands of their jobs. In this event, the Commission can, in the public interest, back-out the cost of such re-examination out of royalty/sign-on payments. If anything, a modern registry will minimise capital investment, bring more businesses into the formal economy and encourage entrepreneurial activity.

Decentralisation of Companies’ Regulation For some reason, it appears that this proposition will be dead on arrival. The proposition is quite simple. Why should companies’ regulation be a matter for the Exclusive Legislative List? Why should trademarks, copyrights/intellectual property regulation be a matter for the Exclusive Legislative List? The Federal Government may need to urgently, revisit the economics of legislative power, as part of legal and structural reforms in a time of economic revival. The Federal Government needs to travel light. It is now no longer a question of political power but that of economic sense. Whilst decentralisation of companies’ regulation will not by itself drive efficiency as a number of innovations will still have to be implemented by state registries, decentralisation will engender competition amongst state registries and can drive efficiency.

The foregoing propositions are examples of the trends we see globally in business registration and regulation. A number of other innovations have also been implemented in corporate registries around the world as part of public sector reforms to save costs and drive efficiency.

In Belgium, all statutory registers have been merged into a single database under the auspices of one registrar. In Gibraltar, a private sector company has been appointed as Assistant Registrar with full authority to run the country’s companies’ registry. In addition to partnering with local agencies saddled with the responsibility of promoting entrepreneurship to register new businesses, South Africa has merged the companies’ registry with the trademarks registry to form the Companies and Intellectual Property Registration Office. In India, a public-private partnership under a BOT arrangement with a private sector operator was used to strategically develop new systems, set-up and operating additional facilities and introducing online facilities.

The point has to be made that there is no one-size-fitsall approach. Indeed, a variety of legal structures can be used to implement far-reaching reforms in business registration and regulation. However, certain goals must, in our view, be of priority to the Commission, namely (a) substantive and administrative reforms must be data-driven and subject to market-testing procedures; (b) the Commission must seek to attain the highest possible standards of register integrity; (c) the Commission must aim to reduce the burdens associated with the provision of filing and search services; (d) the Commission must aim for digital transformation and to become a 100% digital organisation, it should be possible to register a business in 5-7 easy steps online; (e) the Commission must engender an open data approach which should, amongst other things, make the Companies’ Register, subject to relevant restrictions, accessible online.

Olubunmi Abayomi-Olukunle is the Managing Partner at Balogun Harold.

13.09.2016

THE LIGHTER SIDE/13

LEGAL HUMOUR

We Hold Your Brief JUDE IGBANOI jude.igbanoi@thisdaylive.com Dear Counsel, I should have written to you earlier on this issue, but I did not know that my problem would take this long to be resolved.

I worked for a foreigner and his wife as a cook and steward for six and half years. I did not have any problems with the couple or their children for the period I worked and lived with them.

My only worry was the poor salary I was being paid. I got a better job in a fast-food restaurant and told them I wanted to leave. They refused and offered to increase my salary, but I just had to leave because I also saw the job as an opportunity to build my career.

To my surprise, my former boss came with some Police men to arrest me three weeks later at my new work place.

They accused me of stealing their money, clothes and other household items. I spent four days in prison and the Police have charged me and taken the matter to court.

I am completely innocent of these accusations; they are only doing this to me out of malice, and knowing that I have no money to fight them back. The Police searched my house and nothing was found.

What should I do? I have spent all my little savings on this matter. Some people advised me to beg them, but I cannot beg for a crime I did not commit.

L. Etuk Victoria Island, Lagos.

Dear Mr. Etuk, I have heard and seen the needless pain and injustice that some people go through due, basically, to ignorance.

Nobody has the right to force another person to remain in employment against his will. When the terms of agreement are not breached or violated, an employee can lawfully and willfully leave his employment. The law only requires that adequate notice is given by such employee to his employer as provided in the terms of his contract of employment.

You also did not need to spend four days in detention without bail.

But now that the Police have arraigned you in court, I advise that you get a lawyer to represent you in the case. If as you hinted, you don’t have the funds to get a lawyer, there are numerous agencies and NGOs that offer pro bono legal services to indigent persons that find themselves in situations like yours.

I hereby attach with this letter a list of human rights NGOs and agencies that offer free legal services including the Legal Aid Council of Nigeria and the Office of the Public Defender (OPD) of the Lagos State Ministry of Justice.

A prosecuting attorney called his first witness, a grandmotherly, elderly woman, to the stand. He approached her and asked, "Mrs. Jones, do you know me?"

She responded, "Why, yes, I do know you Mr. Williams. I've known you since you were a young boy. And frankly, you've been a big disappointment to me. You lie, you cheat on your wife, you manipulate people and talk about them behind their backs. You think you're a rising big shot when you haven't the brains to realize you never will amount to anything more than a two-bit paper pusher.

Yes, I know you."

The lawyer was stunned. Not knowing what else to do he pointed across the room and asked, "Mrs. Williams, do you know the defence attorney?"

She again replied, "Why, yes I do. I've known Mr. Bradley since he was a youngster, too. I used to baby-sit him for his parents. And he, too, has been a real disappointment to me.

He's lazy, bigoted, he has a drinking problem.

The man can't build a normal relationship with anyone and his law practice is one of the shoddiest in the entire state. Yes, I know him."

At this point, the judge rapped the courtroom to silence and called both counsellors to the bench. In a very quiet voice, he said with menace, "If either of you asks her if she knows me, you'll be jailed for contempt!"

Rhodes-Vivour: Effective Alternative Dispute Resolution will Attract Investment Akinwale Akintunde

The Chairperson of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators UK (CIArb) Nigeria Branch, Mrs. Adedoyin Rhodes-Vivour, has urged counsel in arbitration proceedings to practice within globally accepted standards, adding that an effective alternative dispute resolution (ADR) system will attract foreign direct investment (FDI).

Speaking in Lagos at the inaugural CIArb Arbitration Workshop Series with the theme: “Conduct of counsel in international arbitration”, Rhodes-Vivour stated that developing Nigeria into a favourable seat for international arbitration should be one of the indices of economic development.

“Nigeria is now in a recession and each and every one of us in partnership with government has a role to play in our economic development and survival and exit strategies during this period.

“Arbitration and ADR activities, as well as Nigeria’s perception as a place where disputes are effectively and expeditiously resolved outside the court system, can attract foreign investment.

“Therefore, counsel in arbitration proceedings need to be aware and practice within globally accepted standards”, she further stated.

According to her, the institute’s emphasis is on education, training and ethics, adding that although it is not in competition with any other arbitral organisation, it is ready to cooperate with all other like-minded organisations.

The CIArb Chairperson explained that the workshop series is in line with the institute's commitment to the delivery of quality education and training aimed at building capacity in the field of arbitration.

The guest speaker, Mr. Tunde Fagbohunlu SAN stressed the need for counsel to balance their clients' best interests and the need to comply with ethical standards.

Fagbohunlu explained the processes of drafting the arbitration clause in agreements, how to write the witness statement, preparing for the hearing and cross examination, among others.

He differentiated between various cultures and the need to be aware of the arbitrator’s cultural background, adding that an

L-R: First Vice President, Chartered Institute of Arbitrators UK (CIArb), Nigeria Branch, Mr. Tunde Busari SAN, Hon. Justice Bode RhodesVivour of the Supreme Court, the guest speaker, Mr. Tunde Fagbohunlu SAN and Chairperson, CIArb UK Nigeria Branch, Mrs. Adedoyin Rhodes-Vivour, at the workshop

arbitrator’s background and personality should be considered in case preparation.

Fagbohunlu highlighted some reference material arbitrators must be familiar with, such as the IBA Guidelines on Party Representation in International Arbitration, ICC Guidelines on Conflict Disclosure by Arbitrators and the LCIA Guidelines for Parties Legal Representatives.

Participants were also enlightened on the peculiarities of

international arbitration proceedings, as well as common pitfalls to avoid and case preparation strategies.

The CIArb is a not for profit charity which works in the public interest through an international network of 37 branches with over 14,000 members based in more than 130 countries.

It has supported global promotion, facilitation and development of private dispute resolution for the past 100 years while representing the interests of alternative dispute practitioners the world over.

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13.09.2016

THE WHITE COLLAR IDOWU OLOFINMOYIN

idowu.olofinmoyin@norfolk-partners.com

Digital Rights and the Nigerian Democracy

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hen young people speak about the Internet, it is easy to simply dismiss it as the domain of adolescence.

The pastime of those who are frivolous or who cannot make a meaningful contribution the way “adults” or “normal” people do.

People who would rather spend time online than in the “real world” are often labelled as lazy and unproductive, however there are certain correlations between nations with high Internet penetration (i.e. the percentage of a nation’s population that has access to the Internet) and socio-economic development.

For instance there is an obvious link between Internet usage and literacy levels, however what is perhaps less known is the direct correlation between Internet penetration and national Gross Domestic Product, showing that the latter in fact is a driver of the increased growth of the former. An analysis of nations and their Internet penetration~ ‘Internet Penetration and its Correlation to Gross Domestic Product: An Analysis of the Nordic Countries’- shows that “ICT growth occurs, and as the population becomes more comfortable with the technology and more productive, the GDP level begins to increase as well.” And while this growth usually lags behind Internet penetration by about two to three years it is indicative of the power of the Internet in economic activity.

Informing the World In 2009, when Iran held its Presidential Elections on the ominous date, June 12, those elections were marred by allegations of election malpractice and while the Iranian Government struggled to censor news and information coming from Tehran about mass protests and violence by jamming media satellites and shutting down news agency websites, Twitter, the Internet based social networking website was delivering the news of what was happening, moment by moment, to the rest of the world.

The Internet is Big Business And if the power of the Internet is still not clear, then content yourself with the knowledge that the top ten Internet companies by revenue account for nearly $2 Trillion today. One of those companies, Facebook, whose CEO Mark Zuckerberg visited Yaba’s developing tech hub in Lagos a few weeks ago, is worth $340 billion. The Internet is the foundation of the businesses of tomorrow.

But beyond mere numbers and revenue we are seeing on a daily basis how the Internet is giving a voice to parts of the Nigerian populace that till now had none. There are over 86 million Nigerians online today, some 46% of our entire population, making us the nation with the 7th most pervasive Internet penetration.

With Nigeria’s population of over 170 million and the fact that about 70% of this population is under 30, a demographic group traditionally open to the adoption of technology and a strong Internet presence, it is fast becoming the choice medium of communicating political views. In 2012 we saw #OccupyNigeria protests against the removal of Fuel Subsidy, in 2013 the #ChildNotBride protests against Child

Internet penetration may actually be another proposed Bill- the Communications Tax Bill which seeks to impose a 9% charge on Voice and Data Calls, Data/Internet Services such at Pay Per View TV, Texts Messaging and Multimedia Messaging Services, all traditionally areas of technology and economic activity that are value-adding services creating gains in the telecommunications sector, and unsurprisingly, which are already taxed. The disconnect between government policy to create an inviting environment for business growth and laws such as this proposed Communications Tax Bill, that will inevitably stifle internet services and economic activity, is jarringly apparent. The end effect is therefore a sort of censorship by economic means, is it not?

Brides, in 2014 the world witnessed the #BringBackOurGirls protest which has been used at least 3.3million times and has seen world personalities such as Michelle Obama, the First Lady of the United States and former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, David Cameron join in protests with a deeply Nigerian origin.

Attacks on Rights and Civil Liberties The new impetus Nigerians have for speaking out through the Internet is not one that is universally shared. Across Africa especially various Governments have attempted to censor the free use of the Internet for various reasons. In Ethiopia for example in the run up to their general elections in May 2015 many opposition websites were shut down, the arrest of Internet bloggers has become common place and even Ethiopian Internet Journalists in the diaspora have been hacked by sophisticated programs designed to prevent their Internet presence. In Tunisia, during the last Presidential Election, the Independent Electoral Commission’s website was attacked affecting Voter’s registration and bloggers have been arrested and jailed simply for speaking against the Government.

The Digital Rights and Freedom Bill It is in order to protect the sovereign rights and authority of the Nigerian people to continue to express their chosen views and take advantage of the new digital frontier presented by the Internet and various new technologies that the a bill- the Digital Rights and Freedom Bill of 2016, has been presented in the House of Representatives. It is premised on the protection of Internet Users from infringement of their Fundamental Human Rights and ensures the application of those principles in the use and administration of digital platforms.

The Bill, which has passed the Second

Reading in the House seeks to prohibit unlawful interference with Digital Privacy (section 3), protects the right to communicate anonymously online (section 4) and guarantees the confidentiality of private data (section 6). Section 10 of the Bill- “Surveillance and Lawful Interception” attempts to temper the all too often powers of investigating authorities involved in intercepting personal data with proper scrutiny by mandating that such powers be exercised only under the authorisation of a Court Order and within the principles of necessity, without discrimination by gender, religion or political belief. Subsections 17 and 18 of the same section create a right to protection from sanctions for Whistleblowers and an entitlement to compensation for persons whose rights under the proposed law have been unlawfully impinged.

Coming to the issue of freedom of opinion online which was roused by the Frivolous Petitions Bill, section 12 stipulates that “Freedom to opinion and expression on the Internet shall not be subject to any restrictions, save as provided in the 1999 Constitution… and other relevant laws”. Section 16 then creates offences ranging from abuse of Data held Online, the Infringement of the Right to Free Opinion and Expression, Publishing of Hate Speech to Illegal Surveillance. The Bill also entrusts the administration of the proposed law to the National Human Rights Commission.

Resisting the Future There still remain many challenges to the Digital Rights of Nigerians today, not least of these is the dearth of telecommunications infrastructure to support the 2018 target of 30% broadband i.e. faster more encompassing internet technology, in Nigeria set by the Federal Government. Another less obvious attack on the gains made in the area of

Enabling Democracy Nonetheless, while the Digital Rights and Freedoms Bill may appear to be “another Bill” with little or no assurance of proper enforcement, what it does present is the foundation for the next frontier of the political conversation in Nigeria. Just like the Internet created a global market and removed the restraints of time and place, it is set to do the same for political involvement. “Why?” you may be tempted to ask, and obligingly, the answer is the availability of information.

Information enables scrutiny, it enables accountability and it informs decision-making.

Today the Freedom of Information Act, though still far from its full potential, sets the basis for demanding information from government offices and agencies. The Digital Rights and Freedoms Bill could become the next level of protection in that framework entrenching national and global interaction on all things including how we are governed and how government authority and resources are used. It simply means that the constraints of time and location are eradicated as savvy political movements take advantage of the Internet to reach their electorate and that electorate becomes more sophisticated in using the Internet to demand accountability and, even penalty for unacceptable levels of performance.

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, It is Online Sometimes it is hard to remember that unlike many nations the sovereign authority and decision making power in Nigeria belongs to the Nigerian people, not a monarch, not the President and not even the National Assembly. It is the God-given right of the people of this great nation. That power is only devolved to the Government for periods to be used in the people’s best interest, therefore it is imperative that we continue to remind ourselves of this fact by passing laws that support and entrench that reality. Today we struggle with questions of accountability, checks and balances, the use and abuse of power and the like because there is an absence of information. The Internet however, is the new frontier and the great equaliser where millions of Nigerians can soon go and with the click of a button demand for the type of governance they require. As we move closer to that time, we must endeavour to remember we become the choices we make, we are the Nigeria we create by what we do and no one will come to save us, unless we choose to do it ourselves. The rights and freedoms enshrined in the Constitution are ours and we ought to claim them. If you do not get an audience with your elected representatives, remember all you have to do is go online and there are millions there who will listen and join your hashtag.

13.09.2016

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PEARLS OF LAW SANDRA OKE

sandra.oke@norfolk-partners.com

Musical Works and Copyright Issues

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Introduction

he other day I watched a comical opera performance at the MUSON centre, it was clear that Nigerians are extremely talented, the soloists sang beautifully and the orchestra was brilliant.

We have many musicians who are very popular locally and internationally.

What is missing is an enabling environment to reach our full potential. The starting point should be the framework for the protection of our intellectual property rights.

Under the Copyright Act 2004 section (1) protects musical works while section (2) stipulates the conditions for eligibility for copyright protection which are originality and fixation- meaning that the work should be expressed in a definite medium. Section (5) confers a variety of rights on the author of a musical work i.e. reproduce the work in any material form; publish the work; perform the work in public; produce, reproduce, perform or publish any translation of the work; make any cinematograph film or a record in respect of the work; distribute to the public, for commercial purposes, copies of the work, by way of rental, lease, hire, loan or similar arrangement; broadcast or communicate the work to the public by a loud speaker or any other similar device; make an adaptation of the work.

Currently our copyright act offers artists a traditional form of protection but the emphasis should be on the protection of their digital rights as well since the advent of the internet and illegal file sharing website pose new challenges for artists. The major issue that is being constantly battled by Nigerian artists is piracy especially digital piracy.

Artists have noted that their content is being used on digital media channels without their permission and being downloaded illegally.

Interesting Copyright Cases A pioneer case illustrating the danger of file-sharing websites is the well-known case of A&M RECORDS, INC. v NAPSTER, Inc. Napster was an early peer to peer file sharing network which could be used transmitting various files but was mainly popular for members to share files through MP3. Major record companies were affected by this arrangement and naturally brought an action against Napster for direct, contributory, and vicarious infringement of copyright in order to protect their intellectual property.

One of the defences raised by Napster was fair use, however, rejecting this argument the court held that Napster allowed repeated and exploitative copying. Additionally, songs were close to the core of the types of songs to be protected by copyright. Most importantly entire songs were downloaded which had a detrimental impact on album sales. The court also granted an injunction to prevent any future infringing activities. Years later music publishers went as far as suing Bertelsmann (a German Media Company) for supporting Napster with loans totalling $85 Million who agreed to pay the National Music Publishers Association $130 million to settle the Napster case’s final copyright claims. In the wake of the Napster case, many decentralised file sharing companies have emerged without a central server making it difficult for them to be traced and prosecuted. This makes it difficult to suggest that prosecuting illegal file sharing companies is the way to go in protecting copyright in the music industry.

A more cost effective approach is to hone digital channels such as iTunes, Facebook and Spotify for the benefit of artists with proper licensing agreements.

A major source of copyright litigation especially in developed countries is the sampling of songs without the author’s permission. Sampling has been described as the process of incorporating a portion

of another artist’s recording into a new recording. When a recording is sampled there is copyright infringement of the sound recording and the song itself.

Several American cases have dealt with the issue of sampling for example In TUFAMERICA, INC. v WARNER BROS. MUSIC CORP., et al. 67 F. Supp. 3d 590 (S.D.N.Y. 2014) TufAmerica alleged that the defendants sampled the word “oh” from their sound recording and used it more than forty times in the song “Run this Town” the district court stated that “we are concerned here with an alleged sample of a single syllable that is, at best, barely perceptible in the allegedly infringing works and that at best has only the most dubious claim to qualitative significance with respect to the allegedly infringed work.” Since that alleged copyright infringement was for the word “oh” the court held that single words and titles were not sufficiently original to be eligible for copyright protection.

Another major source of Litigation in the music industry is music plagiarism. This is the outright copying of another artist’s work while representing it as an original work. In

ROBBIN THICKE v MARVIN GAYE 2014 the estate of Marvin Gaye brought an action against Robbie Thicke, Pharrel Williams and rapper T.I and Universal Records for copying Marvin Gaye’s “Got to give it up”. A Los Angeles jury found them guilty of unlawfully copying "Got to Give It Up" and ordered them to pay Gaye’s family $7.3 million. The figure was later reduced to $5.3 million and the Gayes were awarded 50 percent of the song's future royalties. This is a landmark copyright case because apart from the fact that it involved a huge sum of money, other extraneous matters were put into consideration when the case was being decided such as studio arrangements, the strident walking bass and background chatter”. In an unprecedented move the court also stated that "Blurred Lines" aped the vibe of Gaye's song which ordinarily is beyond copyright protection.

Led Zeppelin’s case, in 2014 Mark Andes filed a case through his former bandmate’s estate California to prevent the reissue of Led Zeppelin’s fourth Album which included the song Stairway to heaven which he claimed infringed on their copyright. During the

trial, Led Zeppelin’s lawyers argued that the chord progression in question was very common and had been in use for more than 300 years. Conversely, the plaintiff's lawyers had argued that Led Zeppelin became familiar with Spirit's song after the two bands played at a club in Plant's hometown in Birmingham in 1970, a year before Stairway to Heaven was released in 1971.

The jury held that while California owned the copyright to “Taurus,” “there was no substantial similarity in the extrinsic elements of ‘Taurus’ and ‘Stairway to Heaven’.”

Conclusion Coming back to the Nigerian music industry, to create awareness about piracy, various artists held a rally on 1st September 2016 tagged “No music Day”. This is a step in the direction but judging from the sophistication of the cases discussed above we still have a long way to go in developing our jurisprudence in this area. Urgent steps need to be taken especially by improving our legal framework for the protection of artists’ rights so that we can encourage the talent we possess.

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13.09.2016

Sustaining the NBA Revolution Abdulrasheed Ibrahim

S

imilar to the Attahiru Jega Revolution or the APC Revolution of the 2015 General elections, there is no better way to describe the 2016 NBA elections at the national level but to call it a revolution. Without prejudice to the court cases challenging the validity or otherwise of the said elections, the decision will be left to our jurists on the bench before whom the cases are pending. The analysis here should not be seen as one trying to discuss matters that are sub-judice but rather as an analysis examining what makes the said election a unique one after several years of clamour by lawyers for the adoption of Universal adult suffrage that would enable every lawyer who has paid his Bar practising fee and branch dues determine the leadership of the association rather than through the old delegate system once described as the “tyranny of minority”. This old delegate system has gone with all its ills with the last electronic voting that paved way for the new NBA leadership. If this new regime of e-voting is sustained, it means that lawyers in Nigeria are saying good bye to the old regime which in the past had encouraged an unnecessary rat race among the contestants for NBA leadership, engaging an unscrupulous display of wealth wherein at the end the highest bidder would eventually win the day.

Under the old regime, the Chairmen of various branches of the association were the king makers who after having had their hands greased monetarily by the various contestants would handpick delegates that would dance to their tunes and vote for their respective favoured candidates. Our previous elections at the national level had been nothing but a product of cash and carry politics. This system brought nothing but gross injustice to the NBA electoral system. In the 2014 NBA election, the Lagos branch of the association that often claims to be the premier bar and having the largest membership in the federation with about 5000 members was made to produce only 34 delegates for the election while the Abuja branch that could not boast half of such membership was allotted 47 delegates in the said election and all in all only about 2000 lawyers out of about 100,000 lawyers determined the leadership of the NBA in that year’s election. Can there be any tyranny of minority than this?

During my tenure as the Publicity Secretary of the Lagos branch of the association, I had cause to engage many of our colleagues in discussion as to why they were not showing interest in the activities of the NBA as many did not consider it necessary to attend the NBA branch’s monthly general meeting. Many of them were unanimous and the reason given was that, the association whether at the branch or national level was not adding value to their law practice, which was the reason they (not until very recently when the stamp and seal was made mandatory on all documents prepared by lawyers) were not paying their bar practicing fees and branch dues. Until very recently, it was the Bar politicians who were seeking elective offices in the branches that paid branch dues for many lawyers especially during election years for the purpose of being voted for during elections. The recent innovations and development in the Nigerian Bar Association has actually put a serious check on all these ills including issuance of backdated receipts in those days when dues were not being paid to the banks.

The introduction of electronic voting into the NBA electoral system is indeed revolutionary as this will go a long way in encouraging many lawyers who have reservations towards the NBA to reconsider their position and become very active in NBA activities.

Unlike what happened under the old regime of voting, every eligible lawyer now has the right to vote for any candidate of their choice even in the comfort of their homes or offices in any part of the world as long as they have access to the internet and follow the laid down instructions and procedure. Although there may be some challenges here or there all this will be overcome by the passage of time as we improve on the system. From the report on the last election through electronic voting, the lawyers who were eligible to vote were 24,305 out of which 11,646 updated their records, 6,932 were accredited to vote and only 5442 lawyers voted to determine the winners of the elections. Considering this development, one is of the view that with a better understanding of the system, awareness and readiness of eligible lawyers to exercise their franchise, participation in the future elections as well as the result therefrom will be very encouraging and impressive.

With the emergence of Abubakar Balarabe Mahmoud, SAN as the NBA President, one must say that this is a new beginning for the Nigerian Bar Association. While one must commend the former president for his laudable achievements and for living

NBA President, A. B. Mahmoud SAN

up to some of his electoral promises particularly that of the insurance scheme and making electronic voting a reality. His regime may not have been devoid of lapses, but his successor must identify those lapses, try his best to address them and build or consolidate on his predecessor’s good achievements. One of these apparent lapses is the incessant failure of the successive regimes in the handling of the conference materials.

It is not good for lawyers having paid through their noses, not to have the best conference materials to show for their money. Lessons should be learnt from how international conferences are being organised.

The Nigerian Bar Association whether at the national or branch level is being plagued with several problems, in the past most NBA Presidents and Chairmen at branch level behaved like emperors. Godfatherism, dictatorship, favouritism and nepotism, selfishness, usurpation of powers and duties of other executives, “holier than thou” attitude, corruption and lack of accountability among others characterised NBA leadership. This is why most times there are disagreements among the executives and much is not achieved at the end of the day. The new NBA president and others in similar positions must avoid all these vices. Also there is a position in every branch of the association usually referred to as Branch Representative at the NEC, apart from the incumbent branch Chairman and Secretary, one is of the view that this position should be subject to election rather than allowing the immediate past Chairman to automatically step into that position.

This will allow for transparency and accountability so that if there are issues that need to be clarified by the immediate past Chairman regarding his stewardship while in office, his new position as NEC representative will not hinder this.

The new NBA leadership must listen to the complaints of members and non- members. These complaints must be investigated. This is one of the ways to avoid unnecessary litigations against the association by any aggrieved individual. I write and speak from experience. Sometime in 2005, I applied to the then electoral committee of the Lagos branch of the association to contest for the post of Assistant Publicity Secretary in that year’s election, having paid all the necessary fees and met all the requirement only to be told by the committee that the position I applied for was unknown to the bye law of the branch and as such my application was not processed. I protested and even sent a letter to the NBA at the national level.

I was tempted to go to court to file an originating application praying for the interpretation of the section that stipulated the composition of the executives. On second thoughts I decided not to go to court since I had no other motive than to serve the bar. I had to wait till 2013 to contest for the position of Publicity Secretary which I won un-opposed. The lesson for us all is not to be desperate. A loser today may become a winner tomorrow. We should all learn a good lesson from the experience of President Muhammadu Buhari

and Abraham Lincoln of America who after several failed attempts eventually found their way into the presidency.

The legal profession is being confronted with a lot of problems that the new leadership of the NBA will need to find solutions to. If the truth must be told there are many inactive judges on the judicial bench while at the bar there are a lot of lawyers engaging in unscrupulous activities. Many judicial officers today are very lazy and are not interested in the work they are assigned to do. Sitting in court very late or not sitting at all without just cause, refusing to deliver rulings and judgments as at when due. Some judicial officers even go to the extreme of collecting bribes to deliver unjust rulings or judgments contrary to the judicial oaths they took. Many lawyers today particularly senior lawyers are the ones determining the judges that would hear their matters while some even write rulings and judgments for judges. Some lawyers elevated to the bench are still not content with what they are earning on the bench but still engage in the hidden practice of law rather than leaving their former briefs and clients to other lawyers. All this is not unconnected with the fact that the consideration for appointment to the bench is now based on who you know and not on the ground that those who get appointed know the law or have the zeal for the job. A judicial officer who really has the zeal for the job will not be sitting in court anytime it pleases him or fail to imbibe the attributes of a good judicial officer. If all these problems persist, a time will come when people will begin to take laws into their hands rather than going to court to ventilate their grievances. Well since the new leadership has promised a good fight in this direction, one hopes that a clean judiciary and legal profession as promised by the Brave New Bar will actually be a reality.

The struggle for living and survival by lawyers particularly the young ones today equally needs the serious attention of the new NBA leadership. The problem facing young lawyers has been aptly captured

by Professor Tahir Mamman, a former Director General of the Nigerian Law School when he said that: “My heart bleeds for young lawyers in Nigeria who are facing profound survival issues. A lot cannot find job and many who are in chambers are paid slave wages.

These to me are the critical problems before the Bar and legal profession”. In reality, one’s heart bleeds when one witnesses joblessness and the struggle for survival which has in recent times increased the number of lawyers who are involved in what is popularly referred to as “charge and bail” practice or “ambulance chasing” as it is called in America. Some lawyers have even gone to the extreme of “playing ball” with policemen at the police stations by conniving with them to exploit their supposed clients whose interest they ought to protect.

Abdulrasheed Ibrahim is the former Publicity Secretary, NBA Lagos Branch

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

BUSINESSWORLD

ENERGY

Malo: Renewable Energy is the Way Out of Nigeria’s Power Deficit Ify Malo, the immediate past senior policy advisor on energy, regulations and partnerships to former power minister, Prof. Chinedu Nebo, leads the Power for All in Nigeria, a global advocacy network for renewable energy usage in countries with chronic energy shortage. She told Chineme Okafor in this interview that renewable energy is best way out of Nigeria’s protracted electricity challenges. Excerpts: in the policy. A policy just sets out targets but when there is an action plan, you have what is to be done on a step-by-step process to attain the goals.

I understand we have a draft action document that is yet to be passed, again, I understand they probably have to take into consideration the views of stakeholders but one of the things we want to see in that action document is that there is inclusiveness in the plan so that the benefits of having renewables is spread across the country so that everybody understands that it can work for them.

What does Power for All do, and why are you in Nigeria?

Power for All is a global campaign organisation, and we are a non-profit organisation; completely donor funded by the Department for International Development (DFID), which is our major funder and a few other private foundations. Our core mission is to drive and promote for decentralised renewable energy usage in all of the markets that we operate in.

This is premised on the fact that there are currently one billion people in the world without electricity, and a good chunk of that number is in sub-Saharan Africa. We believe that renewable energy is the only way that sub-Saharan African countries like Nigeria can accelerate energy access and alleviate energy poverty to make sure we are getting to parity when it comes with electrification rates with other developed countries.

In Nigeria, I create that collective voice to help shape policies and ideas to drive projects within the country in the area of decentralised renewable energy deployment.

You mean your organisation is strictly focused on accelerating projects, not execution?

Yes, that is what we do. We work with a lot of stakeholders who are project developers in the renewable energy sector, one of the things we believe is that part of the problems of renewable energy and solar especially is that it has gotten a bad rap in Nigeria and this has created some level of mistrust of solar technology within the market and while we have these developers doing amazing jobs electrifying rural and semiurban communities, their stories are not being told and because they are not getting the kind of publicity they require, they are not doing enough projects that can help them to scale to market or that can bring more investments.

Our job really is help these project developers tell their stories, provide case studies, talk about how this is benefitting people and how it is creating social impact cascades across the communities they work in so that in another way it can help investors see what is going in in Nigeria and push them bring in money to support these developers. That is what we do in terms of project development in Nigeria, we don’t go ahead to execute projects.

Could it be that the bad rap on solar and renewables came from their reported fickleness?

There is a perception based on projects that were done in the past which were poorly executed that solar does not work, and the reasons some of those projects did not work was either because they were given to inexperienced contractors who shouldn’t have gotten those sort of jobs in the first place, and were not technically competent, or installations were put in place and people went ahead to vandalise them and after a while they stopped working so that became the narrative people ran with that solar is not dependable.

However, we have seen countries that have completely run their systems on solar for more than one year as a test model, and if a whole country can run on solar even if they are as small as one Nigerian state, then we should have states here that are completely off grid and on solar because the technology is improving fast and we believe there states that can benefit from this.

Can industrial hubs of countries run on solar or renewables?

When you have countries like Germany and Sweden running on solar that presupposes that their manufacturing outfits run on solar.

Germany is far ahead in terms of how they have deployed solar, and they are showing what is possible.

Malo There are developers in Germany that are doing micro grids that can cover huge demands of electricity in terms of megawatts, and I am talking about utility scale solar power deployment which is almost as much as what you can get using gas.

What we focus on however in Power for All is smaller parts, the stand-alone systems that can be used in homes because we believe those are the sort things that can scale quickly in Nigeria and be beneficial to its people, we are not against the big renewable projects though, we in fact believe there is a ready market for them here, but we think we can move quicker with the small stand-alone systems for homes and people who have not really enjoyed good power supply.

But solar or renewable is said to be quite expensive to deploy to home?

There is a high capital one-off cost that is associated with deploying solar technology, that is true, however, there also policy measures that can be put in place to drive this down.

In some of the east African markets, what the governments have done is to put zero tariffs when it comes to anything that has to do with solar technology – the batteries, panels, or components for the technology.

In Nigeria, we have zero duty for panels and about 25 per cent duty for batteries.

Unfortunately, we don’t distil between deep cycle batteries which we use for cars and solar batteries and that creates a high cost.

If we can get to the level that the eastern Africa market has got to and say zero tariff to anything associated with solar, it will greatly drive the cost down and that is some of the advocacy we want to begin to drive with the government.

The government isn’t interested in subsidy for solar, can such duty free policies help scale its use in the country?

I honestly think so because one of the things about policies is that they have the ability to shape markets in very granular ways and it will remove a lot of bottlenecks that most of the developers that are doing projects across the country are facing. It will provide clarity about what their overhead costs are and

what kind of costs get passed down to the consumers eventually.

I believe that getting to a zero duty regime will certainly make the market a lot cheaper but also, I think developers can begin to think of creative ways of how to scale to market.

There is something called securitisation in this market that we beginning to try to get people to look at. The PPAs are one way but the smaller companies that are doing smaller projects don’t have that luxury, we want to see if there is way to bring them together to begin to so bigger projects.

What are some of the significant challenges that promoters have shared with you?

There are two things – access to finance and access to market. Access to finance is exactly what we talked about, the ability for them to go to banks in their Nigeria to support their businesses isn’t there. Banks are lending in double digits with paybacks not in long terms. This creates a lot of barriers of entry because the market itself is not developed.

The other is access to market. Our geographical spread as a country makes us a very large market and some of the elements for generating renewable energy differ from place to place and so while there is a lot of sunlight in the north, that might not be the case with the south or in the middle belt that is actually very windy.

It is all about understanding these and penetrating them, as well as overcoming some issues to access to market. We haven’t seen an overriding policy that can make it easy for people to go through some of these, everybody has to do it on an ad-hoc basis, which is why we have an association for the sector – the Renewable Energy Association (REA), so that they can go as a collective voice to negotiate these issues with the governments, banks, lenders or even communities and then there will be much more crosscutting collaboration in this.

If this sort of clarity isn’t within the country’s renewable energy policy, what’s its use then?

The policy is one thing and every policy has its objectives and action plan which lays out the step by step metrics to reach the goals

Are we just waking up to the potentials of renewables?

Well, there is the potential but no communication and this is where my organisation comes in. we are hoping to ramp up that publicity because we believe there is a lot that has been done in this market and a lot is yet to be done.

Most of the news around renewable gets overshadowed with what is happening with our grid and because we have relied on the grid so far to supply us electricity, it has become a new whenever anything happens to it. We are hoping to shift a bit from that because there is lot going on currently with the grid that isn’t helping with our electricity.

Renewables are not competing with the grid but can go along with it to help increase electricity penetration in the country. We can quickly get to 10,000 megawatts with renewables and these are some of the targets we get to hear.

We also want to begin to let people know that they can trust this technology when people see case studies and how it has helped people.

When compared with rates of regular power supply, how much will it cost a Nigerian home to go off-grid?

Well, quite interesting. We get asked this all the time but the simple answer is that Nigerians are already paying a lot to generate their own electricity, they probably don’t know this.

When you do a modelling cost of how much you use for electricity both from alternative sources as well, you will see what the cost comes to say in a year. Solar is actually cheaper, the only challenge is that you need that high one-off cost to pay for it and which is what a lot of people struggle for.

That is why we talk about consumer financing to the market, working with the banks to create products that people can go and get just the same way they can get loans for anything and be servicing it for a period. There are churches in Nigeria that have already moved off-grid because it doesn’t make sense for them to continue on the same system that has not really worked.

Nigerian can pay, they are already paying and I think the only concern is that one-off payment, so that leaves out the doubt that this can work in Nigeria.

Are you able to assess the power sector, you’ve being around here for a while now?

I think the problems in the sector remain and have in recent times escalated with what is happening with our gas production. This creates a huge opportunity now for solar to become the mainstream. The government should consider this and most specifically decentralise renewable as a way to begin to pivot from grid and gas connected electricity because some of the issues with our gas probably won’t be solved in short or medium term, this need long term solutions and Nigerian cannot wait further.

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

BUSINESSWORLD

INDUSTRY

Linking Agriculture to Industries for Economic Growth

Harvestplus, Agriculture and Rural Management Training Institute of Nigeria equip farmers with skills to contribute to the nation’s much needed agro-allied industry development Crusoe Osagie reports When the federal government and many states were drawing out maps to diversify the economy from oil many years ago, not many envisaged that the Nigerian economy would be in the bad shape it is today. Regrettably, not only has the country’s stubborn reliance on oil proceeds crippled many states in the wake of fall in prices, the economy has, according to the latest data from the National Bureau of Statistic (NBS) entered a recession, having recorded fall in Gross Domestic Growth (GDP) in two consecutive quarters.

But there were telltale signs of the doom beforehand. Aside the slide in oil prices, a rapacious appetite for foreign goods, indolence in implementing far-reaching policies on the economy and a penchant to sermonise rather than take calculated actions to stem the tide, analyst argue, are responsible for Nigeria’s predicament.

Specifically, for a long time, despite calls to the contrary, investments and policy to drive integrated growth by, among other things, linking the agriculture to industrial sector suffered, as Nigeria threw its gates open for importation of goods that many manufacturers believe could have been produced locally if farmers were better organised and supported.

So, to salvage the situation, in the light of the conundrum Nigeria has found itself, efforts are being made to recalibrate and re-establish relationships that exist between farmers and industries, such that farmers are better equipped, organised and supported to engage with relevant stakeholders in the value chain of their commodities. This, many experts believe, would not only achieve the drive for diversification but address food security.

One of such efforts in this direction is to change the orientation of farmers on how they run their farms, equipping them with the right knowledge and tools to see their farms not just as viable business entities, but as an integral part of the value chain of the expansive agro-allied industries.

Many of these industries need farmers’ produce as raw materials for production.

This thinking influenced the recent workshop and trip organised by Agriculture and Rural Management Training Institute of Nigeria (ARMTI), Ilorin, to the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), to expose farmers to the technologies, partnerships, and strategies necessary for maximisation of value chains of their commodities. The farmers numbered about 100 and were drawn from Ogun and Oyo States.

HarvestPlus Nigeria facilitated the training on strategies for packaging and marketing products to the final consumers and produce processing, which included a tour of the cassava processing facility in the IITA campus.

Consultant on value-chain development to ARMTI, Professor Emmanuel Lufadeju said not only do farmers require training on best agronomic practices to improve yield on their farms, they also needed to learn about the business of farming, which was critical if they are to make the best of the value chain of the crops they are growing.

He noted that the farmers were trained on the value chain of different agricultural commodities, including maize, cassava, yam, poultry, and fisheries, adding “Everybody is geared towards farming now. They have the opportunity to see various options in terms of production, processing, and marketing. They have the opportunity to make some decisions by themselves and write proposals for funding.

They are very happy. Some of them are seeing the facilities for the first time; many of them haven’t been to IITA before. They already have farms. What we are advising them to do is to organise themselves into cooperatives, put up a proposal and look for funding from industries and agencies that need and promote agriculture, respectively. Our purpose here is to expose them.

We expect that as they are going home, they would form themselves into groups, decide on what to do and then seek assistance.”

Noting that the effort would not be complete

Cassava without government’s support, he argued that a different approached should be adopted to disburse funds to farmers who have formed themselves into cooperatives and are linked to a commodities value chain.

According to him, “We are aware that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Bank of Agriculture (BOA) had funds set aside for agriculture and assist farmers. We are also aware that some of those funds cannot be accessed by the farmers because of stringent collaterals.

So we have a different view. We want funding to be within the agricultural value chain itself and less of it coming through the banks. We are working on how to pass that on to the government. It is those who are practicing agriculture that needs to be facilitated, not the commercial banks. They have to design a way by which big players in agriculture, the off-takers, can be given funds to give their growers at the farm level. This is because they are linked, and if these industries don’t facilitate the farmers, of course, they will not get the raw materials.”

For the Country Manager, HarvestPlus, Paul Ilona, the need to link farmers to industries who require their produce is key to enriching farmers, building sustainable businesses and improving the livelihood of rural dwellers, who benefit more from cooperatives.

He said that farmers would start to make meaningful impact on Nigeria’s GDP when they work as groups in cooperatives, so that they not only have better access to funds but also cultivate more land, a development, he noted, would help in improving food security and reducing the country’s frightening food import bill.

“Much as poor, rural households farm to feed themselves, agriculture shouldn’t necessarily be about feeding just your family. Farmers should approach it as a business. They should

be managers, allocating resources as efficiently as possible. When this happens they would be making more money and even employ more people,” he added.

One of the trainees and a cassava farmer in Oyo State, Oyelakin Folorunsho, said he was happy for the initiative, as it afforded farmers an opportunity to learn methods on how to improve their farming. Noting that the team would form cooperatives in their respective localities, he said, “With such structure, we

For the Country Manager, HarvestPlus, Paul Ilona, the need to link farmers to industries who require their produce is key to enriching farmers, building sustainable businesses and improving the livelihood of rural dwellers, who benefit more from cooperatives

would be able to link up with each other and to assist each other in the challenges we are facing. One of the challenges we are facing as farmers are the inability to access capital. We are hoping that when we form the cooperative, we would have better standing to approach funding agencies, such as the Bank of Agriculture (BOA).”

For Opeyemi Ayomide, Orile ilugun, Ogun State, learning about produce marketing has exposed her to the array of business that feed off the farm products, adding, “I have discovered that apart from fufu and garri, there are many other things that I can do with cassava, such as confectionaries, sweeteners, paper, cellotape, baby food and other things that I never thought about before now. I have also learned a lot about the vitamin A fortified varieties. I have learned about their functions and why it is important for us to grow them.”

She added, “In processing cassava into garri, for storage and marketing, I have learned the different steps and procedures to take to guide against wastage and loss. I have learned about the value chain, and that everything starts with what the consumer wants, how and when they want it; it is also important to consider how to plant, process and package the produce.

We also need to know the consumers we are selling to before we decide to plant.”

For Motunrayo Adesanya, from Remo North Local Government in Ogun State, forming cooperatives is the way to go because farmers cannot keep waiting for government to give them money, noting, “As a young person, I would also encourage others to tap into this idea, especially those who are idle and in search of jobs. We cannot all get white collar jobs. In fact, someone has to employ others. So, it is better to leverage any point in the value chain would help people in creating employment and also sustaining them.”

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

BUSINESSWORLD

INDUSTRY

Nigerian Leaders, Others Discuss African Investment Opportunities at China Summit Crusoe Osagie The promotion of investment cooperation in Africa was the topic of a high-level forum on investment in Africa held in Xiamen on the sidelines of the 2016 China International Fair for Investment and Trade.

Nigerian participants along with others across the continent recognised the Programmes for Country Partnership, which the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) is currently implementing in Ethiopia and Senegal, as a successful assistance model.

Each programme is a multistakeholder partnership which

aims to increase large-scale public and private investment in order to accelerate national industrial development agendas.

Co-organised by UNIDO, the Ministry of Commerce and the Fujian Provincial Government of China, the forum brought together senior decision-makers from China, Ethiopia, Nigeria and Senegal, as well as representatives from the private sector, academia and other international agencies.

Participants highlighted the significant contribution of industry to job creation and poverty eradication, calling it “a motor for overall growth and prosperity”, and for the

achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals in Africa and globally. They stressed that governments need to create an enabling environment for investors, and that localisation strategies and environmental protection need to be highlighted. The need to increase investment in high-value added activities and sectors in order to provide opportunities for social inclusion was also emphasised.

Such investments support gender equality, empower women and girls, and create decent employment for young people.

This in turn will contribute to long-term growth and structural change in Africa.

The forum was organised in support of the recently adopted United Nations General Assembly resolution on the Third Industrial Development Decade for Africa, and the recently endorsed G20 Initiative on Supporting Industrialisation in Africa and Least Developed Countries. Speaking at the event, LI Yong, the Director General of UNIDO, stressed that the Organisation, which is mandated to promote and accelerate inclusive and sustainable industrial development, has for many years been implementing technical cooperation projects and promoting investment across Africa. UNIDO’s flagship

Programmes for Country Partnership have already achieved impressive results since their launch in 2014, said Li. At the event, UNIDO also presented a new report on growth identification and facilitation for industrial upgrading and diversification, prepared in collaboration with the National School of Development at Peking University.

The report, written by a team led by former World Bank Chief Economist, Professor Justin Lin, examines Senegal’s key sectors and provides recommendations for achieving “quick wins” based on international market opportunities. It is a

key component of UNIDO’s Programme for Country Partnership for Senegal. As a follow-up to the event in Xiamen, two upcoming events will also provide platforms to present specific investment opportunities in Africa. From 5 to 7 October, the International Agro-Industry Investment Forum will be held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and from 14 to 15 November, Dakar, Senegal, will host UNIDO’s fifth Inclusive and Sustainable Industrial Development Forum.

During the Xiamen Fair an exhibition on UNIDO-China cooperation was also held to mark the Organisation’s 50th anniversary.

Desertification: FG Donates 3,000 Tree Seedlings to Katsina College Patrick Ugeh in Abuja

UPLIFTING EDUCATION STANDARD

L-R: Head, IT Business, Samsung Electronics, Rotimi Agboola; Chairman, Braced Commission, Ambassador Joseph Keshi; Deputy Governor, Akwa Ibom State, Mr. Moses Frank Ekpo; Commissioner for Education, Aniekan Akpan; Managing Director, Etiam Global and partner to Samsung Electronics, Mc Anthony Nduka Eze, at the commissioning of smart classroom in Uyo, donated by Samsung to the state...recently

Food Prices Rise as Global Training Agricultural Harvest Prospects Improve Researchers to Be More Cereal Crops Gender-responsive Staple food prices rose in August even as grain prices fell and the outlook for global production of rice, wheat and maize improved.

The current Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Food Price Index released weekend averaged 165.6 points in August, up 1.9 per cent from July and almost 7 per cent from a year earlier. The monthly jump was mostly driven by cheese and palm oil quotations, while those for wheat, maize and rice all fell.

FAO raised considerably its world cereal production forecast for 2016 to 2 566 million tonnes, up 22 million tonnes from July projections. FAO’s Cereal Supply and Demand Brief, also released today, attributed the increase primarily to anticipation of a record global wheat harvest this year and a large upward revision to this year’s maize crop in the United States of America. The expected increase in grain output is forecast to boost inventories and push up the global stock-to-use ratio to 25.3 percent, an “even more comfortable (supply and demand) situation than predicted at the start of the season,” FAO said.

Coarse grain global output for 2016 should be around 1

329 million tonnes, 2.1 percent higher than in 2015, buoyed by higher forecast maize output in several countries, in particular the U.S. The wheat output forecast was also raised to 741 million tonnes, driven by large upward revisions to projections for Australia, North America, India and the Russian Federation.

Russia is poised to become the world’s largest wheat exporter in 2016/17, overtaking the European Union, where wet weather has hampered this year’s crops. Rice production is also expected to hit a new record this year at almost 496 million tonnes, owing to favourable weather conditions in much of Asia and on more U.S. farmers shifting to the crop as a result of its more attractive relative price.

FAO did not materially change its forecast for world cereal utilisation in the coming year, which is expected to grow by 1.6 per cent, led by maize and to some extent lower-quality wheat supplies - used as animal feed. The FAO trade forecast for cereals in 2016/17 has been scaled up by almost 9 million tonnes on the back of abundant export availabilities of wheat and coarse grains.

The issue of gender sensitivity will top the agenda as 16 trainers and 11 teams of 33 researchers from four continents will participate in a training on “Gender Responsive Root, Tuber, and Banana Breeding,” from 12-21 September in Kampala, Uganda.

According to a statement released by the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), this first of seven training on the theory and practice of gender-responsive research is organised by agricultural theme and offered in a joint Cornell University and Makerere University educational project called GREAT, or Gender-responsive Researchers Equipped for Agricultural Transformation.

In GREAT, researchers who work in sub-Saharan Africa learn how to identify the needs of both women and men when setting agricultural project priorities, implementing projects, and measuring and communicating outcomes.

“In sub-Saharan Africa, the livelihood and food security of a majority of people depends to some extent on roots, tubers and bananas, especially in rural areas,” said Margaret Mangheni, an associate professor at Makerere University who has

more than 20 years’ experience with gender-sensitive agricultural development projects in sub-Saharan Africa, and leads the project at Makerere.

“GREAT training will improve the outcomes of agricultural research for smallholder women farmers, entrepreneurs and farmer organizations across sub-Saharan Africa.”

In the “Gender Responsive Root, Tuber and Banana Breeding,” or RTB course, research teams focus on challenges like banana bunchy top disease, banana xanthomonas wilt, cassava breeding and processing, potato production, banana breeding, micronutrient enhanced cassava, and sweet potato improvement.

“GREAT works to equitably extend the benefits of agricultural research to both women and men,” said Hale Ann Tufan, adjunct professor with International Programs in Cornell University’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, who leads the five-year project at Cornell. “Our goal is for agricultural researchers working across sub-Saharan Africa to improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers by considering gender and prioritizing gender equality goals in their work.”

The Director General National Agency for the Great Green Wall (NAGGW), Mr. Goni Ahmed, has taken the fight against desertification to schools.

To this end, he has donated 3,000 fruit tree seedlings on behalf of the agency in support of the development of the orchard of Yusufu Bala Usman College of Legal and General Studies, Daura, Katsina state.

This was contained in a statement issued yesterday

by Larai Daze, Head, Press and Public Relations Unit of NAGGW. Ahmed said that building effective synergy with all stakeholders was critical to the attainment of the Great Green Wall, GGW, set goals, among which is checking desertification.

He further said the GGW programme is an expression of commitment and a strategy adopted by African leaders, supported by international community and development partners to fast tract the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s) to roll back poverty and address the specific risks and vulnerabilities, in our drylands.

He added that though the challenges ahead in our drylands are tremendous, all stakeholders should strive to ultimately eliminate poverty by creating wealth within the catchment areas.

According to him, the GGW programme also serves as a launching pad for achieving zero net land degradation target agreed by world leaders at the Rio+20 Conference in Brazil.

He said that Nigeria is committed to achieving the target and also implement the resolutions adopted by country parties to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) which Nigeria consented in 1997.

Represented by Mr. Abdullaziz Kolo, Head, Land Resource Management, (NAGGW), the DG said these in a keynote address during the flag-off of the college’s green project.

He said the event provides an opportunity for the NAGGW to further sensitise the populace on the need to protect the environment and build support for the programme, adding that flagging off the institution’s Green Project is timely and an initiative that should be commended, encouraged and emulated by other institutions of higher learning.

He said it is a step in the right direction in the effort to address the problem of land degradation and desertification in drylands area of Nigeria.

He said the NAGGW has introduced school outreach programmes to support and encourage such initiatives as well as establishment of GGW clubs in selected Secondary Schools within the frontline states with the aim of training students on how to raise seedlings, plant and nurture them to maturity.

Ahmed added that Daura Emirate has always been one of the important areas that the agency has made interventions over the years, noting that kilometres of shelterbelt, hectares of orchards had been established and boreholes drilled in ten communities as well as a comprehensive skill acquisition centre in Sandamu Forest Reserve a few kilometres from Daura Town for the training of people in various vocations and crafts to improve their livelihood.

He sought the goodwill and support of traditional rulers, community leaders, women and youth leaders, students, members of the academia, civil society organisations, NGO’s and other stakeholders in mobilising community members and also urged state Governments to support the implementation of the GGW programme in their domain.

Earlier, the Provost, Yusufu Bala Usman College of Legal and General Staudies, Daura, Prof. Sadiya Sani Daura, said the concept of the Green project was borne out of the aggressive attempts of the College towards restoration through a systematic, synergistic approach occasioned by a repositioning initiative.

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

BUSINESSWORLD

SMALL BUSINESS SOLUTIONS

Establishing Polyethylene Bags Production Plant Uba Godwin writes on the need for the establishment of more polyethylene bag plants in Nigeria, to meet the high demand for the product Polyethylene bags or shopping bags are needed in all household, food centers, community trades, drycleaners, restaurants, bookshops, food processing centers, packaging firms, supermarkets, petty traders, bakeries to mention but a few. They serve also as a venue for corporate advertisement.

Different sizes, shapes and colors are seen and used for different purposes.

The demand for this product is very extensive and occurs on a daily basis. It is therefore imperative that the supply must be sustained to satisfy the ever- increasing demand. Market survey reveals that there is a high demand by Nigerian businessmen and ECOWAS traders also come to Nigeria to buy in very large quantities.

This means that more investors into this line of enterprises will carve a niche for themselves readily.

The raw material required for this project, which are abundant locally, include polythene sheets or basic petrochemical products such as Escorene, Luplen, Dow, and B.A.S.F etc. Polythene sheets may be obtained from extruders who produce low-density or high-density polythene materials.

The petrochemical product mentioned above can be obtained and extruded at a token fee.

They can be obtained from chemical dealers or the NNPC. The required machinery and equipment for the project are Nylon cutting and sealing machine, hanger, scissors, transformers, punching blades and the punching machine.

Locally fabricated machine & equipment are recommended for this project and will be supplied to prospective investors on demand.

These machines are very strong and compact enough and may be installed in a room measuring about 12ft x 12ft.

This implies that the project can take off in just a room.

The production process is very simple. The nylon cutting and sealing machine are set to the required dimensions. This will depend on the size of nylon product the investor may want to have at a time e.g. bread wrappers, shopping

Polyethylene Bags Production Plant bags, laundry packs etc. The polythene sheets are then fixed on the hangers and drawn into the machine after which they are cut and sealed automatically when pressed with the foot or automatic cutting & sealing machines.

For shopping bags, the produced materials are then packed into hundreds into the punching machine, which can punch up to 300 bags at a time, thereby opening up handles for the bags.

The decoration printer is then used to make the desired inscriptions.

The products are the packed into bigger polythene bags and sold a wholesale basis.

The project can be located in any part of the country. The basic factors to put into consideration

when setting up the plant is, firstly, how to ensure that trained hands are employed. Secondly, the project is to be set up in strategic area, especially in highly populated zones.

Thirdly, ensure that there is regular supply of electricity, since this is a very small project, it can as well be combined with another cottage enterprises if there is sufficient funds.

Financial benefits from the project are attractive. With a total investment of about N10 million total of over N125, 000 000.00 turnover is envisaged within the first year of operation.

The gross profit (projected) should be N37.7 million by the 2nd year of operation. This figure would increase to about N258.24 million by the

5th year. The projected cash flows, Return on Investment and Payback period, based on our analysis are very impressive.

Detailed structure of the production processes, Including personnel and manpower requirements, Plant layout, Raw materials sourcing, Marketing Techniques etc, will be embodied in a Comprehensive Feasibility Report for interested investors.

Uba Godwin Global Trust Consulting, 56, Ishaga Road (1st floor), Surulere, Lagos Tel: 08034494437, 08023664368, 09093939140 E-mail: ubagodwin@yahoo.com

Techplus 2016 Records One Billion Social Media Coverage Organisers of Techplus 2016, a technology conference and exhibition, which ended recently in Lagos, said it recorded twelve thousand delegate registrations, with over one billion cross-platform digital impressions. From the record number of registrants, the event achieved about 70 per cent attendance with eight thousand attendees converging to learn from a record number of 90 seasoned speakers/panelists lined up for the three day event.

Participants also exploited

huge opportunities created by the conference for networking and exchange of ideas.

The relevance of the annual conference was unveiled at the opening ceremony by the Chairperson, Alliance for Affordable Internet, Dr. Omobola Johnson.

Speaking at event Johnson stated that developments in technology are fundamentally altering the way people live, connect, communicate and transact. These developments, in her view, have had profound effects on

economic development in Nigeria and Africa at large.

According to her, to promote tech advancement, developing countries should invest in quality education for youth, continuous skills training for workers and managers; for all stakeholders to understand the importance of the continuous revolution.” Another dignitary, who spoke at the event, was the Lagos State Commissioner for Science and Technology, Mr. OlufemiOdubiyi. He noted that access and application of technology has become quite

critical in today’s society. He also stressed that service and technology are the differentiators between countries that are able to tackle poverty effectively by growing and developing their economies, and those that are lagging behind.

The commissioner was represented by the Director of Computer Service in the state, Mr. JideAdenuga.

The Managing Director of Connect Marketing Services, organisers of the event, Mr. TunjiAdeyinka, noted that,

TechPlus has come at the right time to tap into the buzz surrounding technology in the country.

His words: “We see our platform as a catalyst which will bring together the entire ecosystem together.

When we started we were looking to create a platform that would allow companies, individuals and businesses in the tech space to bring together customers, clients and for all players to showcase their products and services. Before now, we had lots of talk shops,

but this event is meant to be a practical opportunity to talk about technology and feel the impact that technology has on different parts of our lives.”

“From government’s increasing commitment to the development of the ICT sector, to the rapid emergence of innovation hubs and incubators across the country, it is clear that technology is on the brink of revolutionising the African continent and TechPlus is gravitating towards becoming a key part of this great effort,” the organisers said.

graduates empowered with both academic excellence and ICTdriven professional competences for both the employment and self- employment industry.

Akano equally recapped that the programme would further serve to augment the Webometric ranking of the university, since the training infrastructure to be supplied

by New Horizons including, 100 computers, smart interactive boards, networking, original high-end software, and top international professional skills and certifications like: Androids, Robotics, CISA, Oracle, Java Programming,

Multimedia, Information Security, among others, constitute variables that will boost the IT-driven stance of Caleb University as part of the global ranking metrics.

Akano said such strategic collaboration has been confirmed to be working through the relative edge that products from notable universities like Babcock, Bowen, Redeemer, Salem, Lead City, Adeleke, Mkar, Samuel Adegboyega, and others that have deployed such international professional schemes, are having good time with employers both nationally and internationally.

New Horizons, Caleb Varsity Sign MoU on ICT Certifications Caleb, a foremost Nigerian Private University and New Horizons, a leading largest ICT training institution have signed memorandum of understanding (MoU) with a view to integrating international ICT and e-business certifications into the university’s academic curricular.

At the MoU signing event in the University recently, the Vice Chancellor, Professor DijiAina was full of excitement at the great opportunities, which the programme will primarily accord the students, irrespective of their academic disciplines, and the relevant university staff

members who will also enjoy periodic staff training.

The VC reiterated that the seamless mandatory schedule will guarantee that every student of the university will undergo specialised international certification-based professional IT and e-business skills training and acquire a minimum of four international professional licenses in lucrative technologies.

He reasoned that given the global economic challenges and the shrinking employment opportunities worldwide and in Nigeria especially, Caleb University graduates

will be able to use the extra internationally validated professional skills-set as the “Icing on their B.Sc and BA academic cakes’’ to become the toast of the employers for lucrative jobs as well as get opportunity to become selfemployed as Specialists and Consultants in these globally hot skills and certification areas.

He expressed the joy at the twin advantages that the strategic partnership will bestow on the staff members in terms of the free of cost refresher ICT and E Business trainings that will boost their official and personal productivity and the

second benefit of an annual financial awards/prizes that will be won by three best academic lecturers for academic excellence.

The Managing /CEO of New Horizons Nigeria, Mr. Tim Akano, commended the visionary management of the university for the partnership initiative. He restated the necessity for such strategic synergies between the academics and the industry in this information age, such that the university will regain and fulfil their traditional role of serving as the “manufacturing/incubating house’’ for production of future fully–baked

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

BUSINESSWORLD

NEWS

ntel Announces Network Compatibility with Samsung Galaxy Devices ntel, which recently launched with the most advanced 4G/ LTE broadband technology, has announced its network’s compatibility with two highquality devices, the Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge.

According to ntel, following months of compatibility tests, its network is now compatible with Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge making it possible for owners and users of the devices to call and browse at superfast speeds on the ntel network.

With this feat, ntel becomes the first 4G/LTE provider in Africa to achieve device and network compatibility that will enable VoLTE capable calls, ntel’s network supports crystal-clear HD Voice calling (VoLTE), as well as key LTE-Advanced features: Carrier Aggregation (CA); and Multiple In, Multiple Out (MIMO) Antennae technology.

These features combine to enable downlink data speeds of up to 230Megabits per second and are both supported on Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge devices.

Speaking on the new development, the CEO of ntel, Mr. Kamar Abass, said: “Samsung is the leader in the Nigerian smart phone market and news of the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge compatibility with our 4G/LTE Advanced network is fantastic news for our customers who have been

eagerly waiting to use their high-end Samsung devices on our network.

As Nigeria’s first pure-play 4G/LTE-Advanced network, ntel is committed to ensuring its customers have the widest possible range of devices to choose from.”

The Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge devices are top of the range devices from Samsung with enhanced design, high-quality cameras, water resistance, wireless charging, and connectivity to an unparalleled galaxy of services, products and experiences.

Director and Business Leader, Information Technology and Mobile, Samsung Electronics West Africa, Mr. Emmanouil Revmatas, expressed delight at the partnership with ntel while adding that Samsung will continue to defy boundaries of engineering to perfect the user experience through innovative designs and envelope-pushing solutions as exemplified by the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge.

“Samsung is very particular about its customers’ mobile experience and committed to ensuring that users get the best of their mobile devices.

The S7 and S7 Edge smartphones were designed to usher consumers into a whole new galaxy with impeccable features,” Revmatas said.

“We have further cemented our brand’s promise with

this partnership that allows users make calls and browse at super fast speeds without

interruption. This is definitely a great value added experience,” Revmatas added.

With a sleek, curved-glass back and slim ergonomic body, the Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7

edge are easy to hold in one hand and fit in your pocket or purse.

NITDA, Plateau State Govt Back Hackjos 2016 STRATEGISING TO BOOST OIL PRODUCTION Emma Okonji The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) is backing the second edition of HackJos, the software/hackathon competition holding in Jos, Plateau State from November 1-4, 2016.

The support, according to NITDA, is part of efforts to promote innovation hubs across the country and equip young people with software and entrepreneurship skills.

Aside NITDA, some technology companies have also indicated their interests to join the Plateau State Government to make HackJos 2016 a success.

They include Hotels.ng, Smartweb, and Konga .com, Enspire Incubator, Idea Hub, Gigalayer, Andela, which recently received a venture capital funding from Facebook and the Nigeria Computer Society (NCS). Others are Precise Financial Solutions (PFS), BAU Research and Development, Metronet Communication Concept Ltd and Unity FM. Also on the list of supporters are Qitech Technologies, ProJaro, Instinct Wave, and Smartweb is billed to make presentations at the four day software development marathon featuring a one day conference with the theme: “How ready is Nigeria for the internet of things (IoT)”.

Announcing the support, the Deputy Governor of the state, Professor SonniGwanleTyoden, said: “Technology with Innova-

tion drives today’s economy and we believe young people are the drivers of this process.

This is the new Plateau State open to business and willing to promote entrepreneurs under the leadership of the state Governor, Simon BakoLalong.”

The Hackjos forum is designed as a meeting point for budding entrepreneurs and already established tech-companies as well as for policy makers and investors angling to bet on technology innovation. Speakers for the IoT conference are drawn across sub-sectors with IT and Innovation.

The Ag Director General of the NITDA, Dr. Vincent Olatunjisaid: “We are glad to be supporting HackJos and believe Nigeria’s future rests on the resourcefulness of its young people. As part of our mandate to promote software skills and build indigenous capacity in IT, we consider HackJos a strategic window to build confidence in young people, identify with their budding skill set and provide them with the required impetus to thrive.”

About 30 teams consisting of a minimum of three developers/ ‘hackathoners’ 10 judges, 10 tech support team and over 300 live audience and spectators will be housed for four days in a marathon of wit, entrepreneurship and mental fitness to develop appssolutions under the framework of Nigeria’s readiness for IoT and sector-by-sector challenges in Nigeria’s economic space.

L-R: Director, Business Development, Secol-USA, Mr. Forum Doubara; MD, Platform Petroleum Ltd, Osa Owieadolor; GMD, Platform Petroleum Holdings Ltd, Mr. Konyebagu Opute; and Chief Executive, Energy & Corporate Africa, Mr. Sunny Oputa at 2nd Africa Small & Marginal Oil Fields Development Conference 2016 held in London,UK recently. ..recently

EXMAN Inaugurates Brand Access Bank, Airtel, Innjoo Mobile Endorse Yudala Zero Gravity Ambassadors’ Programme The Experiential Marketers Association of Nigeria (EXMAN), has launched a programme tagged, the ‘Certified Brand Ambassadors’ Programme. The inauguration of the programme was attended by over 40 EXMAN Agency personnel, including the association’s president, Dr. RotimiOlaniyan.

Speaking at the event, Oladele harped on the importance of Project Personnel called Brand Ambassadors in the Experiential Marketing/ Client Management Ecosystem.

According to him, Brand Ambassadors are key personnel representing agencies on the field to deliver on client briefs as the agencies seek to bring meaningful brand experiences alive.

He noted the importance of tooling the Brand Ambassadors appropriately as they undertake their duties.

The Chairman of the EXMAN Committee on Training and Capacity Building, Mr. TunjiAdeyinka explained that the Brand Ambassadors’ Programme has three different pillars. According to him, the first pillar is the Register of Brand Ambassadors which will assign a unique number to each Ambassador anywhere in Nigeria. The register will

also carry the profile of every Brand Ambassador so that EXMAN member agencies can view the profile of the BA before considering them for employment. The second pillar is the Training pillar which provides three different modules of materials on Brand Management, Experiential Marketing, Project Management and other topics. The third pillar is an insurance cover for all registered Brand Ambassadors provided by Mutual Benefit Assurance.

The Customer Marketing Director, Guinness, Mr. ObinnaAnyalebechi who spoke at the launch commended EXMAN for birthing the programme.

He said that apart from setting standards for Brand Ambassadors, the programme would also help clients who will be sure of the quality of the ambassadors they are using for their activations.

He confirmed that Brand Ambassadors are an extension of the brands they work for and are therefore very important in marketing activations. The programme also helps agencies to blacklist Brand Ambassadors who may have committed infractions in the line of duty.

A number of corporate organisations including Access Bank, Airtel and InnJoo Mobile have swelled the growing list of sponsors for a multi-city digital entertainment concert tagged Yudala Zero Gravity powered by Africa’s pioneer composite e-commerce outfit in partnership with New Concept Media Group (NCMG).

Also joining the list of media partners for the debut edition of Yudala Zero Gravity are MTV Base, Cool FM, Wazobia FM, Urban FM, HOT FM, Dream FM as well as major news platforms such as Nigerian Communications Week, Sabinews, ITRealms, News Express, The Capital and Political Economist, among others.

For Access Bank and Airtel, two corporate institutions that have enjoyed sustainable success in the banking and telecommunications sectors respectively, this endorsement of Yudala Zero Gravity continues a track record of mutually rewarding partnerships with Yudala.

Both organisations are major partners to Yudala on YUBOSS – an entrepreneurship and wealth-creation scheme set up by Yudala to build a league of emerging entrepreneurs and generate creative employment

for millions of Nigerians.

Membership of YUBOSS offers participants a chance to become part-owners of Yudala franchise stores without any form of investment, while receiving attractive commissions in the multi-level scheme, among other wide range of benefits. Both companies have also featured prominently in the Gyming with the Stars series – a Corporate Social Responsibility initiative of Yudala which offers Nigerians from all walks of life a chance to work out with their favourite celebrities.

InnJoo Mobile, on the other hand came into the partnership with Yudala on Zero Gravity on the back of its rising profile as a leading manufacturer of cutting-edge and price-friendly smart mobile devices and lifestyle goods. Within a couple of years of launch, InnJoo Mobile which recently launched the Max 3 smartphone which is taking the market by storm, has steadily acquired a growing share of the Nigerian and West African mobile devices market.

Yudala will also benefit from widespread publicity and coverage of the Zero Gravity concerts from the slew of media partners who have identified with the event.

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

PROPERTY & ENVIRONMENT FMBN Enlists EFCC in its Plan for Efficient, Sustainable Credit System in Housing The Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN) plans to establish an efficient, sustainable credit system in the nation’s housing sector. But, first, it is appealing to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to assist it in prosecuting fraudulent housing developers and Primary Mortgage Banks, writes Bennett Oghifo

N

igeria’s rate of home ownership is believed to be one of the slowest in Africa at 25 per cent, as a result of lack of a robust mortgage financing system. Statistics shows that Nigeria’s home ownership rate is much lower than in countries like Singapore (90 per cent), Indonesia (84 per cent), Kenya (73 per cent), USA (70 per cent), Benin Republic (63 per cent) and South Africa (56 per cent).Statistics also shows that Nigeria is a peculiar country where mortgage finance, as a share of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), is extremely low. It is at a paltry 0.5 per cent, compared with 80 per cent (UK), 77 per cent (USA), 31 per cent (South Africa) and two per cent (Ghana). The housing and construction sector accounts for only 3.1 per cent of Nigeria’s rebased GDP. Housing production is at approximately 100,000 units per year while 800,000 units are needed yearly.

Regardless, the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN) is working at an ambitious plan to achieve efficient and sustainable credit delivery to the housing sector.

The FMBN, led by its acting Managing Director/CEO, Richard Esin, says it understands the critical importance of finance in housing delivery and, on account of this, it has been expanding and coordinating mortgage lending across the nation, and is also promoting affordable housing to ensure that the nation’s housing deficit is bridged.

The CEO of FMBN also understands that achieving set objectives would require the collaboration and support of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFFC) to recover FMBN cash in the hands of housing developers, who collected funds but failed to deliver the projects, as agreed. This collaboration, they said is important in the absence of an enforceable foreclosure law.

The National Housing Fund...

In its quest for long-term funds for housing development, the federal government got the FMBN to start the management and administration of a contributory savings scheme known as the National Housing Fund (NHF). It thus mobilised long-term funds from Nigerian workers, banks, insurance companies and the Federal Government to advance loans at low interest rates to contributors, who become eligible after six months.

The FMBN finances mortgages created by primary mortgage institutions (PMI) under the NHF scheme, and also gives estate development loans (EDL) to real estate developers.

Esin’s plan is to have cheap and affordable housing, not exceeding N5 million per unit to encourage more people to own homes in various states of the federation.

Loan default...

The apex mortgage bank has given loans to various primary mortgage banks and housing developers that have not been used for the purpose or repaid. The FMBN is not about to write these off as bad debt either.

The Esin-led FMBN has, therefore, requested the help of the EFCC to recover the huge debt from developers and others, who obtained housing loans from it, but misappropriated the fund. He made the request when he paid a courtesy call on the chairman of the commission, Ibrahim Magu, in Abuja, recently.

He told Magu that but for its resilience; the FMBN would not have been able to meet financial requests of thousands of Nigerians, including staffers of the EFCC, because of defaulters.

Esin explained that the developers, how defaulted, obtained construction finance loans from the bank to build estates, but that they allegedly

Magu

diverted the funds into other non-productive and non-regenerative activities. According to him, some developers completed the estates, sold the housing units and failed to remit the sales proceeds to the bank.

Esin said some Primary Mortgage Banks, which obtained funds from the bank for Mortgage finances, for on-lending to qualified NHF contributors, declined to disburse the funds to the applicants. Besides, he said there were those, who obtained equity contribution from would-be mortgagors, but refused to deploy same in the provision of mortgage finances to the applicants’ benefit.

He said despite the revocation of the operational licences of some Primary Mortgage Banks (PMBs), they were still deceptively encouraging innocent and unsuspecting mortgagors to continue to repay their mortgages to them through fictitious accounts with no intention of remitting same to FMBN. He appealed to Magu to assist in the recovery of the bank’s funds from contractors and vendors, who were mobilised to execute various contracts for the bank but failed to execute same and misappropriated the bank’s money.

“These activities are fraudulent, and constitute financial crimes. We, therefore, seek the EFCC’s kind assistance in the recovery of these funds, which belong to the Nigerian workers.”

Esin informed Magu that his management remained committed to assisting staffers of the commission to own houses, stating that after the historic MoU between both organisations, the FMBN had disbursed N3 billion in 10 batches to 156 staffers of the EFCC. Among the government agencies that have keyed into the NHF project is the EFCC, he said. “The FMBN has packaged a N1.6 billion worth of National Housing Fund loans for 113 staffers of EFCC. The loan is currently awaiting board approval, while N1.3 billion has been approved as NHF loans for EFCC staffers but

Esin

not disbursed because the targeted houses are no longer available.

“FMBN will work with other interested PMBs to revive the scheme once they are able to provide the bank with a suitable and acceptable security,” he said.

He assured the EFCC Chairman that the FMBN was in support of the war against corruption, hinged on one of the four pillars of the bank’s self-reinvention journey of corporate governance restoration, starting with a corporate governance audit of FMBN and training for over 120 members of staff in the leadership cadre, by the BPP on procurement practices and processes to engender the right kind of ethical behaviour among the staffers.

He also informed Magu about the establishment of a vibrant Anti-Corruption and Transparency Unit (ACTU) in the bank and training of over 120 members of staff in the leadership cadre by staffers of Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC) on anti-corruption programmes.

The FMBN, under Esin, has also brought into operation, the globally acclaimed anti-money laundering and combating of terrorism financing manual, which would serve as key guide in driving “our operations and the management of all facets of its relationships with stakeholders.

“We have also redefined our business to sharply focus on the low and middle income earners, collaborating with credible developers to deliver affordable houses at not more than N5 million per unit, to enable us achieve the required spread among NHF contributors in the delivery of mortgages. Our goal is to make affordable mortgages, a veritable tool in the fight against corruption,” Esin said.

According to him, “We have introduced the FMBN Home Renovation Loan for interested contributors desirous of renovating their homes via home expansion and other forms of valueenhancement. We will encourage members

of staff of EFCC to take advantage of these opportunities for their benefit,” the FMBN Acting Managing Director added.

Recapitalisation...

The Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola told participants at a summit on Affordable Housing in Abuja recently that the Federal Government would re-capitalise the FMBN for better efficiency and for it to deliver affordable housing to the masses.

Besides, President of the Association of Professional Bodies in Nigeria, Bala Ka’oje tasked the Muhammadu Buhari administration to make available to the FMBN bailout fund of N100 billion as well as “overhaul and restructure the FMBN for effective housing delivery.” Already, the restructuring of FMBN is on-going and the new team headed by Esin has said it was committed to getting affordable housing to the masses.

An estate developer based in Lagos, Stephen Okiro urged the FMBN to continue to provide affordable housing to the people. “Affordable is housing for which the associated financial costs are at a level that does not threaten other basic needs. States should take steps to ensure that housing costs are proportionate to overall income levels, establish subsidies for those unable to acquire affordable housing, and protect tenants against unreasonable rent levels or increases,” he said.

Besides, the Nigeria Mortgage Refinance Company (NMRC) has been established and has been able to provide a uniform underwriting standard for the Nigeria’s mortgage market.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) said the Mortgage Refinance Companies (MRCs) are required to have a minimum of 50 per cent of their investment in debt obligations issued or guaranteed by the Federal Government or any of its agencies.

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

PROPERTY & ENVIRONMENT

Hearing in Bianca’s Suit against Ojukwu’s Family over Property Resumes Tomorrow Akinwale Akintunde Justice Abdulfattah Lawal of a Lagos High Court, sitting in Igbosere will, tomorrow, continue with the hearing of the suit instituted by Mrs. Bianca Ojukwu, the embattled wife of the late Dim Chukwuemeka Odimegwu Ojukwu, against her husband’s family over property rights.

Bianca, a former Nigerian Ambassador, had on behalf of her two under-aged children, Afamefuna and Nwachukwu (claimants) sued Ojukwu Transport Limited (OTL) and seven others over an alleged move by the Ojukwu family to eject her two sons from the company’s properties situated in Lagos.

Other defendants in the suit are Prof. Joseph Ojukwu; Engr.

Emmanuel Ojukwu; Lotanna Putalora Ojukwu; Dr Patrick Ojukwu; Arch. Edward Ojukwu; Lota Akajiora Ojukwu and Mrs. Massey Udegbe (doing business under Massey Udegbe & Company).

In the suit, Bianca, and her two children, had in their statement of claim, prayed the court to declare that the threat of forceful ejection from 29 Oyinkan Abayomi Street by the defendants is illegal.

She is also asking the court

for a declaration that her children are entitled to possess the following property, namely: No. 13 Hawksworth Road, Ikoyi (now known as No. 13 Ojora Road; No. 32A Commercial Avenue, Yaba, Lagos; No. 30 Gerard Road, Ikoyi, Lagos and No. 30 McPherson Avenue, Ikoyi.

The company (OTL) and its property belong to the grandfather of the claimants, late Sir Louis Odumegwu Ojukwu.

But at the last hearing, one of Ojukwu’s sons, Emeka Odumegwu Ojukwu (Jr) filed an application seeking to be joined as defendant in the suit.

Emeka junior prayed the court to join him in the suit on the grounds that he is a director of the first defendant company (OTL) and by virtue of his position, he has responsibility to look after the interest of the other children of his late father.

He also prayed the court to join him as defendant in the best interest of justice, stating that any decision in respect of the claims of Bianca’s two children in the suit, so far as it relates to his father’s interest in OTL, would affect him as the current head of the late Dim Chukwuemeka Ojukwu’s family.

Lagos gets First Multi-level Car Park, Event Centre Fadekemi Ajakaiye Lagos state is set to get the first-ever multi-level car park and event centre in its Central Business District. The car park is on 5 floors with the event centre on top of it.

The project located on Campbell Street in Lagos Island is a car park designed to accommodate 400 cars and an event centre, stated the Managing Director, Ibile Holdings, Mr. Biodun Amokomow.

Conducting the groundbreaking ceremony in Lagos, recently, the Special Adviser to the Lagos State governor on Global Investment, Prof Ademola Abass, stated that his responsibility was to drive investment into the state, both from within and outside the country, one of which was the car park project.

The Project is a remarkable achievement for the state as it is the first of its kind. It is also a confirmation of the confidence of both Foreign and Domestic investors in Lagos state, he said.

Abass stated that the Multicar Park takes away traffic from the area of the Mega city. “It is the way to go in a city of 21 million people; a population more than that of several countries combined.”

“The project is a major forward movement in the state, especially working with local investors in the country’s trying period. Though challenges abound, but our investors see opportunities,” he said.

He stated that “there exist plenty of opportunities in Lagos State, which propels the synergy between international and domestic investors. Bringing in as many investment opportunities as possible from all over into the State is our aim.”

He stated that the present administration in the state promised to enhance the ease of doing business by partnering with investors; strong on the application of the Rule of law; protection of citizens, and protection of all investors.

The multi-car park project costs N2 billion investment at ground capital and could go beyond that, he said.

Abass stated that the project is a joint venture between Ibile Holdings, the investment arm of Lagos State, and Willao Nigeria Ltd., Property Developers, through a Special Purpose Vehicle.

According to Mr. Femi Williams, the Managing Director, Willao Nigeria Ltd, the Property Developing Company, the project, which started last month, is to be completed in October next year, adding that there was structured finance between Willao Nigeria Ltd and Ibile holdings.

He stated that the project suits the environment, as it helps to eliminate parking problems in the area, serving Island Maternity Hospital, St Nicholas Hospital, Western House, Independence Building, as well as visitors to the area.

The event centre will seat 1000 guests at the top floor, and it is to promote the culture of Lagos, he said.

Mr. Igbuan Okaisabor, the Vice Chairman, Construction Kaiser Ltd, stated that the car park being built by Construction Kaiser Ltd is to serve the neighbourhood and improve the infrastructure of the area generally.

He stated his delight to be involved in such a big project, as an indigenous company. Adequate security is also provided through CCTV, among others.

Emeka junior averred that the claimants in the suit are the last two of the eight children of his late father and that they are represented by their mother who was the last of the six wives of his late father.

Bianca, however, urged the court to refuse the application filed by Emeka Junior seeking to be joined as defendant in the suit. In a 12 paragraphs counter affidavit, Bianca’s children opposed the application on the ground that they have

no claim or relief whatsoever against him in the suit.

Bianca’s children averred that the suit can be duly and properly determined without having their elder brother as a defendant in the suit.

The claimant stated further

that the application was only a ploy to delay and scuttle the hearing and determination of the suit.

It was on this basis that Justice Lawal fixed tomorrow, September 14, for further hearing on the application.

R-L: Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Ezenwo Wike, handing over a souvenir to the Managing Director of the Federal Housing Authority, Prof Mohammed Al-Amin, when officials of the Authority visited the governor in Port Harcourt... recently

Graduate Internship Scheme Operators Partner Govt, NGOs Graduate Internship Scheme (GIS), a nationwide continuous training programme, is collaborating with government and non-governmental organisations to train graduate and prepare them for the future.

The partnership is designed to reduce the rate of unemployment among youth and empower them by promoting career development and free enterprise.

Graduate Internship Scheme was created by the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan and was developed on by the present administration to help increase job creation and enhance social protection among the youth. It does this by providing internship opportunities for graduates, who could be employed by the organisations or have enough training to be self-employed.

According to the Project Director of GIS, Mr. Dennis Chukwu, who was represented by the Head of ICT GIS, Mr. Lassa Samaila, at a workshop in Lagos, recently, the training aims to promote skills building and job creation and the scheme has developed special programmes, which would benefit the non-oil sector.

Chukwu said GIS has entered into special partnerships with governmental and non-governmental organisations to have graduates trained, mentored and supported in areas such as; non-oil export trade, ICT, agriculture, community health, construction, financial inclusion, among others.

He said the internship programme, which would last for 12 months, comes with successes, challenges, and attendant curiosities thereby bringing them to crossroads where they would be fully equipped and prepared to enter into the job market or start-up businesses of their own choice. Chukwu

further explained that the Career Development and Entrepreneurship Skills training have been designed to help answer the question of ‘what next’. “At the end of the training, each graduate is expected to develop an action plan that will guide the next few years of your life.”

He added that skills and experience acquired through GIS internship programme “will help them to contribute meaningfully to national development. So far, 41,161 graduates from the ages of 18 to 40 have benefitted from the scheme, with 68% males, 31% females and 1% vulnerable. Over 35,000 have exited the scheme, with thousands of them having secured jobs.

Many have secured credit facilities and grants (including YouWiN! Grant) to expand businesses they set up using GIS stipends and many have set up cooperative associations, some of which have transformed into SMEs. Rather than seeking for work, they are now becoming employers.”

Samaila, Head of ICT, GIS, said to enhance credibility, the scheme has improved on the system and that it would also continue to improve its capacity to absorb more applicants. “In other to prevent misappropriation and embezzlement in the scheme, the civil servant structure, which is a more guaranteed structure, has been implemented.” He added that the monetary evaluation system has also been implemented to ensure that fund allocated is audited and accounted for.

He advised graduate interns to submit all requirements needed by the scheme to enable the system carryout its functions.

He said though the scheme was the first of its kind in Africa but that there was still room for improvement.

Some of the graduates,

during their testimonies, said GIS Internship is a scheme that they have benefited from despite the present state of the nation’s economy.

It would be recalled that the

federal government’s purpose of setting up the Graduate Internship Scheme was to ensure that unemployed graduates acquired skills that would make them employable.

Rivers to Partner FHA to Develop Affordable Housing Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Ezenwo Wike has stated that his administration would partner with the Federal Housing Authority (FHA) to ensure that the people of the state have access to affordable housing.

The governor said such partnership would involve ensuring that the FHA is given access to land to commence the immediate construction of houses.

Speaking during a courtesy call by the Managing Director of the Federal Housing Authority, Prof Mohammed Al-Amin, recently, Governor Wike directed the management of the Greater Port Harcourt City Development Authority and the State Ministry of Housing to liaise with the Federal Housing Authority to develop a framework for affordable housing.

The governor, however, stated that the Federal Housing Authority must sign an undertaking that it would develop lands allocated to it within one year, failure which the Rivers State Government would repossess the said allocated lands.

He said, “State Governments find it difficult to allocate plots of land to the Federal Housing Authority because lands allocated are allowed to stay fallow without any developments on them.

“I have directed the Greater Port Harcourt City Development Authority in conjunction with

the State Ministry of Housing to discuss with the Federal Housing Authority on how to develop a framework for the Joint development of affordable housing.

“However, we are proposing that the Federal Housing Authority signs an undertaking that should they fail to use the parcels of land allocated within one year, we shall repossess same.”

In his remarks, the Managing Director of the Federal Housing Authority, Prof Mohammed AlAmin noted that the essence of the visit was in furtherance with the directive of the Minister of Power, Works and Housing to the Federal Housing Authority and Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria to use lands owned by the Federal Housing Authority across the country and finance from the Federal Mortgage Bank to invest and deliver housing.

He said Rivers State was among the first slated to benefit from the programme.

He disclosed that the Federal Housing Authority has been restructured into Commercial and Social Departments with a view to making housing a tool for development.

Prof Mohammed appealed to the governor to allocate more land to the authority, as well as intervene in ground rents and acquisition fees charged the authority.

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T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

PROPERTY NEWS

EHORECON Partners NESDRA Guinness Nigeria Provides Water, Sanitation Facilities in Gwam In a renewed bid to deepen commitment to initiatives that by improving access to clean in our state. We are immensely on Practice Regulations health and sanitation practices, improve access to safe water. In water, we can help people in Fadekemi Ajakaiye The Environmental Health Officers Registration Council of Nigeria (EHORECON) and the National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESRA) intend to synergise their practice regulations.

This is to bridge the gap between such agencies and move the profession of sanitation forward, said the Registrar, EHORECON, Sanitarian Dominic Abonyi, stating that environmental health practice had up to 17 facets of environmental health practice and out of these facets up to eight or nine were practiced in NESRA through its mandate.

The Registrar posited that part of the job of the Council was to look at these service areas, be it in NESRA, NOSDRA and any other service agency to see if there was manpower and bridge it.

According to Abonyi, the National Universities Commission (NUC) had given approval to three Universities, namely; Bayero University, Kano, Nnamdi Azikwe University, Awka and University of Ife to mount environmental health programmes and produce professionals at this level.

The Registrar revealed that Council in its wisdom in 2009 decided that individual(s) who are already practicing as scientific officers and who may wish to become environmental health officers need to do one thing, which is, to realign and get all of them on the register.

Earlier in his speech, the Director General, National

Environmental Standard and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESRA) Dr. Lawrence Anukam acknowledged the role being played by EHORECON, saying environment is everything around you, adding that you must understand a bit of the economy of the environment, you must understand the religion of the environment and you must understand the culture of that environment.

Anukam, while extoling the role being played by sanitary inspectors, went down memory lane, saying it was an abomination by every African culture for anyone to use chemicals to fish, even to burn bush, leathers, you need to plan it properly.

According to the NESRA boss, the whole concept had grown to sustainable development but the origin of that is Africa and back to African professionalism.

In the area of practice guide, the NESRA boss agreed that there was a little bit of disconnect between EHORCEON and NESRA and this could be worked out by creating a forum between the two agencies such as to make a thorough presentation and everybody will understand because we can leverage the manpower the Council creates, he said.

Dr. Anukam further, reiterated that he wants the relationship between EHORECON and NESRA to be more cordial, saying that “cordial is the major word but we look at where we are going to have a lot more synergy,” adding also that “we look at the area of commonality so that you can use your leverage as a big regulator in training.”

Estate Developers, Financiers, Facility Managers Join Counterparts at Exporeal in Germany Real Estate developers are set to attend EXPOREAL 2016, the 19th international trade fair for real estate and investment scheduled for October 4-6 in Munich, Germany.

The event is a platform for a wide range of real-estate market.

It premiered in October 1998 in Messe Munchen exhibition center in Munich, Germany.

The event takes place annually and brings together global and local real estate developers, architectural and planning firms, investment companies, bankers, universities and colleges, fund companies, tax advisors, mortgage finance institutions and property consultants.

EXPOREAL is an integrated exhibitor forum focusing on efficient networking with decision makers and financiers. It provides an opportunity for finding potential business partners for every stage in the real estate cycle: from idea and conception through investment, financing, realization and marketing to operation and use.

Nigerians will be joining over 18,985 visitors to the next EXPOREAL scheduled to hold from October 4-6, 2016 at Munich, Germany.

Niche PR and Events a Lagos-based public relations company is working with MESSE MUNCHEN INTERNATIONAL and Trade and Fairs Consulting, Germany to recruit participation from Nigeria, handle logistics required to ensure that Nigeria is well represented.

Niche PR & Events focuses on managing prime exhibitions and international expos with a view to positioning Nigerian brands while promoting joint venture partnerships. In the last decade, the company has worked with international show organizers and trade associations.

Niche PR has invited key industry players to sponsor the Nigerian exhibition booth under the African pavilion in order to entice B2B to the Nigerian participants. The essence of incorporating a booth dedicated to Nigeria is that 75% of visitors are decision makers. They will visit the booth to discuss and conclude businesses. In addition, there will be forums with 80 conferences, panel discussion and symposia 400 recognized participants discussing bank financing and refinancing among other topics.

Guinness Nigeria Plc and WaterAid Nigeria have partnered to construct two solar-powered water facilities in Gwam, Ningi Local Government Area of Bauchi state.

The Guinness Nigeria/ WaterAid Gwam water facility, which was formally unveiled recently, is one of two major water schemes which the brewing giant has delivered this year in collaboration with its international non-Governmental Organisation partners, and the 34th site for the Guinness Nigeria, Water of Life initiative in Nigeria. The Gwam water scheme, which comprises two solar-powered boreholes and two blocks of toilets, will benefit about 20,000 people.

Guinness Nigeria’s Corporate Relations Director, Mr. Sesan Sobowale used the occasion to reiterate the company’s

his remarks, he noted that Guinness Nigeria will continue to play a leading role to promote water stewardship in Nigeria while thanking Water Aid for its transformational work in promoting health and hygiene in the country.

“Diageo’s water blueprint articulates the role we will play as a business to tackle a wide range of water-related issues both in Nigeria and globally.

In furtherance of this blueprint, Guinness Nigeria has prioritized interventions that improve access to safe water especially in communities that face acute water scarcity. We have also invested in technologies that help us manage our water use.

The construction of the Gwam water scheme is in furtherance of our efforts to help more Nigerians access clean drinking water. Our hope is that

Gwam community improve their hygiene and overall wellbeing,” Sobowale said.

Also speaking at the commissioning ceremony, the Commissioner for Water Resources, Bauchi state, Alhaji Mohammed Ghali Abdulhameed expressed the state government’s gratitude over the newly constructed water scheme. He also observed that the water facility will support the state government’s drive to improve health and hygiene for Bauchi state citizens “this intervention is indeed timely and commendable. Water is an absolutely essential resource that is vital for the health and wellbeing of our citizens. We, the people of Bauchi state, are therefore delighted that Guinness Nigeria and Water Aid have joined forces to improve access to safe water

grateful for this intervention” he said.

In her remarks at the event, WaterAid’s International Chief Executive, Ms. Barbara Frost underscored WaterAid’s vision to help create a world where everyone, everywhere has access to safe water, sanitation and hygiene. She said: “It is great to see that the Bauchi state government, Guinness Nigeria and WaterAid are working collaboratively to tackle the challenge of water scarcity in Bauchi state.

I would like to thank the government of Bauchi state for creating a conducive environment that has enabled WaterAid to implement its programmes in the state.

WaterAid will continue to partner various stakeholders in Nigeria to transform lives by improving access to safe water, hygiene and sanitation”.

L-R: Country Director, Water Aid Nigeria, Dr. Michael Ojo; Corporate Relations Director, Guinness Nigeria Plc, Mr. Sesan Sobowale; International Chief Executive, WaterAid, Ms. Barbara Frost; and the Commissioner for Water Resources, Bauchi state, Alhaji Mohammed Ghali Abdulhameed, at the commissioning of Water and Sanitation facilities constructed by Guinness Nigeria Plc in Gwam, Bauchi State... recently

World Water Week in Stockholm: AfDB Joins Global Community to Press for Water for All by 2030 As a leading provider of water and sanitation services in Africa, the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the African Water Facility (AWF) have been invited to participate in World Water Week in Stockholm, Sweden. World Water Week, which takes place from August 28 to September 2, 2016, is the leading annual global event for tackling global water issues and development-related challenges.

The theme of this year’s forum: “Water for Sustainable Growth.”

“The centrality of water to human development and poverty alleviation in Africa is clearly articulated in the new strategic focus areas of the Bank called the High 5s,” said Mohamed El Azizi, Director of the Bank’s Water and Sanitation Department. “These five strategic priorities constitute an integral effort of the AfDB to Light up and power Africa, to Feed Africa, to Industrialize Africa, to Integrate Africa, and to Improve the quality of life for the people of Africa.”

This week in Stockholm, the AfDB has been invited to provide new and emerg-

ing perspectives on how to accelerate delivery of water services to all Africans by 2030.

At the 2015 Sustainable Development Summit in New York, world leaders set new and ambitious targets in the water sector: to ensure access to water and sanitation for all by 2030. Achieving these targets will be central to the AfDB delegation’s mission during the week-long global water event in Stockholm.

“Close to 107 million people gained access to water through interventions of AfDB alongside those of other partners in the last decade in the rural areas of Africa. Yet, collectively, we did not achieve the earmarked water objectives in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs),” said El Azizi. “There is the consensus that more work needs to be done from the perspective of financial mobilization, collaboration, governance, and better integrating climate change and gender issues in water delivery. The Stockholm conference offers us an opportunity to enhance further collaboration towards

innovatively tackling this challenge so as to ensure the ambitious targets set by our Governments under the African Water Vision 2025 and the N’gor Declaration are achieved.”

At World Water Week, the AfDB delegation is expected to meet with key actors in the sector, to strengthen collaboration with current partners and build new partnerships. Meetings are planned with multilateral and bilateral donors, the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI), French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, French Development Agency (AFD), Global Water Partnership (GWP), the Nordic Development Fund and the Swiss Water Partnership.

Resources mobilized from these institutions are expected to further strengthen two of the AfDB’s flagship water initiatives: the African Water Facility (AWF) and the Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Initiative (RWSSI).

The Stockholm conference follows on the heels of Africa Water Week, which took place July 18-22, 2016 in Dar es

Salaam, Tanzania. During the July meeting, the AfDB highlighted the urgent need for action to deliver water and sanitation services to about 340 million and 550 million Africans, respectively.

The Bank is also involved in initiatives with other development partners designed to achieve water security and improved sanitation. RWSSI funds water sector projects and studies; the AWF, for which the Bank is a trustee, provides support to the New Partnership for Africa’s Development Water and Sanitation Program; and the Multi-Donor Water Partnership Program promotes effective regional and national water management policies and practices, and operationalizes the Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) Policy in the Bank’s regional member countries (RMCs). In 2006, the Bank created a Water and Sanitation Department to lead and coordinate water-sector activities and to promote IWRM across all Bank Water Supply and Sanitation interventions.

33

T H I S D AY • TUESDAY,SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

PROPERTY NEWS

Umahi Re-awards Ishiagu Water Project at N2.1Bn Ebonyi State Governor, David Umahi has said that the Ishiagu water project has been re-awarded at the cost of N2.1 billion.

The governor said he has also re- invited CENTRACO to complete a section of the road earlier awarded to it in Ishiagu community.

Umahi stated this during the median Ishiagu cultural day celebration, held at Ishagu, central school in Ivo local government area, recently.

He noted that another road which runs from Nzerem- Okwe through MCC junction will also be constructed soon and ordered a comprehensive evaluation of the lighting needs of Ishiagu and Akeze, to be included in the first phase of state rural electrification programme, promising to provide street lights in Ishiagu and Akaeze.

The governor said, “I have ordered to be completed within the month of September, a comprehensive 10 kilometer street light in the land of Ishiahu, and another 10 kilometer in Akaeze.

So, this project will be jointly funded by the state government and local government. The project duration

Japan Pledges Investment in Quality Infrastructure in Africa Investing in infrastructure and human resource development are crucial for Africa to realise Agenda 2063, a high-level panel during the Sixth Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD VI) heard recently in Nairobi.

The panel, under the theme “Africa, towards 2063 and beyond”, sought to sought to discuss challenges, opportunities and strategies for development as Africa moves towards 2063, and what Asia and Africa can learn from each other. Agenda 2063 is an African Union-driven action plan that calls for collaboration to achieve accelerated development across the continent.

Speaking at the event, Shinzo Abe, Japan’s Prime Minister, highlighted the need for investment in quality infrastructure that connects Africa.

“We need to move ahead with investing for the future of Africa. Africa and Japan will work together. Japan will launch various initiatives that will support Africa in different sectors including infrastructure,” he said.

At TICAD VI, the African Development Bank (AfDB) and Japan announced a US $3 billion private sector development initiative to boost growth and reduce poverty in Africa. The resources, to be provided under the third phase of the Enhanced Private Sector Assistance for Africa (EPSA) initiative, will focus on, among other things, infrastructure - transport and energy.

shall be 30 days.”

He assured the people of the state that work would soon start on the water project and thanked the people of Ishiagu for the honour done him paid glowing tribute to the illustrious son of the area, Dr. Anyim Pius Anyim, the immediate past Secretary to the Government of the Federation, for being a reliable ally in the struggle for political and social justice in the state.

The governor, who was conferred with the chieftaincy title of EBUBE AGU of Ishiagu, and his wife, Rachel Umahi, UGO EJI AMATU 1 of Ishiagu, promised to relaunch vigilante group by September this year starting with Ishiagu community and Akueze.

“We shall in the coming weeks in September launch our vigilante.

We will conclude plans with commissioner of police so that we will launch Ebonyi vigilante starting with Ishiagu and Akueze communities.

So in the month of September, you will see a robust assistance to the very wonderful work the security agencies are doing in Ishiagu

and Akueze.

“We will tackle this and I assure you under my administration you will have peace,” he said.

The former Secretary of Government of the Federation, Anyim Pius Anyim, who re-

ceived the honour of the most industrious son of Ishiagu, in his opening remarks, lauded Governor Umahi, for his quality leadership and pledged the unalloyed support of Ishigu people to the administration of Governor Umahi.

The chairman of the occasion, Dr. Chris Okereke thanked the governor for restoring peace in Ishiagu community.

He described the event as very remarkable. While the president of Ishiagu Com-

munity Development Union, Chief Stanley Uche Chukwu thanked Governor Umahi for his magnanimity to the people of Ishiagu, especially in the appointment of its sons and daughters to positions of authority in the state.

Jigawa to Complete 21 Road Projects Gboyega Akinsanmi The Jigawa State Government has said it would finish the 21 uncomplete road projects left by the immediate past administration.

The state governor, Alhaji Muhammad Badaru Abubakar made the promise at the weekend, while unveiling Phase II and III of Maigatari-Galadi Western road project, which would gulp a sum of N2.7 billion.

At the unveiling, the governor said his administration promised to execute and complete the inherited road projects because of their importance to the socio-economic development of the people of the state.

Badaru said the past

administration awarded the Kyarama-Gasakoli road project at the cost of over N3.07 billion while his administration took over the completion of the project at the cost of N2.7 billion.

He said out of the amount the contractor handling the project made a reduction of N271 million from the initial cost and the state government paid the contractor, which pave the way for its commissioning.

Earlier in his welcome address, the state Commissioner of Works and Transport, Engineer Aminu Usman Yakubu said the project was the first of its kind to be commissioned by the present administration.

He said the governor promised to complete all ongoing road projects statewide, saying

the government accorded priority to projects that have direct impact to the lives of the people of the state.

Before commissioning the road projects, the governor had earlier performed treeplanting exercise along the side of the road.

The ceremony was attended by the Deputy Governor, Speaker of the Jigawa State House of Assembly, SSG, Head of Service, Commissioners, Emir of Ringim and that of Gumel, members of national and state Assemblies, APC, Chairman, as well as businessmen, politicians and members of the public.

In a related development, the governor disclosed the plan of the government “to partner with National Research Institute for Chemical Technol-

ogy (NARICT), Zaria in the areas of fertiliser and tomatoes processing.”

He explained that his administration would focus on Agriculture as it is the only sector that would make people to be self-reliant, noting that he was impressed with the level of innovation and commitment of the institute.

He assured that the government would not be left behind in tapping the scientific research of the Institution, calling on the institution to focus on competitive scientific research that would guarantee sustainability.

The governor inspected tomatoes processing factory at Makarfi and fertiliser factory in Zaria, both of which use local machines and materials.

34

TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 13, 2016 • T H I S D AY

INTERNATIONAL

email:foreigndesk@thisdaylive.com

David Cameron to Quit as Conservative MP Former British Prime Minister, David Cameron, is to stand down as an MP, triggering a by-election in his Oxfordshire seat of Witney. Mr Cameron, who resigned as prime minister after June’s EU referendum, said he did not want to be a “distraction” for the new Prime Minister, Theresa May. The 49-year-old said his replacement had “got off to a cracking start”. Mr Cameron, who has represented Witney since 2001, became Conservative leader in 2005 and PM in 2010. Speaking in his constituency, he said it had been a “great honour” to be an MP for the area, but said it would be difficult for him to remain on the backbenches without becoming “a big distraction and a big diversion” from the work of the new government.

He denied his announcement was related to the government’s moves towards allowing new grammar schools, a policy he rejected as PM. He said the timing - which came after a period of reflection over the summer - was coincidental, adding that there were “many good things” in the proposed education reforms.

“Obviously I’m going to have my own views about different issues,” he said.”People would know that and that’s really the point. As a former prime minister it is very difficult, I think, to sit as a backbencher and not be an enormous diversion and distraction from what the government is doing.”

Friends say that David Cameron’s decision has not been made in a fit of pique, he has not merely

flounced out because he doesn’t like what his successor is doing. But there was a “very real danger”, particularly because he does not support the UK leaving the European Union, that anything he said, any comment he made could “drive a real wedge” between him and the government which could make life harder for Theresa May. It is not that surprising that the man who used to be in charge has decided to go.

But his departure adds to the sense that May’s Downing Street feels more like a new administration after a general election than a continuation of David Cameron’s tenure - “it IS a new government”, one senior Tory told me, “not everyone has understood that yet”.

Mr Cameron said Mrs May - his former home secretary - had been “very understanding” when he told her of his decision.

Asked about his legacy, and whether he would be remembered as the prime minister that took the UK out of the European Union, he said he hoped his tenure would be recalled for a strong economy and “important social reforms” and that he had transformed a Conservative Party that was “in the doldrums” into a “modernising winning force”.

Mr Cameron won a 25,155 majority in 2015 in Witney, which has been held by the Conservatives since 1974.

He said he had not made any “firm decisions” on what to do next, adding that he wanted to continue to contribute to public life.

Mrs May said: “I was proud to serve in David Cameron’s government and under his leadership

Zambia’s High Court Refuses to Block Lungu’s Inauguration Zambia’s High Court has rejected an application by the main opposition party to block President Edgar Lungu’s inauguration set for next week after last month’s contested election, his lawyers said on Friday.

Opposition United Party for NationalA Development (UPND) leader Hakainde Hichilema had petitioned the court to overturn a Constitutional Court decision not to give him more time to legally challenge Lungu’s re-election.

He says the Aug. 11 vote was rigged, a charge Lungu denies. “The court has refused to block the inauguration. The High Court has no power to

block a decision of a higher court,” Lungu’s lawyer Tutwa Ngulube told reporters.

Hichilema’s lawyer Keith Mweemba said the UPND would pursue the case in the Supreme Court. Lungu has led the ruling Patriotic Front since his predecessor Michael Sata died in 2014.

He won the presidency in January 2015, defeating Hichilema in their first election confrontation.

Zambia is Africa’s secondlargest copper producer, but its economy has been hit by a slump in commodity p r i c e s , l e a d i n g to mine closures and exacerbating its already high unemployment.

we achieved great things.

Not just stabilising the

economy, but also making great strides in delivering

serious social reform.” She pledged to continue with

his “one-nation government” approach.

SPIRITUAL MOMENT

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump attends a church service, in Detroit, Michigan…recently

‘North Korea Ready for Another Nuclear Test’ North Korea is ready to conduct an additional nuclear test at any time, South Korea’s Defence Ministry said yesterday, three days after the reclusive North’s fifth test drew widespread condemnation.

Pyongyang set off its most powerful nuclear blast to date on Friday, saying it had mastered the ability to mount a warhead on a ballistic missile and ratcheting up a threat that its rivals and the United Nations have been powerless to contain.

“Assessment by South Korean and U.S. intelligence is that the North is always ready for an additional nuclear test in the Punggye-ri area,” the site of the North’s five nuclear explosions, South Korean Defence Ministry spokesman Moon Sang-gyun told a news briefing. “North

Korea has a tunnel where it can conduct an additional nuclear test,” Moon said.

South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency reported earlier that North Korea had completed preparations for another nuclear test, citing South Korean government sources who said the North may use a previously unused tunnel at its mountainous test site.

It did not elaborate on what activities had been detected at the test site.

North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho, formerly the country’s chief nuclear negotiator, arrived in Beijing on Monday and was seen entering the country’s embassy, Japan’s Kyodo news agency reported.

Ri left Pyongyang to attend a meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement countries in Venezuela and later the

U.N. General Assembly, the Associated Press reported from Pyongyang without citing a source.

His trip comes amid a fresh push by the United States and South Korea for more sanctions following the nuclear test. A U.S. special envoy for the isolated state, Sung Kim, will travel to Seoul on Monday. Kim met with Japanese officials on Sunday and said the United States may launch unilateral sanctions against North Korea, echoing comments by U.S. President Barack Obama on Friday in the wake of the test.

A push for further sanctions was “laughable”, North Korea said on Sunday, vowing to continue to strengthen its nuclear power.Yonhap reported that bad weather had delayed the flight of an advanced U.S. B-1B bomber to the Korean peninsula, a show of strength

and solidarity with ally Seoul, scheduled for Monday. The flight from the U.S. base in Guam would now take place on Tuesday, a U.S. Forces in Korea official told Reuters, declining to identify the type of aircraft involved.

A group of 31 South Korean conservative lawmakers said the country should have nuclear weapons, either by acquiring its own arms or asking the Americans to redeploy tactical nuclear weapons that were withdrawn from the South under a 1991 pact for the denuclearization of the peninsula.

“We should discuss every plan including an independent nuclear armament program at the level of self-defense to safeguard peace,”Won Yoo-chul, a senior lawmaker for the ruling Saenuri Party, said in a statement.

Eastern Libyan Commander’s Forces Seize Key Oil Ports Forces loyal to east Libyan commander, Khalifa Haftar, yesterday seized at least two key oil ports from a rival force loyal to the U.N.-backed government, risking a new conflict over the OPEC nation’s resources.

Ahmed al-Mismari, a spokesman for Haftar’s self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA), said its fighters had full control of Es Sider, Ras Lanuf, Brega and Zueitina after launching an early morning military operation on the eve of the Muslim holiday of Eid. The attacks on Libya’s major oil ports by Haftar, who opposes the U.N.-backed Government of

National Accord (GNA), could derail efforts to restart production. Those efforts are seen as critical to saving Libya’s economy and helping the GNA survive.

The National Oil Corporation in Tripoli confirmed LNA control of Es Sider and Ras Lanuf, while the situation in Brega and Zueitina could not be independently verified. Armed conflict, political disputes and militant attacks have reduced Libya’s oil production to about 200,000 barrels per day (bpd) from the 1.6 million bpd it was producing before an uprising toppled Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.

Western states have backed the GNA to stabilize a country where chaos allowed Islamist militants and migrant smugglers to operate across swathes of territory. But Haftar, a former army general who has been a divisive figure in post-Gaddafi Libya, has resisted attempts to integrate him into unified armed forces and overcome divisions between factions in the east and west.

Many in western Libya and Tripoli criticize Haftar as a former Gaddafi ally bent on establishing a military dictatorship, but he has become a political figurehead for many in the east who feel

abandoned by the capital.

A government and parliament based in the east still resist the GNA’s authority in Tripoli and they have in the past tried to sell crude themselves. In a statement released late on Sunday, the GNA’s leadership, or Presidential Council, called the attacks an“unjustified escalation” that would “prolong the period of conflict” in Libya.

The ports targeted by the LNA were previously under the control of the Petrol Facilities Guard (PFG), whose leader, Ibrahim Jathran, struck a deal with the GNA in July to end its blockade of Ras Lanuf, Es Sider and Zueitina.

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INTERNATIONAL

Germany’s Anti-immigrant Party Suffers Election Setback The anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party finished a distant fourth with just 7.8 percent of the vote in local elections on Sunday in Lower Saxony state - a week after beating Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives in an eastern region.

The AfD had shocked Merkel last Sunday by winning 20.8 percent in a state election in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern with her Christian Democrats (CDU) falling to third with

19 percent. That rout had sparked renewed criticism of her pro-refugee course.

But in the local elections in the neighboring western state of Lower Saxony, the CDU was top with 34.4 percent, according to preliminary results published on Monday. The center-left Social Democrats (SPD) were second with 31.2, the Greens third with 10.9 percent, the AfD at 7.8 percent.

In local elections in the western state of Hesse in

March the AfD had won 11.9 percent. The AfD is stronger in the former communist east. In Lower Saxony, it was below 10 percent in most towns and cities but it did win 10.1 percent in the state capital of Hanover - behind the

SPD (31.2 percent), CDU (29 percent), Greens (13.6 percent).

Last Sunday’s election in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern was the first time the CDU lost to a far-right party in a state election.

The AfD played on the

public’s angst that refugees, some 70 percent of whom are Muslims, are overrunning Germany, siphoning away housing, resources and jobs from Germans. Merkel rejected that argument, saying no funds were taken away for refugees.

The AfD has climbed steadily in national polls lately. An Emnid poll for Bild am Sonntag newspaper on Sunday showed support for the AfD rising by one point to 13 percent while Merkel’s Christian Democrats lost one point to 33 percent.

Drones Keep Watch as Pilgrims Move to Haj’s Final Stages Saudi authorities deployed drones to watch over nearly 2 million pilgrims as they descended Mount Arafat on Sunday and entered the haj’s final stages, part of stepped-up efforts to avoid a repeat of last year’s crush amid an escalating war of words with Iran.

Last year, in one of the deadliest disasters to befall the annual Muslim rite in decades, the crush killed nearly 800 pilgrims, according to Riyadh, although counts by countries of repatriated bodies showed over 2,000 people may have died, more than 400 of them Iranians.

On foot or seated on the roofs of buses, the faithful climbed down the craggy hills outside Mecca at sunset and set out en masse for the open plateau of Muzdalifah.

There they collected pebbles in the dark before retreating for the night into Mina, the narrow city of air-conditioned white tents where last year’s crush occurred as pilgrims moved to throw their pebbles in a ceremonial stoning of the devil.

Authorities have deployed drones to reinforce a network of electronic surveillance of the crowds that would alert authorities to intervene quickly if necessary.

Saudi Arabia has said that 1.855 million pilgrims, most of them from outside Saudi Arabia, have arrived for the annual pilgrimage, a religious duty for every able-bodied Muslim who can afford the journey.

Saudi Arabia stakes its reputation on its guardianship of Islam’s holiest sites and organizing haj, a role that Iranian authorities have challenged as part of a growing dispute over the handling of last year’s disaster.

The Grand Mufti, the kingdom’s top religious authority, warned Iran that to disrupt the haj would be unacceptable, in comments

reported by local daily al-Okaz on Sunday.

“Any policy that aims to divert the haj from its proper course is un-Islamic and is a criminal policy,” he was quoted as saying.

Saudi Arabia’s state news agency, SPA, also published a four-part broadside accusing Iran’s leaders of using “the cloak of religion to implement heretical policies.”The series said 300 Iranian pilgrims caused last year’s crush by taking a wrong turn in the direction opposite where they had been assigned to move.

Later updates of the SPA stories removed the reference to the 300 Iranian pilgrims and their actions, without elaborating. Saudi authorities have previously suggested that pilgrims failing to follow crowd control rules bore some blame for the disaster, but have not released any further details.

An investigation into the incident is still pending.

Last Monday, Iran’s supreme leader accused Saudi authorities of murdering pilgrims during the crush.

In response, Saudi Arabia’s mufti said Iran’s leaders were not Muslims.

Pilgrims from Iran are not attending haj this year, after talks between the two Middle East powers over haj arrangements broke down in May. The 2015 crush, in which two large groups of pilgrims arrived together at a crossroads in Mina, a few km (miles) east of Mecca, on their way to performing the “stoning of the devil” ritual at Jamarat, was the worst disaster to strike the annual pilgrimage for at least 25 years.

The Saudi authorities redesigned the Jamarat area after two stampedes, one in 2004 and one in 2006, killed hundreds of pilgrims, and the frequency of such disasters has been greatly reduced as the government spent billions of dollars upgrading and expanding haj infrastructure and crowd control technology.

PATRIOTIC CITIZENS

People of North Korea taking part in a dancing party on the 68th founding anniversary of the DPRK…recently

Kidnap, Rape, Looting on the Rise in South Sudan Looting, kidnapping and sexual violence are increasing in South Sudan, refugees arriving in Uganda have told the United Nations, while hunger and disease are worsening as conflict continues.

Over 103,000 South Sudanese have fled to Uganda since fierce fighting in the capital between troops loyal to President Salva Kiir and his former deputy Riek Machar in July raised fears that the five-year-old nation could slide back into civil war. Fighting and insecurity in the Equatoria states bordering Uganda continue to drive thousands from their homes, the U.N. said in its latest update late on Thursday.

Most of the new arrivals

-- totaling nearly 14,000 in one week up to Sept. 2 -- are fleeing Central Equatoria State, home to the capital Juba, it said.“New arrivals to Uganda from Central Equatoria report having been harassed by armed actors and increasing violence across the area,” the U.N. update said.

Refugees from neighboring Eastern Equatoria reported widespread looting and killing of civilians by armed men, it said.

“Activities by armed actors are reportedly increasing, including looting, kidnapping, and sexual violence,” it said.

“The eruption of violence in July 2016 has heightened food insecurity and been accompanied

by... checkpoints, road ambushes, looting and theft of properties,”it said, citing a recent humanitarian assessment in Eastern Equatoria.

One in five of South Sudan’s 12 million people have fled their homes since war broke out almost three years ago, triggering widespread hunger as farmers and markets have been unable to function. Staple food prices spiked to more than 10 times the five-year average in parts of the northwest in late August, the U.N. said, ahead of the autumn harvest.

The Famine Early Warning Systems Network last month predicted localized famine -- or IPC Phase 5 -- in parts of northern South

Sudan.“It is likely an increasing number of households in these areas are exhausting their capacity to cope and may be moving to Catastrophe (IPC Phase 5) and experiencing an extreme lack of food,”it said, calling for aid agencies and traders to be given increased access to hungry people. Disease is further weakening populations, with 1.3 million cases of malaria reported since the start of 2016 and cholera spreading to new locations, the U.N. said.

Kiir publicly agreed last month to accept 4,000 additional U.N. peacekeepers to the 12,000-strong mission already on the ground but details of the deployment still need to be worked out.

Syrian Rebels Agree on Truce but Battles Persist Syrian rebels have agreed on truce but the battle has continued in major parts of the country. Government troops and insurgents fought in several parts of Syria on Sunday, apparently seeking to strengthen their positions on the eve of a ceasefire that Free Syrian Army rebels said they would observe but with major reservations.

The Free Syrian Army groups wrote to the United States on Sunday about the deal it agreed on with Russia, saying that while they would “cooperate

positively” with the ceasefire, they were concerned it would benefit the government.

Although the letter did not explicitly say the groups would abide by the ceasefire, two rebels who confirmed its text to Reuters said they would respect the ceasefire when it comes into force on Monday evening.

But according to the letter, the groups are worried by the absence of enforcement mechanisms, a lack of provision for besieged areas and clauses letting army jets fly for up to

nine days after the deal comes into effect.

The influential hardline Islamist rebel group Ahrar al-Sham issued a statement late on Sunday attacking the ceasefire deal, but stopping short of explicitly saying it would not abide by its terms.

A war monitor reported clashes around Aleppo and Damascus, but pushes by the government in the mountainous northwest and rebels in the southwest indicated an effort to improve their positions before fighting is due to stop

on Monday.

Syria’s five-year civil war has killed hundreds of thousands of people and displaced 11 million - half the country’s prewar population - causing a refugee crisis in the Middle East and Europe and inspiring jihadist attacks around the world.

Underscoring the war’s global impact, President Bashar al-Assad is backed by Russia’s air force, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and Shi’ite militias from Iraq and Lebanon, while the rebels are supported by the United States, Turkey and Gulf Arab states.

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TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016 • T H I S D AY

NEWSXTRA

There’s No Faction in PDP, Says Jegede

Groups plan mega rally for him Ebiseni faults return of Jimoh Ibrahim

James Sowole in Akure The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governorship candidate in Ondo State, Mr. Eyitayo Jegede, has dismissed the festering rumour that the party is factionalised, saying those parading themselves as factional PDP members are empty barrels.

He spoke in Akure, the state capital yesterday at an interactive session with party supporters, organised by Sunshine Continuity Network (SCN).

Jegede who insisted that the PDP is one and indivisible party, noted that the author of a factional PDP in Ondo State is not a PDP member, adding that all those who entered the train cannot but be stranded.

“Let me tell you the fact. All those canvassing the factional PDP thing are empty barrels and should be ignored. This is how you will know they are unserious people: All the PDP governors are under the leadership of Makarfi; all PDP senators are for Makarfi, House of Representatives member, Makarfi, and the Board of

Trustees (BoT), Makarfi. So, how would they manufacture a PDP without people, without leaders?

That is how you will know that they are jesters.”

He urged the people of Ondo State to await a new dawn, as he would not only build on the foundations laid by the current administration in the state, but also initiate fresh development projects that would create jobs and make the state attractive to foreign investments.

If elected, he said, his administration would encourage private investments from which government too can generate tax to embark on capital projects.

“I know that our people are suffering under this harsh economic situation which came with the government at the centre. But by the special grace of God, the PDP government in Ondo State will continue to initiate programmes that will bring relief to our people, and that is why I have come to seek your votes,” Jegede enjoined.

Earlier, the state coordinator of the SCN, Mr. Macks Ayanbade, had announced that the group

We will Turn Zik’s Residence into Tourist Site, Says Ugwuanyi Christopher Izoguso in Enugu Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State yesterday paid a courtesy visit to Onuiyi Haven, the Nsukka residence of Nigeria’s first President, the late Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, promising to turn his official residence in Enugu into a tourist site.

Ugwuanyi who was accompanied by the former Minister of Information, Chief Nnia Nwodo; Second Republic politician, Chief Maxi Ukuta; the Chairman of Nsukka Local Government Area, Prof. Rose Onah and other top government functionaries, said they were at the residence to pay their respects and express the courtesies and the goodwill of the government and the people of Enugu State.

The governor thanked and commended Zik’swife, Prof.

Uche Azikiwe, for the family’s continued support and service to the state government and the entire nation.

He also commended the former first lady for upholding the legacies of her late husband, describing him as “the undisputed icon of Nigerian nationalism, most revered statesman, political philosopher, nation builder, international political figure, celebrated journalist, author, orator and more importantly, our beloved father and brother.”

Ugwuanyi appreciated the relationship between the people of Enugu State and Azikiwe, adding that “we are very proud to have been associated with such a legendary personality.

“As the Premier of Eastern Nigeria (with Enugu as capital), he made many visionary and enduring contributions to the development of the state

including the establishment of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka - the first indigenous university in Nigeria - as well as many important government institutions, organisations and edifices some of which are still standing today.

“He also made Nsukka his permanent home and was a notable advocate for the creation of Wawa (ie Enugu) State.

“We as a government, decided to honour him once more by renovating and turning his official residence in Enugu (i.e the Premier’s residence) into a tourist centre so that the whole world can join us to appreciate and celebrate his enduring legacies,” Ugwuanyi noted.

He added that the honour was “the least we can do for a person of his stature and accomplishments, more so, one with such close historical, political and social bonds with Enugu State and her people.”

The governor also pointed out that the late former president did not only refuse to name the University of Nigeria Nsukka (UNN) after himself, he also turned down all entreaties and pressures to name the institution after him, adding that such gestures were a demonstration of “his patriotic spirit, selflessness and altruism.”

Responding, Prof. Azikiwe thanked the governor for the “surprise” visit, saying that it was the first visit by any governor from Enugu and Anambra States to Onuiyi Haven since 1999. She praised the governor for his giant strides in the state and prayed to God to continue to bless his efforts to take Enugu State to greater heights.

in collaboration with other groups of like minds, has slated a support rally for Jegede tagged, ‘Sunshine Continuity Mega Rally’, for October 21, 2016, in Akure.

Ayanbade, while canvassing for continuity in the developmental profile of Ondo State, stressed that his group was backing Jegede to enable him build on the many achievements of Governor Olusegun Mimiko.

“The goal of the rally is to further drum up the growing adulation of Eyitayo Jegede to the wider Ondo State populace and to endear him to the heart of the voting public by showcasing his constructive and innovative developmental blueprint to the electorate of the Sunshine State,” he stressed.

Meanwhile, the only opponent of Mr. Jimoh Ibrahim in the primary election of the Ali Modu Sheriff’s faction of the PDP held in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, Chief Olusola Ebiseni, yesterday described the exercise as one fraught with irregularities Describing what took place in Ibadan as a mockery of democracy, Ebiseni in an interview with journalists in Akure, said he had already

petitioned the Appeal Committee of the party to readdress the matter.

Ebiseni, who is a former Commissioner for Environment under Governor Olusegun Mimiko’s administration, pitched his tent with the Sheriff’s faction of the PDP due to the alleged endorsement of his counterpart in the same cabinet, Jegede by Mimiko.

In the interview which came up three weeks after the primary election, Ebiseni said what happened in Ibadan was an illegal anti-democratic contraption that cannot stand.

The legal practitioner also stated that the candidacy of Jegede, whom he described as the governor’s handpicked candidate against democratic tenets and just political culture of the people is also bereft of legitimacy from the beginning.

“Our grouse is that what took place in Ibadan could not be referred to as any form of election by any stretch of the imagination. There was no means of identifying who really were delegates. No delegates’ list or register presented, no accreditation of any form which faulted the entire process.

“How could an election which lasted barely an hour

have involved accreditation of almost 1,000 delegates?” he asked.

Ebiseni expressed concern that the faulty conduct of the Ibadan primary had made a mess of the desire for integrity which made him and others to seek correction under Sheriff’s faction.

“It was unfortunate that some people would, out of indiscretion, desecrate the altar of integrity on which the Sheriff group in Ondo State worship and for which we sought a separate tabernacle in the first place,” he lamented..

Ebiseni, who expressed suspicion on the nomination form allegedly issued to Jimoh Ibrahim by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), said with the current position of things at the national headquarters of the party, the form might not be a genuine one.

“I have seen forms displayed on social media by several claimants to the candidacy of the PDP and I am amused that it is either some people are playing pranks or the INEC is just enjoying itself by such shenanigans.

“In the Sheriff group, the committee that conducted the primary just submitted its report

to the NWC on September 6 after my petition has been received, yet purported Certificate of Return dated September 1 has earlier been on display including form CF001 which is supposed to be obtained by the National leadership of the party.

“It is unfortunate that rather than see the Sheriff group as a veritable higher credible platform for power, some members, especially the state executives, merely used it as an engine of vengeance against Mimiko and anyone ever associated with him.”

Ebiseni said though, the fact that he and others came to seek the party’s ticket under Sheriff Group added credibility to the group but some members of the group are now treating them with suspicion.

“Our choice of the platform brought colour, glamour, greater credibility and acceptance by the people. Unfortunately, these assets attracted suspicion and campaigns of calumny and we were immediately denounced as Mimiko agents while some even wickedly said the governor, from whose cabinet I have resigned out of irreconcilable differences, paid my nomination fees,” he said.

ROYAL PRAYERS

L-R: Oba of Lagos, Oba Rilwan Akiolu 1; Baba Adini of Lagos, Sheikh Abdulhafeez Abou; and Majority Leader, House of Representatives, Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, at the prayer ground, Dodan Barracks, Obalende, Lagos...yesterday. ETOP UKUTT

Anti-graft War Won’t Succeed with Poorly Paid Workforce, Labour Tells Buhari Organised labour has said the prompt payment of salaries by states and local governments and urgent wage increase in both private and sectors linked with productivity improvement, are the smartest and quickest ways to stimulate the nation’s economy and effectively fight corruption.

This is just as it averred that Nigeria as a nation needs wage- led economic recovery.

A statement issued yesterday by the General Secretary of the Textile Union and National Executive Committee (NEC), member of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Issa Aremu,

noted that the recent report by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on the economy, and to a large extent, the latest report of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed that weak demand for goods is one factor responsible for low capacity utilisation of many private sector companies.

Aremu, according to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), stressed therefore that to overcome the economic crisis, workers whose wages to buy basic goods and services must not only be paid on time but their wages must be increased.

“Nigeria cannot overcome

recession with the existing miserable pay of workers and pensioners.

“To this extent, President Muhammadu Buhari must urgently constitute the tripartite committee on the review of the current national minimum wage. Nigerian workers have long been in depression, not just recession going by the crisis of compensation manifesting in salary arrears and collapse of wages caused by massive naira devaluation and price inflation of close to 20 percent. There is wage income poverty that cannot help economic recovery.

“Minimum wage was N125 ($240) in 1981. Then we had stable strong exchange rate and lower inflation. In real terms, workers in 1981 earned more than the current N18, 000.00 minimum wage.

“The 2010 negotiated national minimum wage of N18, 000 was about $120 in 2010. With naira devaluation, it has unacceptably fallen to less than $45 in 2016, a quarter of its nominal value in 2016 and less than 1 per cent of its value in 1981 about 40 years ago worsening income poverty,’’ Aremu said.

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NEWSXTRA

Rebuilding Houses Destroyed By Boko Haram will Require N20bn, Says Geidam Tobi Soniyi in Abuja Yobe State Governor, Ibrahim Geidam, has said about N10 billion to

N20billion will be required to reconstruct the destroyed homes of Boko Haram victims in the North-east before they could return

Sanusi Urges Federal, State Governments to Boost Agriculture

Ibrahim Shuaibu in Kano

The Emir of Kano, Alhaji Muhammad Sanusi II, yesterday urged local, state and federal governments to focus on agriculture so as to boost food production in the country.

According to him, there is also the need for the federal government to construct additional dams across the country to enhance dry season farming for massive production of cash and food crops.

Speaking after while delivering his traditional Eid-el-Kabir message shortly after the Eid prayer at the Kofar Mata Eid praying ground in Kano metropolis, Sunusi said constructing more dams was necessary in view of the fact that most of the developed countries had for long stopped depending on wet season farming.

He urged wealthy Muslims to support the less privileged persons in the society in order to alleviate their suffering, especially during the

current economic recession in the country.

The Emir said the call was also necessary in order to provide job opportunities to the teeming number of unemployed youths as well as ensure food security in the country.

He called on Nigerians irrespective of their religious beliefs and political inclinations to continue to pray for economic growth and development in the country THISDAY observed that the Eid prayer was led by the Emir himself and was attended by the Acting Governor, Professor Hafiz Abubakar, members of the state executive council, as well as other traditional rulers from the 44 local government areas of the state.

It was also observed that many Muslims could not attend the Eid prayer due to the early morning down pour in the city.

THISDAY correspondent observed that the Eid prayer was conducted peacefully across the various locations in the state.

Ogun Set to Access AFD Facility to Finance Water Projects The Ogun State Government is set to access the multilateral facility of the French Development Agency (AFD) to finance water projects towards improving water supply to residents of the state capital, Abeokuta and its environs.

The General Manager of the state water corporation, Mrs. Monsurat Agboola, disclosed this while playing host to the members of House of Assembly Committee on Water, Oil/Energy and Rural Development, who visited the corporation over the 2016 Budget Performance and Evaluation.

According to her, the projects would amongst others, involve increasing the coverage area of water pipeline network, developing the capacity of the corporation staff and upgrading the infrastructures.

She stated that consultants that would commence the preliminary works for the projects

have been engaged, noting that the scope of their work would include technical assistance on institutional development, o r g a n i s a t i o n a l development, detailed designs and supervision for pipelines and reticulation in Abeokuta as well as technical assistance on rehabilitation of barrage at Arakanga main scheme.

In his remarks, Chairman of the Committee, Hon. Atunda Oduntan, urged the corporation to intensify effort on its various initiatives introduced to boost it’s Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) and extend improved service delivery to every other parts of the state.

Other members on the committee in their separate contributions commended the corporation for its effort at improving the revenue and charged management to ensure that the people at the grassroots enjoy regular potable water supplies, which would ultimately guarantee healthy living among the people.

home.

The governor spoke with the State House Correspondents after briefing President Muhammadu Buhari on development in the state.

However, the governor said he and the people of Yobe State were elated by the fact that the state has been finally liberated from Boko Haram.

According to him, two local government areas previously occupied by the insurgents had since been liberated.

Geidam said many of the Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) who were hitherto quartered in different camps had returned home.

He said: “In Yobe State, we experienced insurgency for about two or three years.

There were times when the Boko Haram terrorists occupied two of our local government areas of Gulani and Gujiba before they were liberated. As I am talking to you now, we have more than 3,000 IDPs in our camp.

“All of them except these 3,000 have returned to their homes. That is why I am here to advise Mr. President on how best these people should be resettled.

“Because they need a kind of rehabilitation of their destroyed homes by Boko Haram, some need outright reconstruction of their homes especially those

which were completely destroyed by the Boko Haram terrorists. So, I came here to give him a first hand information of things on ground there.

“I briefed him on how much we were able to do to resettle those who have gone back home and then what the federal government wants the remaining ones to do. So that they will go back and settle fully in their homes and resume their normal business activities.

“By our estimates, actually if the federal government spends anything from N10 billion to N20billion, the whole area which was destroyed by Boko Haram will be reconstructed and

people will go back to their homes and resume their normal lives.

“We have got relative peace. People are going about their normal lives and businesses. No threat to security of lives and property in any part of Yobe.

We do not have any threats of Boko Haram anywhere in Yobe as I speak with you right now.”

Geidam also told journalists that his requests to the president received positive responses.

“His responses were very positive. He appreciated my coming and he promised that he would look into all those issues I raised,” he said.

LET US PRAY

L-R: Muslim leader, High Chief Lateef Oyelade; Oyo State Governor, Senator Abiola Ajimobi; Aare Musulumi of Yorubaland, Alhaji Dawud Makanjuola; and Secretary to State Government, Alhaji Ishmael Alli, at the Agodi Eid-el prayer ground, in Ibadan...yesterday

How to Avert Dry-up of River Niger Tops Agenda as Africa’s Auditors-General Meet in Abuja Ndubuisi Francis in Abuja Nigeria will today host other African countries in Abuja under the aegis of the African Organisation of Supreme Audit Institutions Working Group on Environmental Auditing (AFROSAI WGEA), with one of the major items on the agenda being how to avert the possible drying up of Africa’s third longest river, the River Niger.

Experts had warned that the river faces the danger of drying up in a few years if urgent remedial measures are not taken to arrest man-made activities and the threat of climate change, among others, which are inimical to its existence.

Nigeria’s Auditor-General of the Federation (AuGoF), Mr. Samuel Ukura, is hosting the meeting, which would have in attendance

his counterparts from other parts of the continent.

In the course of the meeting, eight countries, including Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Benin Republic, Cameroun, Algeria, Chad and Cote d’Ivoire as well as Nigeria, which are along the River Niger belt, will be brainstorming on how to avert the drying up of the River Niger.

The theme of the threeday meeting is ‘Working Together for a Healthy and Sustainable Environment.”

Ukura had recently disclosed that an environmental audit of the river to determine its level of dryness was imminent.

The decision on the river’s audit is to be taken at the AFROSAI WEGA meeting, which kicks off in Abuja today.

Experts had disclosed that initial investigation

of the river indicated that the decline of its flow was occasioned mainly by climate change, industrial waste and population growth problems.

Ukura and his counterparts from the other eight African countries in the River Niger belt would decide at the Abuja meeting when the environmental audit of the river would commence.

The audit would be executed under the African Organisation of Supreme Audit Institutions (AFROSAI), with Nigeria, Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Benin, Cameroun, Algeria, Chad and Cote d’Ivoire playing pivotal roles.

Ukura had in May this year noted that it was necessary for governments of the affected nations to address the threat to the river so as to avoid a repeat of the negative impact of the drying up of Lake

Chad, with the attendant socio-economic fallouts.

“Within a few decades, River Niger will completely disappear. There are certain things in the preliminary investigation we discovered that are happening. People have been building dams without authorisation along the river. And the law establishing the River Niger Basin Commission states that before you do any serious activity along the River Niger, you have to tell other countries. But these activities are taking place without authorisation.

“Also the river is being misused. There are certain activities that will cause the river to dry up, like dumping waste. People dump certain things like toxic waste and it destroys our aquatic system.

So we will look at these things to see what can be done to stop its drying,’’ Ukura said.

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NEWSEXTRA

Family to Celebrate 50th Anniversary of Odumegwu Ojukwu’s Death Akinwale Akintunde The Ojukwu family will today celebrate the life and times of Sir Odumegwu Ojukwu, who died on September 13, 1966 at Nkalagu after a heart attack.

Odumegwu Ojukwu, a businessman from Obiuno Umudim, Nnewi, was the first and founding President of the Nigerian Stock Exchange as well as Chairman of the defunct African Continental Bank (ACB).

Minister Urges Women to Support Buhari Sylvester Idowu in Warri The Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development, Aisha Alhassan, has enjoined women to be steadfast and support President Muhammadu Buhari in his bid to transform the wellbeing of Nigerians.

The minister made the appeal at the weekend in Warri while addressing scores of women from the 25 local government areas of the state, noting that the president was not only gender-friendly but also passionate on the uplifting of women from poverty to grace.

The minister who was represented by her Coordinator for Women Empowerment, Mrs. Akukalia Angela, disclosed that her ministry was presently distributing forms to various states for women organisations and active groups to benefit from the national empowerment fund to assist them in their chosen professions.

Alhassan however advised the women to be focused and should not allow themselves be used by desperate politicians, assuring that the All Progressives Congress (APC) would do everything humanly possible to put Nigeria back on the right positive track.

“The present process of economic recession is not caused by the APC-led government, rather it was caused by the immediate past government that looted the

nation’s treasury and throw the people to hardship, remarked Alhasan, insisting that Nigerians should bear with President Buhari in his effort to sanitise the battered economy.”

The Delta State APC Woman leader, Mrs. Janeth Oyubu, in her remark lauded the effort of both the president and the minister whom she said were fighting very hard to put smiles on the faces of Nigerian women.

While noting that the PDP government hijacked all the palliatives initiated by the President Buhari government, Mrs. Oyubu charged all APC members to be fully prepared to take over the reins of government in 2019 in Delta State.

“Don’t be carried away with peanut from the ailing PDP. I can assure you that the APC has all it takes to transform your wellbeing by empowering you so that you can be helpful to your family and the society,” the APC woman leader said.

She therefore, charged the women to put their acts together and support the Buhari government in other to achieve better and prosperous future.

“There will be more palliatives from the federal government and we are all witnesses to what our first lady, Mrs. Aisha Buhari is doing to cushion the hardship faced by the less privileged in the society. We will continue to support her,” she assured.

Gowon, Others Mourn Ugoeze Ezeibe Burial holds Oct 8 The death has been announced of Her Royal Highness (HRH) Ugoeze (Ezinne) Cecilia Ihuocha (ChaCha) Ezeibe. She was aged 93 years.

Ezeibe,assumed a leadership position early in life and remained an inspiration and motivator to her community Nsulu in Isiala Ngwa North LGA of Abia State.

A great farmer with vast expanse of palm plantation who devoted her time in the service of God and humanity, Ugoeze Ihuocha will be buried on Saturday October 8 after an all-night wake keep at her home Umuomainta Nbawsi Isiala Ngwa North LGA, Abia State.

Meanwhile, tributes have been pouring in

from eminent Nigerians including General Yakubu Gowon (rtd) and his wife, Governor of Abia State; Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu, Commissioner for Insurance; Alhaji Mohammed Kari, General David Jemibewon (rtd), Chief & Mrs. Chuku Wachuku, Mr. Oye HassanOdukale of Leadway Assurance, Sir and Lady Marc Wabara, General Lawrence Onoja (rtd) and many others.

She is survived by a host of children, grandchildren, great grandchildren and brothers among whom are Dr. Amadike Ezeibe, Navy Captain Umunnabuike Anthony Ezeibe, Azu and Ekeoma Ezeibe who are renowned lawyers, international consultants and insurance practitioners.

He was also Chairman and member of the board of directors of some of Nigeria’s most profitable companies such as Shell Oil Nigeria Limited, Guinness Nigeria Limited, Nigerian National Shipping Lines, Nigerian Cement Factory, Nigerian Coal Corporation, Costain West Africa Limited, John Holt, and Nigeria Marketing Board, among others.

A statement by one of the grandsons, Dr. Ike Ojukwu, said part of the activities to mark the 50th anniversary include a lecture, charity visits and donations.

Ike also said a memorial hospital building in honour of his grandfather would commence within a year.

“We also intend to award annual prizes for the best graduating student in Business Administration and

Estate Management at UNEC. “We have had to scale things down because of the current state of the economy and security,” he said.

Speaking on the insinuations in some quarters that the wealth of his grandfather was not wellmanaged, Ike maintained that the property were well-managed despite the civil war.

“You cannot mismanage what you do not have. There was a civil war, a failed/foiled attempt to sell off, then a struggle to secure and release the assets from the government, followed by a protracted, expensive legal war with bandits. I give God thanks and some people a lot of credit for making sure there is anything left to talk about,” he stated.

Ike also dismissed insinuations that the Ojukwu family are

lazy people that’s why they are fighting over their late grandfather’s property.

According to him, “Ojukwu family are not lazy but hard working people. I have heard that before, usually from jobless buffoons. I personally have worked for 38 years, 34 of them as a doctor. I am retired. You can lecture me when you have clocked the same.

“It is only a castrated nincompoop that would sit on their filthy bottom, cross hands and watch vermin (both within and without the family) attempt to seize what a man (Sir Odumegwu Ojukwu) toiled so hard and sacrificed so much to achieve.

“If armed robbers enter your house and you tackle them, if some loafer describes you

as ‘fighting for property’ you will be justified to give that individual a dirty slap.

“You may be right in a way though, while the eldest son, Prof. Joseph Ojukwu, worked tirelessly as a surgeon for over 60 years.

“The family, estate, company etc., there may be up to 20 cases in court. Obviously one has to have respect for the courts especially with ongoing cases but the majority of our cases involve jobless opportunists. Their claims are not valid in my humble opinion, unfortunately justice could be faster and less expensive. One really feels for the dependants.

“Mind you, my grandfather never hesitated to sue when he felt the justification,” Ike stated.

MORE PRAYING FOR PEACE IN YOBE

L-R: Speaker, Yobe State House of Assembly, Adamu Dala Dogo; Deputy Governor, Abubakar D. Ali; Governor Ibrahim Gaidam; All Progressives Congress (APC) National Secretary, Alhaji Mai Mala Buni; and state Director, Department of State Services (DSS), at the Eid prayer ground in Damaturu...yesterday

Nigerian History is Women History, Say Ex-UI VC, Dabiri-Erewa Former Vice Chancellor of the University of Ibadan and emeritus Professor of English Language, Ayo Banjo and Senior Special Assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari on Foreign Affairs and Diaspora Matters, Mrs. Abike Dabiri-Erewa, have decried what they called ancient systems and structures that limit the Nigerian woman.

They stated however that going by the array of women in history who have distinguished themselves as icons, the Nigerian history cannot be effectively written without giving women a prime place.

They both made this known in their foreword to a new book written by foremost Professor of History and retired Director of the Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan, Bolanle Awe, entitled: ‘Nigerian women pioneers and icons.’

The book is a historical assessment of the contributions of some 34 women pioneers from pre-colonial era till date which

showcases their uncommon contributions to the historical development of Nigeria and how they rivaled their male gender counterpart even when it was unusual for such demonstration of nationalism and patriotism.

Some of the women pioneers recognised in the book include Nana Asmau, the legendary poet; Hajiya Fatima Lolo, pioneer female musician; Olufunmilayo RansomeKuti; Wuraola Adepeju-Esan; Margaret John Ekpo, pioneer parliamentarian; Irene Thomas; Ladi Kwali, world-acclaimed potter; Adetowun Ogunsheye; Mabel Segun; Flora Nwapa; Folake Solanke; Grace Alele Williams; Gambo Sawaba; Hansine Napwanijo Donli, legal practitioner; Onyeka Onwenu; Zaynab Alkali; Batule Alake; Joy Ogwu, among others.

According to Professor Banjo, prejudice and discrimination, which he likened to the racial prejudice of apartheid South

Africa, have been the bane of the assessment of the contributions of women to the Nigerian history, which he said suggested that a gender was superior to the other.

“The arbitrary doctrine of a class of human beings occupying a lower status in a falsely designed hierarchy within one humanity also lies at the root of discrimination against women. Unfortunately, discrimination against women had been allowed to go on for several centuries and in practically all the cultures of the world, before it was finally confronted in the nineteenth century,” he said.

The professor however said in spite of the fact that what he called legal walls which he said were built around women have continued to be broken down, “inhibition of attitudes” was still a major factor stopping a thousand and one women achievers from occupying their rightful status in society.

In her own contribution, Dabiri-Erewa called for an understanding of the difference between the modern woman and her foremothers.

“The modern woman’s work differs considerably from that of her grandmothers and great grandmothers. The most significant difference is that the modern woman works and earns a living most of her adult life, whereas her forerunner, once married, stays at home and takes care of domestic affairs,” she said, asking for the striking of balance by the modern woman in her different roles.

Dabiri-Erewa decried a situation in which the menace of the few bad women in society is used to obliterate what she called “the unquantifiable contributions of women to the social, political, economic and religious cum cultural spheres of Nigeria,” stating that the history of Nigeria can never be complete without the mention of these women of note.

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HP Concludes Deal to Buy Samsung Printer Business for $1.5bn To absorb 6,000 Samsung employees

Emma Okonji

Few months into splitting Hewlett Packard (HP) company into two divisions, HP Incorporated and HP Enterprise, the company yesterday, closed a deal to buy the printing business of Samsung Electronics for $1.5 billion (N510 billion).

Around 6,000 Samsung employees will join HP, including about 1,500 engineers, following the acquisition.

The deal is expected to bolster the HP’s offerings in the market for high-volume devices that handle printing and copying for office work groups.

The transaction, which has regulatory approval, was concluded yesterday, the companies said in a statement.

Samsung also agreed to buy between $100 million and $300 million in HP shares through open-market purchases after the business sale is completed.

Confirming the deal, Managing Director, HP Nigeria, Mrs. Ify Afe, told THISDAY that the plans to acquire the printing business of Samsung has been ongoing, but that the deal was closed yesterday.

She said HP became interested

in the deal, because it wanted to boost its printing business and add more flexibility to it, in order to improve on efficiency. “The essence of the acquisition is to broaden the printing portfolio of HP, especially in the area A3 and A4 printing. We are already working Cannon Printing and the addition of Samsung Printing business, will definitely enhance our printing efficiency, designed to boost customer experience,” Afe said.

Several hours after disclosing the deal, HP unveiled 16 new multifunction printers targeted at A3 larger printer-copier combinations that are the stronghold of such companies as Xerox Corp., Canon Inc., Ricoh Co. and Konica Minolta Inc. HP, created as part of the split of Hewlett-Packard Company, sells personal computers but gets most of its profit from supplying ink and toner for its printers. It is the market leader in the desktop printer business.

That business hasn’t been growing lately, in part because PC users print fewer pages these days. HP last month reported that revenue from ink and toner supplies declined 18 per cent in the third fiscal quarter from the year-earlier period, while printer

NBA Disciplinary Committee Dismisses Petition against Kashamu’s Lawyer TobiSoniyiinAbuja The Nigerian Bar Association’s Legal Practitioner and Disciplinary Committee has dismissed a petition alleging professional misconduct against a legal practitioner, Mr. Ajibola Oluyede.

In a letter dated September 8, 2016, the umbrella body of lawyers in the country said the petition against Oluyede by a Chief Godwin Obla (SAN) disclosed no prima facie case of professional misconduct against the lawyer.

In the petition against the lawyer, Obla accused Olueyde of lying against him when he (Oluyede) claimed that Obla was the one who informed him of a plot to abduct and extradite the Senator representing Ogun East, Buruji Kashamu, to the United States ofAmerica for trial over alleged drug-trafficking offence.

In an affidavit before the court, Ajibola Oluyede, maintained that the plot was leaked to him by Obla.

Obla was believed to be close to the immediate pastAttorney General of the Federation and Minster of Justice, Mr. Mohammed Adoke (SAN0, from whom he (Obla) allegedly got the information.

Obla, who denied having or leaking the information, had dragged Oluyede before the Legal Practitioner Disciplinary Committee, accusing him of fabricating the story to make his client’s case look good.

He had said he could never have had and shared such a piece of information with Oluyede, whom he said was no more than a professional acquaintance to him.

After the LPDC heard the parties involved in the matter, the committee in its decision communicated to chief Obla and signed by Mr.

Isiaka Abiola Olagunju said, “We write to inform you that the NBA Disciplinary Committee,Abuja panel B has concluded the hearing of your petition, it is the decision of the panel that your petition does not disclose a prima facie case of professional misconduct.

“Therefore, your petition against the respondent (Oluyede) is hereby dismissed.”

The controversy started with a petition dated April 15, 2015, which was authored and sent to the National Human Rights Commission

by Oluyede on behalf of Kashamu.

Oluyede had stated in the petition that Obla leaked the information to him while they were both on a flight from Abuja to Lagos.

Following Obla’s denial of leaking the information, Oluyede again reacted by insisting that the information was unsolicited when Obla offered it to him as a “whistle blower.”

Oluyedesaidinastatement,“Ihave just seen Mr. Obla’s reaction to the letter written by my firm to the NHRC. I assume from the tone of the rejoinder that Mr. Obla is under fire for leaking this information to me and I am therefore not surprised.

“It is true that Mr. Obla and I are only acquaintances and this was the reason I thought of him as a conscientious and honourable whistle blower when he gave me this unsolicited information.

“I had, in the matter he referred to in his rejoinder, begun to admire his candour and independent thinking. Even at that time he was very open about his candid views about the facts of that case.

hardware unit sales fell 10 per cent.

The Chief Executive of HP, Dion Weisler has vowed to spur revenue growth by expanding in A3 printing markets, a business HP estimates has $55 billion in annual revenue and which it has tried to crack before with little success. Samsung already has a business selling A3 machines, which HP acquired in the deal.

HP also acquires through the

deal, the ability to manufacture the crucial mechanisms inside laser printers, known as printing engines. Samsung developed the printing engines used in its own laser printers, while HP has always used external suppliers for these components.

President of HP’s Imaging and Printing business, Enrique Lores, said acquiring printer-engine technology would bolster its profit margins and help it shape

the evolution of its laser printers.

“What is important for us us that we will have control over the core technology,” he said.

Canon is HP’s main supplier of printing engines in its existing product line, a relationship, Lores said he expected to continue. HP’s new A3 laser printers rely on Samsung’s print engine.

Beyond helping HP enter the market for A3 machines, he said, the deal would likely help winnow

the number of suppliers in the market.

“We see HP as a consolidator in the market,” Lores said. “We want to drive this consolidation and make it happen.”

The deal includes about 6,500 Samsung printing-related patents, which Lores said would also help HP expand its business. Around 6,000 Samsung employees will join HP, including about 1,500 engineers, he said.

PRAYERS FOR THE NATION

L-R: Chairman, SUBEB, Ogun State, Alhaji Jelili Okewole; Assistant Inspector General of Police, Zone 2, Abdulmajid Ali; sate Commissioner for Works and Infrastructure, Olamilekan Adegbite; Governor Ibikunle Amosun; Baba Adini of Egbaland, Navy Captain Rasheed Raji (rtd); and Registrar, JAMB, Alhaji Ishiaq Oloyede, during prayers to observe the Eid-el-Kabir at the Lantoro Praying Ground, Oke Lantoro, Abeokuta...yesterday

Learn from Critics to Get Prof. Johnbull, Glo Drama Exposes Ills of Filthy Environment Nigeria out of Recession, The damning consequences Elizabeth, Yomi Fash-Lanso Cleric Tells Buhari of filthy environments and the need for members of the public to consciously cultivate the culture of proper disposal of wastes is the focus of Episode 9 of the Glosponsored TV drama series, Professor Johnbull, airing this Tuesday on NTA Network, NTA International on DSTV Channel 251 and NTA on StarTimes.

Viewers of the mustwatch sitcom will have the opportunity of knowing how the action, omission or commission of each person in the society can impact positively or negatively on public health as the episode tagged Mobile Dustbin accentuates the essence of public sanitation.

“Mobile Dustbin is not only as hilarious as other episodes before it, the moral lessons contained in this episode are the type needed at a time like this when the issue of deteriorating public health has become an important topical issue in our society,” Globacom added.

It will star the likes of Kanayo O. Kanayo (Professor Johnbull), Queen Nwokoye as

(Olaniyi), Mercy Johnson Okojie, who plays the role of Caro, Funky Mallam (Mai Doya), Ogus Baba (Samson) and Junior Pope as Churchill. There will also be a cameo appearance

by Glo Ambassador and Nollywood actor, O.C. Ukeje, who acts as Efosa.

Viewers have the opportunity of knowing if or not the sanctimonious professor maintains his moral stand when his son is caught on the wrong side of the law.

Why was Olaniyi’s popular Nkwobi joint sealed off in this episode?

Which other locations are affected by the sanitary audit?

What brings Mai Doya and Olaniyi together as friends for the first time? How will Caro handle Olaniyi’s love overtures?

Globacom encouraged viewers to keep a date with Professor Johnbull as Mobile Dustbin, the nineth episode of the TV Series, is aired at 8.30p.m. on Tuesday on NTA Network, NTA International on DSTV Channel 251 and NTA on StarTimes with a repeat broadcast on Friday at the same time on the same NTA channels.

Paul Obi in Abuja As the present economic recession bits harder, the Senior Pastor, Shepard House International Church, Rev. Joshua Talena, yesterday told President Muhammadu Buhari to stop seeing critics as enemies but humble himself and learn from them in order to take Nigeria out of the current economic recession.

He said Nigeria at the moment requires divine solutions to the country’s problems, particularly, the economic downturn that has continued to increase suffering across board.

Talena gave the charge during the service to celebrate media practitioners in Abuja, adding that, criticism is meant to help leaders become bitter and find solutions to problems bedevilling their societies.

“The leadership of Nigeria is not humble to seek solution, they are not accessible for advice. Most times, my enemies give me more of the information I need to become better.

“So my advice to the president is not to attack people who criticise your policies, learn from your critics to become better. By so doing, we will get out of the recession,” Talena stated.

The Senior Pastor observed

that “the leadership of Nigeria must be humble before the nation can have a turnaround” stressing that, “the leaders must have a heart of God and make themselves available to God.” Talena comended the Nigerian media but added that it must do more in holding the leaders accountable, he further tasked Christians in the media to seek divine guidance in order to flourish in the present economic recession.”

He said: “There has always been famine in the bible but people have been able to come out through divine guidance.

“I am asking all media practitioners to ask God for idea and innovation and through that we will soon come out of the recession.”

He contended that if the media had done more in holding leaders to their words, Nigeria would not be in recession.

“The media should stand for the truth no matter the pressure, the government spent $16b on electricity, we didn’t hold them accountable, media should change tactics and come out with a system that will change this nation.”

Talena further stated that “there is a lot of corruption in the system but the change in individuals is the most important factor in bringing out the change promised by the government.”

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Alaba Crisis: Chairman Insists Peace Has Returned to Market

Embattled executives pass vote of no confidence on incumbent chairman

Chiemelie Ezeobi After years of crisis, often leading to bloodbaths and visits in and out of police stations, peace has now returned to Alaba International Market, Ojo, as the opposing factions are said to have embraced peace.

This was disclosed by the present chairman of the Fancy and Furniture Dealers Association (FFDA), Emeka Mozoba, who is also the President, Alaba International Amalgamated Traders Association.

Mozoba, who said the members have embraced peace, however said they had impeached four executives for being among the traders that are promoting crisis and bastardising efforts of the association executives in promoting peace in the market.

Their impeachment was moved by three of the members during the general meeting of the association which was held to discuss the traders welfare among others.

Moving the motion for impeachment, the traders said the impeached persons were among those calling for government to handover the leadership of the market to Baba Oja or independent committee.

Stating the position of the board of trustees of the association, the acting chairman Raphael Okorem, said it is not true that a committee wants to take over the leadership of the association.

The four newly elected and sworn in executive members are Ernest Okonkwo for first Vice Chairman, Felix Obalum for Second Vice Chairman, Ihuoma Malachey as Public Relations Officer and Chukwuwike

Udensi for Welfare.

Addressing the press shortly after swearing in the four newly elected members of the executives, the president of Alaba International Amalgamated Traders Association, Hon. Emeka Mozoba, said the traders decide to impeach the four traders because have abhorred peace.

On his plan to bring all the warring parties together he said, “We have our reconciliation committee, whose job is to bring together all warring factions.”

The association legal adviser, Igwe Okoro said he had been arrested and detained by police for defending the rights of the traders, adding that most crisis that come up in markets are promoted by external bodies.

However, the other faction who were impeached said the opposite was the fact, as they were ones who had impeached the incumbent chairman, after they had passed a vote of no confidence on him.

The vote of no confidence was signed by the first Vice Chairman, Acholamokwu Mmadueke; the second Vice Chairman, Stephen Ndubuzo; the financial secretary, Eselu Chukwudi; treasurer, Obinna Umeh; the public relations officer, Onyekwelu Chukwuemenam; the chief welfare officer, Victor Ndubuzor and the assistant welfare officer, Victor Onyerionwu.

The statement, which was made available to crime reporters alleged thus, “We the elected officers of Fancy and Furniture Dealers Association (FFDA), Alaba International Market, Lagos, wish to state the following atrocities and illegalities committed by the

present chairman.

“He registered the union’s vehicle in his personal name and be built 30 container shops, sold them and used the makeshift shops to illegally block member’s shops in the market.

“He does not have shop and is not a practical trader in the market. He deceived the elders and stakeholders into appointing him as the chairman against the provisions of the union’s constitution.

“On Friday, August 12, 2016, he invaded the market with thugs and cult boys armed with guns and other dangerous weapons, inflicted injuries on many elected officers.

“They caused hundreds of members of the market to be dispossessed of their money and other belongings. He still parades those hoodlums till date.

“He is an ex-convict that served a 13-year jail term for drug trafficking in Thailand and was wrongly and unconstitutionally appointed as chairman of the market union.

“He approached a female trader by name Onyinyechi for sex and because she refused, he forced a fine of N100,000, which she paid.”

Other grievous but unsubstantiated allegations were that he allegedly collected N50,

000 each from 100 members of the market for NTA award without approval from elected officers.

They also alleged that the chairman removed tags from shops belonging to the elected officers for no reason.

They added, “He dissolved the executive council, elders council, security and task force without approval of the elected officers .

“He sexually harassed the office secretary and defiled the office of the chairman.

He intimidated and imposed a fine of N50,000 on the first vice chairman for correcting him for sexually harassing a

female trader.

“He does not allow the offices of the treasurer and the financial secretary. All the monies and revenue go direct to his table and he has never rendered any account of the monies.

“We the elected officers moved a motion for his impeachment and he stands impeached and removed as the chairman FFDA with immediate effect.”

One of the embattled members who was brutalised during the recent fracas, Michael Obinna, called on the state government and the police to ensure justice is done.

MOST IMPROVED BANK

L-R: Head Segments, Retail Banking, Union Bank, Paul Aseme; Head Strategy, Lola Cardoso; Head Alternate Channels, Folunrosho Orimoloye; Non Executive Director, Mrs. Nike Akande; Executive Director, Commercial Banking, Kunle Sonola; and Head AgriBusiness, Olabode Abikoye, after winning the Most Improved Bank in Retail Banking at the BusinessDay Banking Awards, in Lagos...recently

Nigeria, French Navy Collaborate in Exercise NEMO Economic Recession: Hajj Commission Organises France sending two warships Prayer for Nigeria Senator Iroegbu in Abuja

The Nigerian Navy will be collaborating with her French counterpart in exercise aimed at securing the nation’s maritime borders as well as the coastal area encompassing the Gulf of Guinea.

The Director of Information (DINFO), Commodore Christian Ezekobe, in a statement yesterday, said two French warships HPD DIXMUNDE and FF CODUING, will be leading a French maritime initiative under the a serie tagged: ‘Exercise NEMO 16.5’ with the theme: ‘Maritime Structure on Securitisation’.

Ezekobe said the exercise is geared towards sharpening skills in anti-piracy and anti-illegal fishing.

According to him, the maritime exercise also seeks to strengthen a 2013 agreement between the Economic Community of Central African States and the Economic Community

of West African States (ECOWAS) to fight piracy in the Gulf of Guinea.

He said: “Exercise NEMO is being conducted in collaboration with the Nigerian Navy as well as navies of Gabon, Cameroun, Benin, Togo and Ghana, among other countries in Gulf of Guinea.

“The objectives of the exercise include cooperation in the fight against piracy and illegal fishing in the Gulf as well as testing interoperability between participating navies.”

The naval spokesman noted that the vessels will carry out several exercises including a simulated attack on an oil tanker which will be tracked by Nigeria’s Maritime Domain Awareness Capability Systems.

He also stated that the exercise NEMO’s activities would be conducted in the country’s waters between September 13 and 16, 2016 and that NNS OKPABANA has been designated to partake in the exercise.

Jameelah Sanda in Mina Saudi Arabia Following the economic recession and several challenges facing the country, the National Hajj Commission of Nigeria (NAHCON) yesterday organised prayers for Nigeria on the plane of Arafat in Saudi Arabia.

The prayer, which was said in five different languages invoked Allah to grant President Muhammadu Buhari the wisdom and sincerity to govern the country effectively.

The prayer warriors also prayed for the peace, prosperity and development of the country.

One of the shcolars who conducted the prayers in English language prayed to Allah to relieve the country from the current economic downturn and guide it to the path of sustained development.

Earlier, the Chairman, National Hajj Commission of Nigeria, Mallam Abdullahi Muktar, in a media briefing on the plane of Arafat, encouraged

officials of the commission to adopt the spirit of volunteering to officiate the activities of Hajj without partaking in the Hajj exercise.

On the welfare of female pilgrims, the chairman encouraged male pilgrims to protect their female counterparts while observing the rites of Hajj Muktar further advised female pilgrims to always move in groups for the purpose of their safety and security.

The hajj commission boss, who did not perform this year’s hajj in other to ensure that Nigerian pilgrims are well attended to and accounted for, called on Nigerians to always sacrifice for one another.

Pilgrims who spoke to THISDAY commended the hajj commission boss for his sacrifice saying that they have never had it this good over the years.

“Mallam Abdullahi Muktar has led by example; he did not perform the hajj because he wanted to ensure that everything

goes on well. I can attest to the fact that this year has been fantastic. Accommodation has been top class, we have been fed for free and movements to several sites have been seamless, “said a pilgrim from Kwara State.

Ahead of the pilgrimage rites that began last week in Makkah, the Consulate General of Nigeria and Charge d’affair in Saudi Arabia had praised NAHCON for the number of innovations brought into the 2016 Hajj administration.

The envoys gave the commendation at the stakeholders Pre Arafat meeting held at Badar Hall, Makkah, Saudi Arabia.

In their assessments, the introduction of feeding of pilgrims in Makkah , Medina Mina and Arafat has ensured marked improvement in the welfare of pilgrims as well as the transportation system.

According to them, the idea of feeding the pilgrims and housing them in the highbrow

Markaziya area in Madina has not only reduce the incidences of illness but also the stress of walking long distances to the holy mosque in Medina.

They however called for more collaborative efforts between the state boards and the commission to ensure that pilgrims abide strictly by Saudi regulations.

Speaking in the same vein, the Etsu Nupe and Leader of the delegation, Alhaji Muhammad Yahaya Abubakar, said NAHCON’s feats need to be applauded as it had ensured continued success of Hajj performance in the country since its creation.

In a related development, the Nigerian Consulate has revealed that the seized wristband by the Saudi Arabian government would soon be released as the embassy was in advanced talks with the host government to ensure the release of the wrist band to the states for eventual

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TUESDAYSPORTS

Group Sports Editor Duro Ikhazuagbe Email duro.ikhazuagbe@thisdaylive.com

2 0 1 6 R I O PA R A LY M P I C S

Onye Wins Team Nigeria’s First Athletics Gold Nwosu, Omolayo add two more power-lifting gold Keno Edhowo Team Nigeria’s good run at the ongoing 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio, Brazil continued yesterday with Lauritta Onye winning gold in Shot Put. It is Nigeria’s first gold medal from the track and field.

Competing in the women’s shot put f40 event on the Day-four of the Rio Paralympics, Onye first heaved 7.83m that saw her break her world record of 7.72m set at the IPC World Athletics Championships in Doha, Qatar in 2015.

Her second throw was 7.54m.

She however went one centimeter further on her third attempt.

Onye’s fourth attempt of 8.40m sent Team Nigeria camp into jubilation mood as it secured the fifth gold medal for the country.

Onye’s medal is Nigeria’s seventh at the Rio Paralympic Games.

Also yesterday, Ndidi Nwosu defeated the defending champion to win women’s -73kg Powerlifting

event gold medal Nwosu was set for the bronze medal before she stepped up in her very last attempt, lifting 140kg to equal the Paralympics Record (PR) and usurp France’s Souhad Ghazouani for the gold.

Another Nigerian, Bose Omolayo broke her own World Record (WR) and set a new one of 138kg to win gold medal.

Earlier, Team Nigeria’s captain, Lucy Ejike, broke the Paralympic and world record three successive times, to win the women’s -61kg event in power-lifting. Her successful attempt at 136.kg on Sunday set a new Paralympic record and world record.

Ejike went on to set a bigger mark of 138kg, before lifting a massive 142kg.

Another power-lifter, Paul Kehinde, had earlier at the weekend given Team Nigeria her second gold medal of the Games. Kehinde in the -65kg men’s category, lifted

218kg to beat his rivals to the gold medal.

His gold came after Roland Ezuruike had on Friday won Nigeria’s first gold in Rio, also in

power-lifting.

China’s Peng Hu (200kg) finished second, while Egypt’s Shaaban Ibrahim (193kg) won the bronze medal.

Latifat Tijani won silver in the women’s power-lifting -45kg on Friday, with Esther Oyema adding another silver in the women’s power-lifting -55kg

category on Saturday.

As at press time last night, Nigeria was listed tenth on the medals table with six gold, two silver and one bronze.

NCC TENNIS LEAGUE

Emmanuel Beats Michael to Salvage One Point for Team Offikwu Team Tombim cruised past Kaduna-based Team Offikwu in their first round robin encounter winning two out of three matches of the ongoing NCC Tennis league on Sunday to wrap up the Tie 6-1.

The Abuja-based Team Tombim had on Saturday taken an insurmountable 4-0 lead and went up 5-0 when Edwards Christopher beat Emmanuel Idoko in the first reverse singles 6-2, 6-3.

However, Sylvester Emmanuel, ranked No.2, rescued some pride for the Offikwu team by upsetting national champion Moses Michael 6-3, 3-6, 10-5 ( tie break decider) in the second reverse singles.

In the mixed doubles match which ended proceedings, the Tombim pair of Henry Atseye and Lovette Donatus overcame

the Offikwu pair of Albert Bicom and Aanu Aiyegbusi 6-3, 6-4.

The NCC Tennis league continues at three centres next weekend.

Team Anambra will be hosting Team Goshen of Ilorin in Onitsha, CBN Futures will take on Team Kalotari of Port Harcourt at the National Stadium in Lagos and Team FCT will face Team Hope of Asaba in Abuja.

Ten teams are competing in two round robin groups with the top two finishers from each group qualifying for the semifinals.

The NCC Tennis League, the first of its kind in Africa, is offering N7 million in prize money to the winners, N5 million to the runner-up, N3 million to third place and N2 million to the fourth place finishers.

Kanu Bereaved

Former Nigerian International Nwankwo Kanu has lost his mother with no details shedding light on the cause of her unfortunate demise Kanu’s mother, Mrs. Susan Kanu Iheme, was reported to have passed away on September 7.

According to papilonews.com Kanu eulogised his mother, whom he described as a great pillar of strength to the entire family.

“The loss of Mama is hard to bear. She is a rock that stood by me and all my siblings.

She showed us equal love and affection, and always prayed for each and every one of us.

“Her support and prayers for me right from the beginning of my playing career till the end were invaluable. Her guidance also went a very long way into

moulding me into the man I am today. She taught me to love, and to give. I will miss her, but God knows best.

Mama Kanu had the rare privilege of raising three sons who played professional football. Aside Olympic Gold medal winning legend Nwankwo, her eldest son Godwin played for Bendel United and her last son Ogbonna played for Ajax Amsterdam amongst other clubs.

The former Arsenal and Ajax star was a member, and later captain, of the Nigerian national football team for 16 years from 1994 until 2010. He has been married to wife, Amara Nwankwo for 12 years and the pair has three beautiful children.

Burial arrangements are yet to be announced by the family.

Lauritta Onye celebrating his gold medal in the shot put event yesterday in Rio

Eagles will Qualify for World Cup in Russia, Pinnick Assures Nigerians Agha Ibiam in London President of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), Mr. Amaju Melvin Pinnick, has assured Nigerians that the federation will be up and doing to ensure that Nigeria qualify for 2018 World Cup finals in Russia.

However, he expressed displeasure on the exit of both the Flying Eagles and Golden Eaglets from international competitions, adding that coaches should isolate business from coaching for Nigeria football to go beyond where it is.

Pinnick who was in London

at the weekend made the comment when speaking with the Association of Nigerian Journalists in the United Kingdom (ANJUK) at Marriot Hotel.

He said he was on transit from Zurich after attending a meeting with other two African football managers.

According to him, the most important project for his board now is how to qualify the country for Russia 2018 World Cup as all the junior teams has failed to make it to the global stage.

The former Delta Sports

Commission chairman maintained that the future of Nigeria football will be robust as the Super Eagles is settled for the tournament.

He said, “There is no form of politics surrounding the preparation and the country has the youngest and talented footballers in the continent.”

Pinnick however stressed that one major problem faced by his federation was the issue of finance as the country is going through serious economic challenges. ‘’You are also aware that the country is facing financial

difficulties and it is affecting us, but we will try our best to see that the country’s flag is hoisted in Russia,’’ he promised.

Nonetheless, Pinnick applauded Nigeria’s Europebased players especially those plying their trades in England for the superlative and unmatched performances most of them have been exhibiting recently. ‘’I am really happy for our players in Europe especially in those in England. They are adjudged the best and they are still young in their respective club sides,” concludes the NFF chief.

R I O 2 0 1 6 O LY M P I C S

Mikel Reveals How He Funded Dream Team VI to Bronze Medal Chelsea midfielder John Mikel Obi has revealed he had to foot the bill to help Nigeria win an Olympic bronze medal after the Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports failed to take responsibility.

The 29-year-old had to put up more than £30,000 to organise travel for the team, pay for food and book training pitches ahead of the trip to Brazil which ended in his country’s 3-2 win against Honduras – providing the only medal for Nigeria at Rio 2016.

With lack of support for their training camp in Atlanta

– where the Dream Team led

by Nwankwo Kanu won a gold medal in 1996 – Mikel took matters into his own hands to help the team realise their Olympic dream, with help from coach Samson Siasia.

“I think if we talk about the money that I put into the team I think it was more than (£30,000), but we just had to do it” Mikel told Goal.com “I said to myself, ‘I won’t let this happen. If I can help, I’ll try to help’. Sometimes there was no food, sometimes there was no pitch to train on, and

there was no bus to go to the training ground. So all of this was what I and the coach had to figure out, and get money together.

“I came to the camp. I sat down with the boys in Atlanta and I could see the frustration, the pain and the anger. Their aim was to play in the Olympics; their goal was to play in the Olympics.

“And for me being there and seeing what they are going through, they are young boys, they want to start their career and someone in the ministry

is trying to crush that dream.”

“There was just no flight provided by the Nigerian ministry,” he added. “We planned to leave three or four days before the tournament, but we ended up leaving the day of our first game. It was a difficult one. I don’t think I have ever seen something like that before, it was crazy.”

Nigeria beat Sweden, Colombia, Japan and Denmark in Rio, before a 2-0 defeat to Germany saw them in the bronze medal play off against Honduras.

45

T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

TUESDAYSPORTS

UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE

Guardiola Challenges Man City Ahead of M’gladbach Clash Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola warned yesterday that his players have not yet met his expectations ahead of their opening UEFA Champions’ League group game at home to Borussia Moenchengladbach today.

City have won all six of their matches in all competitions this season and moved clear at the top of the Premier League with a slick 2-1 derby win at Manchester United on Saturday.

It has raised hope among City’s fans that Guardiola is already on course for glory, but he says his team must raise their level if they are to finish the season with silverware.

“We are first after four games in the Premier League, but the way we have played until now will not be enough to win the Premier League,” he said.

“We have to improve to win the Premier League. Of course we are so happy for the results, for the numbers, for the way we are playing after two months.

“But it is not enough to win the Premier League or to achieve big targets in the Champions League.”

Guardiola is a two-time Champions League winner and has never failed to reach the semifinals in his seven seasons coaching in the tournament with Barcelona and Bayern Munich.

City broke new ground in the competition last season under Guardiola’s predecessor Manuel Pellegrini, reaching the last four for the first time before losing 1-0 on aggregate to eventual winners Real Madrid.

Once again they find themselves in an arduous pool, with Barcelona and Scottish giants Celtic completing Group C. City beat Gladbach twice in last season’s group phase, but needed a 90th-minute Sergio Aguero penalty to win in Germany and a late salvo of goals from Raheem Sterling and Wilfried Bony to prevail at home.

With a trip to Celtic to follow, and then an emotional double-header against his former club Barcelona, Guardiola knows City cannot afford to make a sluggish start at the Etihad Stadium on Tuesday.

“They are a brave team,

(with a) brave coach – one of the best teams in Europe,” Guardiola told his pre-match press conference at the City Football Academy training complex.

“They have a lot of quality.

The draw was difficult for us.

Barcelona was there, especially with Gladbach.”

Aguero is available for City despite currently serving a three-game domestic suspension and has shaken off a calf problem that forced him to withdraw from international duty with Argentina.

Close-season signing Ilkay Gundogan, the Germany midfielder, could make his debut after overcoming a knee problem, while captain Vincent Kompany is close to a return after thigh surgery.

After 37 years during which they did not play a single game in Europe’s top club competition, Gladbach are appearing in the Champions’ League group phase for the second season running.

Fourth in the Bundesliga last season, 33 points below Guardiola’s Bayern, they reached the group stage in impressive fashion by crushing Swiss side Young Boys 9-2 on aggregate in the play-off round.

Andre Schubert’s men face a battle to avoid a second successive group-stage elimination, but American midfielder Fabian Johnson believes they can pull off an upset against City.

“I don’t think there is a team in the world that cannot be got at,” he told the Bundesliga website.

“Obviously City have an outstanding squad with many world-class players. They’ve also made an impressive start to the season.

“So we respect them, but we don’t fear them. We know what we are capable of and showed that last season – against Man City, too.”

Gladbach opened their league campaign by beating Bayer Leverkusen 2-1, but went down 3-1 at Freiburg on Saturday.

Alvaro Dominguez and Josip Drmic are long-term absentees for the Foals, while Marvin Schulz and Mamadou Doucoure are yet to feature this season due to groin and muscular injuries respectively.

FIXTURES TUESDAY

Barcelona v Celtic Benfica v Besiktas Dynamo Kyiv v Napoli Basel v Ludogorets Bayern v FC Rostov Man City v M’gladbach PSV v Atletico PSG v Arsenal

WEDNESDAY

Leverkusen v CSKA Club Brugge v Leicester FC Porto v København Juventus v Sevilla Legia Warsaw v Dortmund Lyon v D’Zagreb Real Madrid v S’Lisbon Tottenham v Monaco

Yaya Toure (right, front row) and David Silva (2nd right, front row) were welcome sights at Manchester United training yesterday ahead of M’gladbach clash

B A R C E LO N A V C E LT I C

Rodgers Labels Suarez Best Striker in the World Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers yesterday labelled Barcelona’s Luis Suarez as the best striker in the world ahead of the Scottish champions’ daunting task of stopping him, Lionel Messi and Neymar in their Champions League opener tonight.

Rodgers worked with Suarez for two years at Liverpool as the Uruguayan’s 31 goals nearly carried the English side to their first Premier League title in for 24 years in 2014.

However, Rodgers admitted Suarez has gone to another level alongside Messi and Neymar in forming what the Northern Irishman described as one of the deadliest strike forces in football history.

“We respect that this is arguably the best team in the world with maybe the best front three of all-time,” Rodgers said at the Camp Nou yesterday.

“I know from working with Luis he used to occupy a four or five-man defence on his own, so if you put Neymar and Messi into that it is a very difficult task.

“In this moment in time Luis is the best striker in the world there is no question about that.

“I had the pleasure of working with Luis for two years. He is the best in the world. The biggest compliment you can pay him is he came to an already world class team and made them better.

“Barca now wouldn’t be the

same team without Luis in the team.”

Celtic is huge underdog to progress in a group that also contains Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City and Borussia Moenchengladbach.

However, the sides suffered contrasting fortunes at the weekend as Celtic thrashed old rivals Rangers 5-1 in the first league meeting between the two for four years, while Barca slumped to a shock 2-1 home defeat to newly-promoted Alaves.

However, Enrique expects a very different clash with Champions League points at stake.

“It helps to have played them in pre-season, but in terms of

intensity and fighting for the three points there is a huge difference,” added Enrique.

And he lauded the impact made by Rodgers in his short time in charge at Celtic in leading the Scottish champions back into the Champions League for the first time in three years.

“He loves good football, he is a coach that likes to play on the front foot, to take the game to the opposition and you can see that already in his short time at Celtic.

“They have made good signings and have players that will cause us problems. I Like Rodgers as a coach and his idea of how to play football.”

PSG V ARSENAL

Koscielny Boost for Gunners Arsenal were handed a fitness boost as Laurent Koscielny trained ahead of their Champions League opener with Paris SaintGermain at the Parc des Princes tonight.

The centre-back picked up an eye injury during Arsenal’s 2-1 against Southampton, in which he scored a scissor-kick, but he was training at London Colney yesterday Arsene Wenger, who was able to rest some of his big name players in Saturday’s victory, is expected to field a strong line-up in the French capital.

New signing Shkodran Mustafi could partner Koscielny, with Arsenal missing their other centre-backs Per Mertesacker and Gabriel through injury.

Wenger confirmed Koscielny has recovered well and is

Koscielny available, but Aaron Ramsey (hamstring) trained away from the main squad yesterday and did not travel to Paris.

“He (Koscielny) is alright,” Wenger said at his pre-match press conference. “I was worried

after the game at Southampton because he took a big knock to his face, but he is OK.” Olivier Giroud is pushing for his first start of the season, having made two substitute appearances for the Gunners this campaign.

Paris Saint-Germain last met Arsenal in the 1993/94 Cup Winners Cup semi-finals, when the Gunners won 2-1 on aggregate.

The Gunners are unbeaten in their 12 away games against French clubs in European competition, including winning their last seven.

This is the Ligue 1 side’s fifth consecutive Champions League campaign and ninth in total.

Only Lyon has more appearances in the competition among French clubs, with a total of 14.

FACTS Arsenal has qualified for the Champions League for the 19th consecutive season, with only Real Madrid boasting a longer current streak of 20.

Arsenal has made it past the group stages in the last 13 seasons but has been knocked out at the last 16 stage in the last six campaigns.

Their solitary Champions League final ended in defeat against Barcelona in 2006.

Petr Cech has kept 47 clean sheets in 111 Champions League games.

Only Iker Casillas (51) and Edwin van der Sar (50) have kept more among goalkeepers.

Alexis Sanchez has scored three and assisted five of Arsenal’s last 13 Champions League goals.

Wenger has taken charge of 176 games in the Champions League, more than any other current manager. Only Alex Ferguson boasts more games, with 190.

46

TUESDAY, september 13, 2016 • T H I S D AY

TUESDAYSPORTS

Wawrinka Deserves a Place amongst Tennis ‘Big Five’, Says Djokovic World number one Novak Djokovic has said that tennis now has a ‘big five’ following Stan Wawrinka’s US Open triumph at the weekend.

Wawrinka beat Djokovic in four sets on Sunday to win his third Grand Slam.

“He plays best in the big matches and definitely deserves to be mentioned in the mix of top players,” said Djokovic.

But world number three Wawrinka, who said he was crying with nerves before the final, insisted he was “really far” from the ‘big four’ of Djokovic, Andy Murray, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal.

That illustrious quartet have won 42 of the past 47 Grand Slams, though Wawrinka now has the same number of major titles as Olympic champion Murray.

In head-to-head matches against them, Wawrinka trails Djokovic 19-5, against Murray he is 9-7 down, Federer leads 18-3 while Nadal is 15-3.

Wawrinka also only has one Masters 1000 title compared with Murray’s 12.

“Just look at the tournaments they have won, how many years they’ve been there,” said Wawrinka, who has now won his past 11 finals.

“If you look, yes, I have three Grand Slams. How many Masters 1000 has Murray? They have been there 10 years.

“They have not only been winning, but being in semi-finals, final every time. That’s why I’m not there.”

At 31, Wawrinka is the oldest male US Open champion since 35-year-old Ken Rosewall in 1970 and only the fifth man in the Open era to win more than one major tournament after turning 30, following Rosewall, Rod Laver, Andre Agassi and Jimmy Connors.

He now needs the Wimbledon title to complete a clean sweep of the Grand Slams.

In reaching the US Open final, Wawrinka spent almost nine hours longer on court than Djokovic, a beneficiary of three retirements during the event in New York.

“He’s a very complete player.

If he feels right he doesn’t miss much and he makes a lot of winners so it’s hard to play him,” said Djokovic, who also lost to

Wawrinka Wawrinka in the 2015 French Open final.

Wawrinka’s confident performance was at odds with his pre-match nerves, when he broke down in tears while speaking to his coach Magnus Norman.

“Before the final I was really nervous like never before. I was shaking in the locker-room,” said the Swiss, who was match point down against Britain’s Dan Evans in the third round.

“When we start talking five minutes before the match, last few things with Magnus, I start to cry,” he said. “I was completely shaking.

“But the only thing I was convinced with myself was that my game was there.

“Physically I was there. My game was there. Just put the fight on the court and you will have a chance to win.

“And that’s what happened, after a few games when I start to believe in myself, I start to be in the match.”

Balotelli: Liverpool Move Worst Mistake of My Life Striker Mario Balotelli has described his spell with Liverpool as ‘the worst mistake of my life’ after he scored twice in his Ligue 1 debut with Nice on Sunday.

The 26-year-old former Inter Milan and Manchester City forward helped Nice to a 3-2 win over Olympique Marseille to leave his team second in league standings, behind leaders Monaco on goal difference.

Balotelli scored only once in 16 Premier League appearances in his first season at the Merseyside club and was sent back to AC Milan on loan last season in an injury-hit campaign.

“I joined Liverpool (in 2014)... it was the worst mistake of my life. Apart from the fans, who were fantastic with me, I must be

honest, and the players, who I had a good rapport with, I didn’t like the club,” Balotelli told reporters in France.

“I had two coaches, Brendan Rodgers and Jurgen Klopp. As people they didn’t make a good impression on me. I didn’t get along with them.”

Balotelli, who won the Champions League and three Serie A titles with Inter Milan and lifted the English top flight crown with City, believes he still has a chance of winning the Ballon d’Or. “Of course. It’s not too late. I think I could have already won it by now, but by working hard in training I could still win it in the next two or three years,” Balotelli added.

Balotelli

Man Utd First UK Club to Earn £500m in a Year Manchester United has recorded record revenues of £515.3m for the 2016 financial year, the first UK football club to do so.

In a year when it won the FA Cup, the Old Trafford club also signed 14 sponsorship deals, and saw commercial, match day and TV revenues all rise.

It is now predicting 2017 revenues of up to £540m, even though it is not in the Champions League this season.

Under new boss Jose Mourinho they are currently third in the Premier League.

The club’s accounts up until June 30, 2016 confirm that the Premier League club was the first British team to break the half-billion mark, but the figure is short of Barcelona’s €679m (£570m) revenue revealed in July.

The Premier League giants

also revealed operating profits of £68.9m, and adjusted core earnings of £191.9m, both also records.

Net debt increased by £5.7m on the previous year, to £260.9m, which the club said was primarily due to the impact of foreign exchange rate movements on its US-denominated debt.

Big figures for Manchester United, slightly exceeding their own expectations of £510m revenues for the year to June 30, 2016.

As has been the case for a number of years now, commercial income is roaring ahead, with a 36.3 per cent increase in that sector alone to £268.3m.

To put it into context, that figure would have put United 11th in the latest Deloitte Rich List, ahead of Tottenham, both Milan clubs and Roma.

The only slight downer is that

United cannot claim to be the first football club to generate annual revenue in excess of £500m.

That claim belongs to Barcelona, who benefited from a stronger Euro against the pound post-Brexit.

Meanwhile, Manchester United has written off £6.7 million due to Bastian Schweinsteiger’s demotion to the reserve team.

The club also paid £8.4m to clear out former manager Louis van Gaal and his coaching staff.

However, an extra exceptional cost was that of the value lost in Schweinsteiger’s banishment from the first-team.

The German midfielder is not wanted by new boss Jose Mourinho and cannot train with the senior players, while he has been left out of their Europa League squad.

Mourinho and his players

47

T H I S D AY • TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

TUESDAYSPORTS

Ijirigho: Re-engineering Sports at the Grassroots Against the backdrop of the country’s poor outing at the last Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil where Team Nigeria won only a bronze medal in the men’s football event, ex international athlete, Dr Bruce Ijirigho who was in Lagos recently offers his views on how to halt the slide. DURO IKHAZUAGBE writes Standing at over 6ft 5, with graying beards, Dr Bruce Ijirigho cuts the picture of a fulfilled man.

Of course, he is. He holds a Ph.d in Petroleum Geology. At various times, he has been a lecturer and practitioner of his discipline in the United States and Nigeria. He lectured at the University of Ibadan for eight years before returning to the United States. For some years now, he has been back in the country. He has been silently reengineering a different field other than petroleum geology. Ijirigho has returned to his first love-Sports.

To refresh memories, Bruce Ijirigho and the likes of Charlton, Ehizuelen, Harrison Salami, Godwin Obasogie and several others of their generation were a special breed that took Nigerian sports by storm.

Ijirigho in particular was a complete sportsman.

He played soccer, did the pole-vault and excelled in the 440 yards (now 400 meters) event.

In 1971 as Captain, he led the Midwest (later Bendel) State and now Edo and Delta states to the Hussey Shield Competition in Port-Harcourt, with the state coming first in all but two events.

Ijirigho and his colleagues also represented the country at the Olympics and made the finals of their various events. It is against this backdrop that Ijirigho finds it difficult to turn his back on sports that gave him the scholarship to study in America and become who he is today.

And so when he was called upon by former Governor Liyel Imoke to help revive sports at the grassroots in Cross River State, he gladly accepted the challenge. Today, the products of that experimentation are there for all to see.

While Nigerians were gnashing their teeth and sighing over Team Nigeria’s poor outing at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games in Brazil, some of the athletes that came out of the Cross River State experiment at the grassroots were all over the place, competing for other countries. Some of them even made the finals of the events they competed in yet, none of Nigeria’s athletes made it to the final of the track & field events!

But Speaking with THISDAY recently in Lagos, Ijirigho opened up on how Nigeria can return to winning ways in sports. He insisted that a return to grassroots and nurturing of identified talents can help solve the heartache Team Nigeria’s outings now bring to compatriots.

“Based on my experience and what I went through as an athlete, I can conclude that our problem has always been management of our sports men and women, finding them and nurturing them to the world level. But because as a country we have not been able to do this, that is why we have always had problems getting the right results at international sports contests, and this is disgraceful,” stressed the former captain of Team Nigeria.

He readily admits that he may have left sports along while ago as an athlete but his mind has not left the arena.

“For me sport is my main life endeavour.

Professionally I am a geologist, I have been teaching petroleum engineering at the University of Ibadan and also I am an environmental consultant in the USA. But in all these, my heart has always been with this country and its sports, because we have talents everywhere.”

The ex-international points at how his contemporaries in Jamaica have help their small Caribbean islands become world powers in global sports.

“Guys like Don Quarry and Bert Cameron are the people behind the success that Jamaica has been enjoying in athletics. Asafa Powell, Usain Bolt, are some of their products. I went there to interview them on three different occasions on how they were able to make gains in sports. I spoke to their sports minister, chairman of the Jamaica athletics association and their coaches. I took notes. What they told me was that the sports development structure, which the British colonialists left behind in Nigeria, we did not maintain them;

Blessing Okagbare and Team Nigeria’s women’s 4x100m squad at the Rio 2016 Games

Sport is my main life endeavour. Professionally I am a geologist, I have been teaching petroleum engineering at the University of Ibadan and also I am an environmental consultant in the USA. But in all these, my heart has always been with this country and its sports, because we have talents everywhere Ijirigho we allowed them to crumble and decay. But they (Jamaicans) continued on their own and even built upon the structures. Some of their top stars from that programme who went abroad even came back home and contributed their experiences into the development of the sport there,” Ijirigho said of the success of Jamaica whose top athlete Usain Bolt alone won six individual gold medals at three Olympic Games in addition to three other gold medals from the 4x100m relays of Beijing 2008, London 2012 and Rio2016.

The grassroots sports development consultant insisted that his experiment with the Cross River State sport is capable of turning around the Nigerian situation if replicated at the national level.

“Yes it is possible... that was what I had in mind (to help with grassroots sports development) when I came back to Nigeria.

I want to see how we can implement such a programme that has helped the Jamaicans become what they are today. I wrote a proposal in 2002 and handed it over to then Sports Minister, Stephen Akiga. He invited me before the Council of Sports meeting and I did a presentation, and Akiga liked it because it was a grassroots oriented developmental programme. But before we could put the first step forward, he was removed from office and his predecessors were not keen to follow up.

“It was this same proposal that I took to places like Kaduna and Delta states. But it was Cross River State that embraced the programme in 2010. The governor then; Senator Liyel Imoke did everything and removed all the impediments.

I gave Imoke a one-page proposal and we had

a five- minute discussion on the proposals.

Thereafter, he called his Deputy (governor) and the Commissioner for Sports to give me all the support that they can, and to see to it that the programme took off without hitches. The rest is history,” Ijirigho noted with pride the result of that experimentation.

He continued: “We implemented the programme and the whole nation saw the success that we recorded in the short time that we ran it. For me it was vindication that with a concise programme and the sports talents everywhere in this country we can produce a pool of quality athletes who will meet world standards. For four years in a row Cross River State dominated the Schools Sports Festival and the National Under-17 Championships.

At the 2012 National Sports Festival we had athletes in every final that was contested some of them achieved podium performances. This is where we had the likes of Edidiong Offonime Odiong who ran for Bahrain in the final of the 2016 Olympics in Brazil. I counted four athletes from the programme who were in the World Junior Championships in Bydgozcz, Poland.

Offonime won a gold medal in the women’s 200m. If we, as a country, was taking care of those athletes, they will not go to Bahrain. There were many kids we discovered and are doing well. For instance there was one Endurance who was selling food at the museum in Calabar and also Mercy Ntia Obong, whom we picked up from selling food in the market and brushed up to the world level.

Even as we have produced these athletes how can we stop other countries from snatching them? We have to find a way to keep them.

But if we tell Nigeria to give these kids a

N100, 000 a month token will they do it?

And how much is that compared to what these athletes are being lavished with in the countries they have gone to compete for?” queried the ex-international.

As a product of the Samuel Ogbemudia sports philosophy in the old Midwest and Bendel State, Ijirigho emphasized that sport and education must run side by side. “At end of our programme in Cross River, we had 21 kids in the University of Calabar who we were paying their fees. We have four others who are studying in United States Universities. We got admission for them as part of the programme.

There were others we brought from the villages and we put them in schools in Calabar, we were paying these athletes allowances. Every athlete that met the standards we required, was automatically admitted into our programme, right from primary to secondary.We had boxing, swimming and weightlifting, Cross River State had the best under-17 team in the country.

This is a very good programme we want it to continue. But so far we haven’t heard anything from the present governor of the state.”

Despite the level of rot in the country’s sport, Ijirigho believes all is not lost yet if the right things are done to salvage the situation.

“I believe that we can salvage sports in this country. Samuel Ogbemudia did it, majority of the athletes discovered during the Ogbemudia programme represented this country. Ogbemudia was able to achieve it because he fell on the structures that the colonialist left behind. Sport was thriving in the schools. There was synergy between the ministry of education and the various sports councils.”

Tuesday September 13, 2016

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Price: N250

MISSILE Falana to FG

“Imposing conditions on Nigeria regarding the spending of returned assets is disproportionate and amounts to an unlawful intervention because Switzerland has no legal or moral right to the assets. Indeed, Switzerland is completely complicit for the stashing and depositing of stolen assets from Nigeria in its banks and other financial institutions.” – A human rights lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana, asking the federal government to reject the conditions the government of Switzerland attached to the repatriation of $321 million stolen by the late Head of State, Gen. Sani Abacha.

C.DONADINUBA GUEST COLUMNIST

Back to the Ekwueme Constitution

O

ne of the most perplexing paradoxes in today’s Nigeria is the strident campaign for the adoption of the report of the 2014 national dialogue on the Nigerian condition organized by the Goodluck Jonathan administration as the basis of a new constitution.

Even people who should know better have joined the bandwagon, showing that many Nigerians just go with the flow. Mental rigour remains a commodity in awfully short supply in the Nigerian public space. The most critical objective for the campaign for Nigeria’s structural redesign since the mid-1990s is to reduce the number of states from 36 to about 6, so as to, among other factors, free the economy from perennial paralysis arising out of the humungous annual recurrent expenditure at all levels. But the 2014 Conference agreed that the number of states should, in fact, balloon from 36 to 54.

The delegates believed that Nigeria, whose 28 out of the 36 states cannot pay workers’ salary, should have the highest number of states throughout the globe, four more than the United States, the world’s wealthiest nation which has 50 states and a population of 300m. This recommendation highlights the emptiness of the Nigerian political class. Still, some people who delight in being called social critics and statesmen have of late been trumpeting the 2014 Conference Report as Nigeria’s only hope for survival whereas it actually sounds the country’s death knell. Pray, how can Nigeria survive for up to six months with some 54 states?

High-minded people recognize the enormity of power conferred on Nigeria’s centre, observing it is a principal cause of the country’s socioeconomic underdevelopment. And a major reason for the concentration of power at the centre is the large number of states. In other words, the more states are balkanized to create other states, the more they become dependent on the federal government. And yet the people who complain that the centre is too powerful are the same individuals and groups pushing for the 2014 Conference Report which advocates as many as 18 more states to be created in one fell swoop! The truth is that the death of the report iwas foretold ab initio. Besides the fact that there is no law creating the 2014 Conference, it never had legitimacy or moral authority. All the almost 500 delegates were appointed by one single individual. This is not tenable in a democracy in the 21st century. And those asking President Muhammadu Buhari to adopt and implement the report should know the Constitution does not vest such power in the president. Interestingly, those who advocate Buhari’s implementation of the report frequently accuse the president of dictatorial tendencies.

Nigeria needs to be redesigned. Much

Ekwueme

of the work has mercifully already been caught out, as can be gleaned from the 1995 Constitution which is sometimes called the Ekwueme Constitution because its key differentiating features were canvassed by former Vice President Alex Ekwueme at the 1994/5 Constitutional Conference in Abuja.

The major differentiating contents of the 1995 Constitution are the division of the country into geopolitical zones, the adoption of the zones as the federating units, rotational presidency, one term of five or six years for the president and each state governor which is not renewable, increase in the use of the derivation principle from 3 to 13%, etc. Sani Abacha had begun to implement the 1995 Constitution, as shown by his creation of six states in 1996, with each zone getting one new state. One good thing about the zones is that it makes for equity and stability. It divides the South into three zones and the North into another three zones.

Nigeria began as an amalgamation between the North and the South.

It is regrettable that Afenifere leaders coerced Abdulsalami Abubakar into jettisoning the 1995 Constitution and replacing it with the 1979 Constitution. Afenifere leaders felt that since the 1995 Constitution was drawn up under Abacha who was justifiably considered an enemy, it must be rejected, even though Abacha had practically no input in it. It was a case of throwing away both the baby and the bad water. Abubakar was desperate to have the Yoruba participate in his transition to civil rule programme, and so capitulated to the Afeniferi demand. He acquiesced to the demand that the 1979 Constitution be brought back. This is why there are almost no differences between the 1979 and 1999 constitutions. The few differences lie in such matters as the establishment of the National Judicial Commission and the increase in the

use of the derivation principle from 3to 13% in the revenue allocation formula because the chairman of the committee set up by Abdulsalami to look into the adoption of the 1979 Constitution, Justice Niki Tobi, an indigene of oil-rich Delta State, insisted on its retention from the Ekwueme Constitution. Ironically, the Afenifere leaders who made jettisoning the 1995 Constitution and its replacement with the 1979 Constitution their condition for participation in the transition programme are the same people now accusing the Abubakar military junta of imposing the 1999 constitution on Nigerians—and many otherwise perceptive Nigerians believe the propaganda stunt!

Nigeria needs a new constitution to meet its new challenges. Only people directly elected by the citizens can have the mandate to undertake such a sacred enterprise as designing or reforming a constitution in a fundamental sense. Though some critical national issues have been addressed by the 1995 Constitution, one matter which should not be overlooked is the imperative for multiple vice presidency.

It was about the only issue which Ekwueme spiritedly but unsuccessfully fought to include in the 1995 Constitution. Ekwueme argued that there should be six vice presidents, with each zone, including the home zone of the president, supplying one. In the event of the president

dying in office or resigning or removal from office, the vice president from his zone will complete the term of the president.

If the term is not completed, the people from the president’s zone are most likely to feel cheated, as we have seen in the case of President Umaru Yar’Adua when he died in 2010, in the third year of national leadership; the North felt shortchanged. To reduce costs and make things easier, the people who may be regarded as vice presidents can be the Senate President, Speaker of the House of Representatives, secretary to the federal government, head of civil service, and a person who may be designated as Vice President 1 and working daily with the president in State House. This means that people coming from these offices mentioned above will perforce hail from different geopolitical zones.

Nigeria needs a new constitution or a comprehensively reformed one. The states as currently constituted and local government areas cannot have a place in the new constitution.

The idea of a so-called third or fourth tier of government is a misnomer. The 1995 Constitution, otherwise known as the Ekwueme Constitution, provides the starting point for a new Nigeria.

• Adinuba is head of Discovery Public Affairs Consulting.

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