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Monday, April 15, 2013

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* Amnesty for Boko Haram: ACF, northern leaders ask FG to list terms ACF, northern leaders ask FG to list terms * MEND threatens to attack mosques, Islamic institutions * Fear of sack grips LUTH doctors over death of pregnant woman * Four die in Osun building collapse, many injured * Attack on Somali Supreme Court claims 19 * Shell, Chevron, Agip, others scale down operations at offshore facilities -- Price of kerosene skyrockets * Another strike looms in varsities nationwide * Gunmen kill NNPC GMD’s brother * PDP crisis: OBJ, Anenih meet today * ACN alleges plot to scuttle national convention * CIIN to partner NAICOM on insurance awareness, enforcement * Investors task Nigerian, Portuguese authorities on direct air link
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P.4 P.6 Vol. 3 N0. 599 Monday, April 15, 2013 N 150 CONTINUED ON PAGE 5>> CONTINUED ON PAGE 2>> ACF, northern leaders ask FG to list terms Shell, Chevron, Agip, others scale down operations at offshore facilities Another strike looms in varsities nationwide MEND threatens to attack mosques, Islamic institutions ...hold emergency meeting in Minna Amnesty for Boko Haram: Alison-Madueke BUSINESS THE SECTION P.A5,A6 Free inside Investors task Nigerian, Portuguese authorities on direct air link ree inside d P.51 P.12 P.12,13 Gunmen kill NNPC GMD’s brother PDP crisis: OBJ, Anenih meet today ACN alleges plot to scuttle national convention Fear of sack grips LUTH doctors over death of pregnant woman P.49 Attack on Somali Supreme Court claims 19 P.2,8 SOLA ADEBAYO WARRI I ndications emerged weekend that oil ma- jors and their ser- vice companies in the Niger Delta have scaled down their operations at the offshore locations in the coastal axis of the region in the aftermath of the recent murder of 12 policemen in Bayelsa State. It was learnt that the managements of vir- WALE I GBINTADE, T ORDUE SALEM, WOLE ADEDEJI , AZA MSUE, PRISCILLA DENNIS T he Arewa Consul- tative Forum, ACF, has called on gov- ernment to spell out clear terms and conditions for those who would decide to accept the amnesty of- fered members of the Boko Haram sect and benefit to them. The ACF stated this dur- ing an emergency meeting at the weekend with its patrons, including former Heads of State, political and religious leaders over the proposed amnesty for mem- bers of the Islamic sect. Four die in Osun building collapse, many injured CIIN to partner NAICOM on insurance awareness, enforcement Price of kerosene skyrockets Rufai Yakubu Mr. Favour Odozor 20, the youngest Commercial Pilot Licence (CPL) holder in Nigeria and South Africa, after receiving his wings at the Afrika Union Aviation Academy in Mafikeng, South Africa, yesterday. PHOTO: NAN Anenih
Transcript
Page 1: Monday, April 15, 2013

P.4

P.6

Vol. 3 N0. 599 Monday, April 15, 2013 N150

CONTINUED ON PAGE 5>>

CONTINUED ON PAGE 2>>

ACF, northern leaders ask FG to list terms

Shell, Chevron, Agip, others scale down operations at offshore facilities

Another strike looms in varsities nationwide

MEND threatens to attack mosques, Islamic institutions...hold emergency meeting in Minna

Amnesty for Boko Haram:

Alison-Madueke

BUSINESSTHE SECTION

P.A5,A6 Free inside

Investors taskNigerian, Portugueseauthorities on direct air link

ree insided

P.51

P.12

P.12,13

Gunmen kill NNPC GMD’s brother

PDP crisis: OBJ, Anenih meet todayACN alleges plot to scuttle national convention

Fear of sack grips LUTH doctors over death of pregnant woman

P.49Attack on Somali Supreme Court claims 19P.2,8

SOLA ADEBAYOWARRI

Indications emerged weekend that oil ma-jors and their ser-

vice companies in the Niger Delta have scaled down their operations at the offshore locations in the coastal axis of the region in the aftermath

of the recent murder of 12 policemen in Bayelsa State.

It was learnt that the managements of vir-

WALE IGBINTADE, TORDUE SALEM, WOLE ADEDEJI, AZA MSUE, PRISCILLA DENNIS

The Arewa Consul-tative Forum, ACF, has called on gov-

ernment to spell out clear terms and conditions for those who would decide to accept the amnesty of-fered members of the Boko Haram sect and benefit to them.

The ACF stated this dur-ing an emergency meeting at the weekend with its patrons, including former Heads of State, political and religious leaders over the proposed amnesty for mem-bers of the Islamic sect.

Four die in Osun building collapse, many injured

CIIN to partnerNAICOM on insuranceawareness,enforcement

Price of kerosene skyrockets

Rufai

Yakubu

Mr. Favour Odozor 20, the youngest Commercial Pilot Licence (CPL) holder in Nigeria and South Africa, after receiving his wings at the Afrika Union Aviation Academy in Mafikeng, South Africa, yesterday. PHOTO: NAN

Anenih

Page 2: Monday, April 15, 2013

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Fear of sack grips LUTH doctors over death of pregnant woman

People wading through the flood at Ile-Epo/Oke-Odo Bus Stop on Lagos Abeokuta Express Road, Lagos, after the rainfall yesterday.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 5>>

CONTINUED ON PAGE 5>>

The forum, in a state-ment by its National Public-ity Secretary, Mr. Anthony Sani, said the crucial meet-ing was held in Minna to evaluate the Federal Gov-ernment’s decision to con-sider the option of amnesty as an alternative course of action to the use of military force in the current cam-paigns to subdue Boko Ha-ram and other insurgents in parts of the North.

ACF, while commending the initiative, also called on the government to put mechanism in place that would guarantee the securi-ty of the insurgents, saying without their protection they may be afraid to come out.

The statement said: “Are-wa Consultative Forum, ACF, has learned with sat-

isfaction that the govern-ment has shown courage and sensitivity to public opinion and should be com-mended by all peace-loving and patriotic Nigerians.

“In response to that de-cision, ACF is submitting some suggestions to the Federal Government in the hope that it will help in-form further action on the amnesty plan to the insur-gents.

“Amnesty that could lead to dialogue to recommends itself precisely because the use of force in other coun-tries like Iraq, Palestine, Af-ghanistan and even in our country by President Umar Yar’Adua in 2009 against the sect have not delivered on the desired peace, since in all these places the ter-rorists remain unsubdued. In such circumstances, an

alternative approach or strategy is imperative, even if not popular.

“ACF is fully aware of the fact that amnesty may not automatically end ter-rorism, especially when we know that some hardliners may not accept the offer. But it will most likely mark the beginning of a process that holds the promise of bringing the tragic situa-tion to an end.”

Also the Northern Speakers Forum said the Federal Government should include northern governors in its Amnesty Committee.

The forum also com-mended the government for taking steps that will lead to peace in the region through the amnesty programme.

The Speakers made the call in a communiqué at the

end of their conference in Minna, Niger State.

In the communiqué, signed by its chairman, Mr. Stephen Onmeje and made available to National Mirror, the Speakers urged various state governments, elders and traditional rul-ers from the region to en-sure that peace returns to the North in the interest of its overall development.

The Speakers also ap-pealed to the National As-sembly to hasten the pas-sage of the Hydro Power Producing Area Develop-ment Commission Amend-ment Act, 2012 toward en-suring the commencement of the commission’s activi-ties.

Also speaking at the weekend, Bauchi State Gov-ernor Isa Yuguda, said that the Boko Haram members

kicking against the amnes-ty package are criminals and those who are politi-cally motivated.

Speaking with journal-ists in Lagos, Yuguda urged the government to take de-cisive action against any sect member that declines amnesty.

He said: “On the issue of Boko Haram, amnesty has been given to the real Boko Haram and I believe they are willing to accept that. That is my belief but you know there is the criminal Boko Haram and there is the real Boko Haram. Both the criminal and the politi-cal Boko Haram, they are the armed robbers; that arm of politicians that call themselves Boko Haram and go about attacking people.

“Maybe, it is the crimi-

nal Boko Haram that is re-sponding to say that they don’t want amnesty be-cause they have a different intention. Some of them are gun runners, some of them are armed robbers and some of them are do-ing that on behalf of poli-ticians. So, they just hide under Boko Haram and perpetrate evil.

“Now that the president has extended that olive branch to them, I would like to believe that they are quite happy. There has to be an end to all this. Once they have accepted, we know that we have to face the criminals. Any other person that is calling him-self Boko Haram, we know they are the armed rob-bers and the political Boko Haram. You have to under-

ACF, northern leaders in emergency meeting

TOBORE OVUORIE

Fear of an impending sack has gripped medical doctors

and other health workers of the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, LUTH, who were recently que-ried following the death of a pregnant woman.

Following the incident, the authorities of the hos-pital, and the Association of Resident Doctors, ARD, LUTH chapter, instituted panels to investigate the circumstances which led to the death of Mrs. Mar-garet Akingbehin, 45, dur-ing childbirth on Febru-ary 28, 2013.

While the ARD has completed its investiga-tions with its report ready, that of LUTH manage-ment is still ongoing, and has stopped the ARD from releasing its findings.

Speaking in an exclu-sive interview with Na-tional Mirror, Dr. Bankole Adebambo, General Sec-retary of ARD, said: “I am not permitted to make comment on this case as the hospital has instituted a committee to look into it and we are also eagerly awaiting the outcome of the panel’s report. But we as an association have also set up a committee to look into the issue and have studied the report of the committee but we are constrained from making

the report of the commit-tee a public for now.

“All of the members of the committee are work-ers in LUTH and since hospital as a bigger body has instituted a panel, we have to wait for the out-come of their findings; we can’t preempt their investigations with our own report; so we are also waiting.”

National Mirror’s in-vestigations however revealed that representa-tives of the Federal Min-istry of Health last week Monday joined the panel instituted by manage-ment of LUTH. One of them told our reporter on condition of anonymity that the investigation was to be concluded on Friday and results releasing this week.

But the Chief Medi-cal Director, LUTH, Prof. Akin Oshibogun, told our reporter over the week-end that investigations are still ongoing.

Findings by National Mirror revealed that al-most all the health work-ers on duty on that fateful day which included five doctors are presently on suspension. They have been ordered by manage-ment of LUTH to stay away until investigations are concluded, and were paid only half salaries last month.

David Akingbehin, husband of the deceased

and his family had three weeks ago petitioned the Medical Dental Council of Nigeria, MDCN, and the Chief Medical Director of LUTH. They insisted that the negligence or prefer-ential treatment given to a patient, who displaced Margaret in the theatre killed her.

According to Akingbe-hin, he watched his wife being stopped from un-dergoing surgery in the theatre twice because of preferential treatment was being given to other persons who had relation in LUTH.

Akingbehin, who is still grieving over the de-mise of his wife disclosed to our reporter that he

learnt that someone else had been rushed to the theatre, which was why his wife had to be taken back to the ward on two different occasions, add-ing that “I overheard some of the nurses say in Yoruba, ‘We need to at-tend to staff first”.

He explained that the way they said it made it unclear whether the pa-tient who had displaced his wife was a wife of a staff or an employee of LUTH.

According to him, when he started complaining about his wife’s condition and how the medical per-sonnel had neglected her, he was sent out. At this point, his late wife was

kept alone waiting at the pre-surgical room of the theatre.

He said that the health workers on duty did not even care about her while she was in pain. After be-ing ordered out, he could still hear the nurses chat-ting.

“While I was waiting outside, I think a nurse must have noticed she was groaning. I heard some-one say, ‘the baby’s head is showing, don’t push’ But the baby later came out and it was found dead in the room. Some moment later, my wife died in the same room and I did not know. They told me noth-ing until about 4p.m.”

When contacted, one of

the doctors on duty that day, said that Mrs. Aking-behin was not neglected nor a staff of LUTH given preferential treatment over her as alleged by her husband.

“The husband doesn’t know what he is talking about. He wasn’t in the pre-surgical room of the theatre. He is making un-confirmed statements. We tried all within our reach to save her.

“The patient whom he claims was given pref-erential treatment over his wife is not a staff of LUTH, the patient was on the elective list scheduled for the day while his wife was on the emergency list.

National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net2 Monday, April 15, 2013News

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Monday, April 15, 2013National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 3

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National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net4 Monday, April 15, 2013 Photo News

KEMI OLAITANIBADAN

Fresh crisis is loom-ing in the nation’s tertiary institu-

tions as the National Executive Council, NEC, of the Senior Staff Asso-ciation of Nigeria Uni-versities, SSANU, has mandated its leadership to declare a nationwide strike if the expected meeting with the Fed-eral Government on Friday failed to address their demands.

Some of the demands include payment of earned allowance and rejection of the NEEDS Assessment report in the varsity system.

The President of SSA-NU, Comrade Samson Ugwoke, who disclosed this at the weekend, while addressing jour-nalists after the NEC meeting held at the Lad-oke Akintola University of Technology, LAUT-ECH, Ogbomosho, Oyo State, said varsity work-ers may commence a na-tionwide strike should its meeting with the

Secretary to the Govern-ment of the Federation, SGF, failed to address the twin issues and oth-ers, such as the Payroll and Personnel Informa-tion System, PPIS.

He said the varsity workers may be forced to embark on another pro-tracted strike anytime from now.

According to him, oth-er sister unions in the universities such as the National Association of Academic Technology, NAAT, and the Non Aca-demic Staff of Univer-sities, NASU, under the Joint Action Commit-tee, JAC, have secured the same mandate from their members to com-mence strike on the is-sues.

Ugwoke said the unions have delayed the strike before now be-cause of the interven-tion of members of the House of Representa-tives, who advised the Executive to raise a sup-plementary budget to cover the payment of the Earned Allowance.

He lamented that

despite their various meetings, dialogues and discussions under the Implementation Moni-toring Committee, IMC, in the last two years and promises from the government, the money needed for the payment was not put in the 2013 budget.

This, he described as an affront on the work-ers, the unions and their leaders.

According to him, the National Univer-sity Commission, NUC, wrote that it will take N157 billion to pay the Earned Allowance, which he described as untrue.

He said: “To our sur-prise, the National Uni-versity Commission, NUC, decided to write that it will take N157 billion. We said it is not true, IMC did not say it will take N157 billion to pay. How they came about that figure by Chief Wale Babalakin (chairman pro-chancel-lors) was not clear to us.

“We were not taken along because when we

met last, the position was that the non-teach-ing staff will go with Babalakin to the House Committee on Education and the Senate Commit-tee on Education and present the amount that will cover the four years arrears of Earned Al-lowance, including the 2013 aspect of the allow-ances in the 2013 budget.

“That was the agree-ment, but we were sur-prised to read in the newspapers that Chief Babalakin, some mem-bers of ASUU and the NUC went to the Chair-man of the Senate Com-mittee on Education, Senator Uche Chuk-wumerije to present N157 billion as money needed for the payment. This is not true.

“They were bent on sabotaging our agree-ment and efforts, be-cause dropping SSANU, NASU and NAAT in such visit was sabotage, be-cause that was not what we agreed. Secondly, we don’t know how they came about the figure they quoted. We are talk-

ing of between N96 bil-lion and less than N120 billion. That was what we are talking about and someone was saying N157 billion.

“It seems that some people don’t want that money to be paid by un-necessarily over-inflat-ing the figure so that it will look staggering in the sight of the Federal Government.”

He also stressed that what they were asking for is for one-quarter of the amount to be put in the 2013 budget and not all, stating that mem-bers of the House of Representatives had al-ready said the money should be paid.

The Executive, he said, could raise a sup-plementary budget if they really wanted to pay it.

“The resolve was that within the one month, the meeting with the SSG would have been held and the govern-ment will come up with a reasonable answer and solution to the crisis be-fore we reconvene with

the House to cement ev-erything.

“As we agreed in our JAC meeting, NAAT had their NEC meeting last week and NAAT is standing bye by now, waiting for us to meet, so that we give Federal Government a strike, to-tal strike.

“But we will not go on strike today until after the next meeting, which is April 19. But we look forward for a positive result especially with the intervention of the House of Representa-tives.

“We have waited enough for the supple-mentary budget. At the meeting with the Fed-eral Government, we ex-pect a definite answer on the payment of Earned Allowance either con-clusively up to date or the implement of the one-quarter of the mon-ey that is expected to be included in the 2013 budget for a start. Any-thing short of that the NEC has mandated us to declare a total strike ac-tion,” he added.

Another strike looms in varsities nationwide

L-R: Managing Director, Sovereign Wealth Fund, Mr. Uche Orji; Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and Chairman, Heirs Holdings, Mr. Tony Elumelu, during a reception at Heirs Holdings in Ikoyi, Lagos, at the weekend.

L-R: Managing Director, Nigerian Breweries Plc, Mr. Nico Verveide; Managing Director, Nordica Fertility Centre Lagos and Consultant Obgny/ Fertility, Dr. Abayomi Ajayi; Representative of First Lady, Lagos State, Mrs. Adenike Ogunlewe and special guest, Mr. Jimmy Agbaje, during Nordica’s 10TH year anniversary in Lagos, yesterday. PHOTO: BAYOOR EWUOSO

L-R: Group Managing Director, LT&C, Group, Pastor Charles Abraham, Directors; Mr. Bily Lawson; his wife, Bola and Chairman, Mr. Yetunde Dabiri, during the 25th year anniversary celebration of the advertising firm in Lagos on Saturday.

L-R: Managing Director Brains and Hammers Limited, Mr. Umar Abdulahi; Managing Director, Aso Savings and Loans Plc, Mr. Hassan Usaman and Director, Corporate Services, Brains and Hammers, Mr. Abiodun Maciver, during the closing ceremony of 3rd Aso Housing Exhibition and conference in Abuja on Saturday. PHOTO: ROTIMI OSASONA

National News

Page 5: Monday, April 15, 2013

National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 5Monday, April 15, 2013 News

Shell, Chevron, Agip, others scale down operations at offshore facilities

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 2

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 2

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Fear of sack grips LUTH doctors over death of pregnant woman

ACF, northern leaders in emergency meeting

Scene of exploded car bomb attack by the members of the al-Shabab Islamic extremists outside the Mogadishu’s Supreme Court, Somali, yesterday.

tually all the oil firms and service companies in the oil-rich belt have suspended major activi-ties in the region for the safety of their employ-ees.

Already, investiga-tion by National Mir-ror showed that Anglo-Dutch oil firm, Shell Petroleum Development Company, SPDC; Chev-ron Nigeria Limited, CNL; Agip, Exxon-Mobil and other oil firms and service companies have taken the step in the in-terest of their employ-ees.

Reliable sources stated that companies lacked confidence in the

ability of the Joint Task Force, JTF, in the Niger Delta, Operation Pulo Shield and the Nigeria Police Force, NPF, to protect their employees and strategic facilities.

A reliable source told our correspondent that recent experience had showed that it would be counter-productive for the oil to repose confi-dence on the JTF and NPF in handling deploy-ment of personnel and logistic supplies to the coastal facilities.

Findings showed that the oil firms were con-vinced that it would be unsafe to deploy oil workers and equipment in the offshore locations

following the experience of the slain policemen.

It will be recalled that 12 policemen assigned for surveillance duties at the burial of the father of the Special Assistant to the Bayelsa State Gov-ernor on Maritime Secu-rity, Mr. Kile Torughedi, were murdered in the creeks of Azuzama com-munity in Bayelsa State, on Friday, April 5.

The fate of the po-licemen triggered fresh fears in the region, espe-cially the oil industry in the area.

National Mirror gath-ered yesterday that managements of the oil companies were ap-prehensive that the fate

of the slain policemen could befall any user of the waterways in the re-gion.

The oil companies have decided to main-tain a low profile in the offshore facilities until it was safe enough to up-grade their activities in the area.

According to him: “Most of the oil compa-nies, especially SPDC, Chevron, Agip, Exxon-Mobil have suspended their operations in the offshore locations in the Niger Delta following the killings of the 12 po-licemen in the creeks of Bayelsa State.

“We don’t and we can’t gamble with the welfare

of our workers by de-ploying personnel and logistics in the coastal locations. If these mili-tants could kill 12 police-men in one fell swoop, then who is safe? If the security agents could not protect themselves, who then is safe and how can we subject the lives of our personnel under their protection?

“Can you imagine

that even a special assis-tant to the governor on maritime security could not protect his guests at the burial of his fa-ther? With that we can’t take the risk to mobilise workers and logistics at this point in time. We are going to maintain a low profile until the sit-uation improves,” added a source in Shell, who pleaded anonymity.”

stand this. For any Muslim or Christian who picks up a weapon and says I want to kill, that man is a crimi-nal. He is not a Muslim, he is not a Christian. And the earlier you start preaching this philosophy, the better for all of us. We must find a reason for the killing. It is either poverty, tribal or we look for the reason. It is not religious.”

But a former presiden-tial candidate under the platform of the National Action Council, NAC, Dr Olapade Agoro, expressed reservations over the am-nesty proposal, saying that the North would divert the money for the 2015 elec-tions.

In an interview with Na-tional Mirror, Agoro stated that the money that would be given to Boko Haram if they laid down their arms would be used to fund the 2015 elections.

His words: “The money that would be given to Boko Haram under the disguise of amnesty will be used to fight Jonathan in 2015 elec-tions. They will also use the money to buy more weap-ons to terrorise Nigerians. How could Jonathan grant amnesty to the Boko Harm he claimed were in his cabi-net.”

Agoro, who described President Jonathan as a very weak leader, wondered if the President had agreed to meet the terms and con-ditions laid down by the Boko Haram sect that he (Jonathan) must become a Muslim and that Nigeria must convert into an Islam-ic country.

The politician opined that the President wrong-ly confused the amnesty granted to the ex-Niger Delta Militants with that of Boko Haram, saying Ni-

ger Delta militants were fighting for their economic rights.

Meanwhile, a member of the House of Representa-tives yesterday condemned the amnesty plan, describ-ing it as unreasonable.

Hon. Bitrus Kaze, rep-resenting Jos South/East Federal Constituency said the amnesty arrangement was a mere political strata-gem by the president to gain support of the North in 2015. He however warned that the President will be jilted at the end and regret his decision.

According to him, the president has only succeed-ed in exposing his incompe-tence and has shown that he is incapable of running the country.

Kaze said: “I am unable to see any motivation for re-warding unrepentant kill-ers other than an attempt to please their mentors who in the long run will not even support President Jona-than’s ambition.

“The Boko Haram ter-rorists have disgraced and ridiculed President Good-luck Jonathan’s govern-ment. I am not sure of any President of Nigeria that has brought so much ridi-cule to our national pride and sovereignty by his in-consistent statements and policies on security.”

However, another mem-ber of the House of Repre-sentatives, Mohammed Ali Wudil (ANPP-Kano) dis-agreed with Kaze.

He said that the plan to grant amnesty to members of the sect is reasonable.

Wudil, who is the Deputy Chairman of the House Committee on Works, said he does not believe the group is elusive and urged the Federal Government to find members of the sect and grant them pardon.

For reasons best known to the doctors who were sup-posed to have carried out the operation on the wife, they never did, those of us to do that for the elective went ahead to do ours and that is the woman he is re-ferring to,” he stated.

A senior consultant with the teaching hospital also gave a different ac-count of what happened.

According to the doctor, Mrs. Akingbehin’s death could have been prevent-ed.

“That morning, she was brought into the la-bour room by 6a.m. A consultant sectioned her and someone else for CS. The doctors didn’t move until about 3p.m. or there-abouts. The doctors didn’t handle the emergency list, which is the one on which she was placed. The doctors for elective

did theirs; while the wom-an started bleeding after being wheeled out of the theatre.

“The second time Mrs. Akingbehin was dis-placed as claimed by the husband was still for the elective case because the woman who had been op-erated on started bleeding profusely thus had to be attended to first.

“The late patient was on the red line. She was shouting all the while with no one attended to her but later went silent. I guess that is when she had died.

“You see, I feel pained that the woman died but she didn’t want a CS ini-tially. She had previously done an anatomy scan elsewhere and was asked to bring her result which she never did until the day of delivery. Upon see-ing her result, she was

told and realised that she had no option but agree to the CS.

“Had she brought the result on time, perhaps all these wouldn’t have occurred but this is not to say that the doctors should be absolved of carelessness because as things are, we still haven’t established exactly what happened between 6a.m. to 3p.m. when she pur-portedly died. We haven’t been able to prove beyond reasonable doubts that both operations- emer-gency and the elective case could have been man-aged. But I have a feeling from all I have heard from those involved that it was an avoidable death. But these are part of what the panels are trying to also establish.

“The wife of the staff is not the elective patient that was wheeled into the

theatre instead of the late patient. The staff ’s wife being referred to by Mr. Akingbehin was operated after his wife died and it was in another theatre. She had lost both babies (twins) as a result of com-plications thus taken else-where to deliver normally instead of being opened up for surgery,” he con-cluded.

All efforts to speak with the hospital’s Pub-lic Relations Officer, Mrs. Hope Nwanwolo, as at the time of going to press was futile as she was said to be in “a meeting.”

Meanwhile, a senior administrative officer in LUTH who spoke with our reporter yesterday said: “I doubt if you will get the PRO because she is a civil servant and would have to wait for her boss to talk before she can make any comment.”

Page 6: Monday, April 15, 2013

Transparency International disowns Nigerian clone

Salami: Counsel to address court today

EMMANUEL ONANI ABUJA

About 20 months after the suspended Presi-dent of the Court of

Appeal (PCA), Justice Ayo Isa Salami, filed a suit against the action of the National Judicial Council (NJC), the matter still gropes for justice at the Federal High Court, Abuja.

Today, respective counsel in the matter are expected to brief the court on what trans-pired at the Abuja division of the Court of Appeal, where parties had gone to seek clarification on which of the courts - Federal High Court or National Industrial Court - has the inherent jurisdiction to entertain the suit.

It will be recalled that the appellate court had on Sep-tember 7, 2012, struck out the referral suit on the ground that records of proceedings from the trial court were not properly compiled by the Registrar of the court below.

The referral suit was con-sequent upon an application made at the lower court by NJC’s counsel, Chief Mike Ozekhome (SAN), wherein he argued that the subject-matter of Salami’s suit was connected with labour, em-ployment, trade unions as well as industrial dispute, which only the NIC had ex-clusive jurisdiction.

Ozekhome cited Section 254c (1) of the 1999 Constitu-tion (as amended), to but-tress his position.

But Salami’s counsel and former Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) and

Minister of Justice, Chief Akin Olujimi (SAN), can-vassed a counter argument, insisting that the Federal High Court, not NIC had the jurisdiction to hear and de-termine the suit.

Delivering ruling, a five-man panel of the appellate court, headed by Justice Husseini Muktar, on Sep-tember 7, 2012, struck out the suit for not meeting the expectation of the court’s Order 5, Rules I & II.

In a chat with National Mirror on the status of the suit, the former AGF said: “The suit is still before the Federal High Court 8; the matter has not been trans-ferred.

“On April 15, counsel will be expected to brief the court on the position of the appeal at the Appeal Court. The reference to the Court of Appeal is still pending; what the Appeal Court struck out is the improper record com-piled by the Registrar of the Federal High Court,” Olu-jimi said.

In a related development, former National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Prince Vincent Ogbulafor, will open his de-fence at a Federal Capital Territory FCT High Court today.

Ogbulafor is facing a 17- count charge bordering on conspiracy and award of fic-titious contracts to the tune of N107 million.

He is being prosecuted by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Re-lated Offences Commission (ICPC).

National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net6 Monday, April 15, 2013News

Kerosene price rises by 150 per cent

Stakeholders worried over nation’s domestic debtsJOHNSON OKANLAWON

Stakeholders in the Ni-geria’s economy have expressed worry over

some local debts that were not included in the 2013 bud-get.

The debts include over N4.7trn bonds issued by the Asset Management Corpo-ration of Nigeria (AMCON), which was not captured in the local debt records.

Also, debt owed local con-tractors by ministries and agencies, which run into billions of naira, are not cap-tured.

The President of Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), Mr. Goodie Ibru, noted that for several years, many of these contractors have remained unpaid and some have even gone bankrupt.

He said it is necessary for all these to be brought into the picture, so that the true position of the public debt and its sustainability would be better appreciated.

As at December 2012, Ni-geria’s public debt captured in the 2013 budget stood at $48.5bn and of the amount, domestic debt accounts for $41.97bn, representing 86.5 per cent, while external debt accounts for $6.53bn, repre-senting 13.5 per cent.

The amount being cur-rently used to service debt is about 36.5 per cent of the cap-ital budget of the Federation.

The Managing Director of Nigerian Economic Sum-mit Group, Dr. Frank Nweke, said since the AMCON was set up by the Federal Gov-ernment, its loans must be included in the public debt.

He said: “I wonder why the loan was not included

in the domestic debt and the 2013 budget.”

When asked why the AM-CON debt was not included in the domestic debt, the Minister of Commerce and Industry, Dr. Olusegun Agan-ga, said the Federal Govern-ment is monitoring the debt off balance sheet items.

Aganga, who hinted this at a business conference in Lagos recently added: “The debt is an accounting issue and the group of consultants are looking at it.”

The Central Bank of Ni-geria (CBN) fired the chief executive officers of eight of the country’s 24 banks in 2009 and bailed them out with N620bn after loans by banks to stock speculators and fuel importers pushed the industry to the verge of collapse.

The government then set up AMOCON to buy bad

debts from the banks worth over N5.7trn, including N25bn loan Diamond Bank had extended to Geometric Power Limited, a power gen-eration company.

The government had said it would take action this year to slash its domestic debt from around N6.35trn, as debt service is eating up the fund for the capital invest-ment.

The Minister of State for Finance, Alhaji Yerima Lawan Ngama complaint of the double-digit interest rates, which according to him, makes the cost of ser-vicing debt too high.

He said that the govern-ment is going to summon the Central Bank of Nigeria, the Chief Executives Officers of banks on how to lower inter-est rate because it costs the government N699bn to ser-vice the debt in 2012.

UDEME AKPAN AND CHIDI UGWU

The price of kero-sene has risen by over 150 per cent

following the acute short-age of the product in many parts of the coun-try, especially Lagos and its environs.

Investigations at the weekend showed that many marketers, in-cluding those who made arrangement with the Nigerian National Pe-troleum Corporation (NNPC) to sell the prod-uct at only N50 per a li-tre did not have it.

Consequently, depot price of the product has increased from N40.90 to

N102 per a litre, showing an increase of over 100 per cent in most depots visited.

An Apapa-based opera-tor, who preferred not to be named, said: “There is no way we can sell kerosene at N50 per liter because we do not get it cheap. In fact, there are presently no depots that can sell at that price.”

The NNPC stations ex-pected to sell at N50 per liter because the Corpora-tion remains the sole im-porter of the product do not have stocks.

Some independent mar-keters, who got the prod-uct at N102 per litre, sold it between N120 and N150 per litre, depending on some factors, especially location.

A marketed survey in the Federal Capital Terri-tory (FCT) showed that many filling stations did not have the product.

The Acting Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division of NNPC, Ms Timinu Green, did not pick her telephone calls or re-spond to text messages sent to her over the issue.

But the Petroleum Products Market-ing Company (PPMC) spokesman, Mr. Nasir Imodagbe, said in a tele-phone interview that: “I think there should be enough supplies because the refineries are doing well. I will find out the situation and let you know when work resumes on Monday.”

The Acting Secretary General of Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG), Mr. Isaac Aberare, whose members are involved in the movement of petro-leum products from one part of the nation to an-other said it is not clear why the product was not available at affordable prices.

Aberare said: “We are aware of the market sit-uation, but cannot pro-vide any explanation. It is the duty of NNPC and PPMC to explain to the consumers.

“There is no reason why consumers should be made to pay so much because we are not aware of any official change in the price of kerosene.”

Father one of the Executive Director, Bank of Industry, Alhaji Sanusi Olagunju (right), receiving an award from the guest of honour and National Leader, Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, for contributing to the development of New Bussa in Niger State, yesterday.

PAUL ARHEWE

Transparency Inter-national, the global a n t i - c o r r u p t i o n

organisation, said it has no links with an organisa-tion calling itself “Trans-parency in Nigeria (TIN).”

Several articles pub-lished in the Nigerian press last week referred to a report entitled: “Budget discipline perception in-dex (BDPI) 2012/2013,” by “Transparency in Nigeria (TIN),” described the or-ganisation as the Trans-parency International chapter in Nigeria.

But Transparency In-ternational said it has no links with “Transparency

in Nigeria” nor does it currently have an affiliate in the country.

“Transparency Inter-national is not responsi-ble for the report and does not endorse its content,” it said.

According to the re-port published in some Nigerian newspapers last week, the supposedly Transparency in Nigeria made an assessment and adjudged Kano to be the most transparent state in the out-gone fiscal year in terms of budgeting, bud-get implementation and monitoring.

Some of the points that scored Kano high, accord-ing to TIN, were its expen-ditures on human capital development.

•Ogbulafor opens defence on N107m contract scam

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Monday, April 15, 2013National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 7

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National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net8 Monday, April 15, 2013News

L-R: Star musicians, Professor; Ice Prince; 2Face Idibia and Davido, at the MTV Africa All Stars in Lagos, yesterday.

10, 000 NSCDC operatives for UTME

Moses wins Nigerian Idol 3

Displaced Bakassi people reject relocation offerRICHARD NDOMACALABAR

Displaced Bakassi people currently residing at Ikot Eyo

Edem in Akpabuyo Local Government Area of Cross River State at the weekend rejected plan by the council Chairman, Dr. Ekpo Ekpo Bassey, to relocate them to Ikang.

The over 1,000 displaced persons claimed that Ikang was not a safe place for them because they had been mal-treated by residents of the community in the past.

They insisted on relocat-ing to Dayspring Island, which, according to them, is conducive because it would provide them the opportu-nity to continue with their

fishing activities. One of them, who gave

his name as Etim Edet, said: “As a fisherman, I cannot relocate to a place where there is no water because I will be cut off from my business”.

He claimed that in 2008 some housing units were constructed by the gov-ernment to accommodate them, but that they were surprised when those hous-es were allocated to non-displaced persons.

Edet said for this reason, the displaced people would not accept the plan to relo-cate them to Ikang.

“We prefer relocating to Dayspring Island because it will give us the opportunity for continue with our fishing activities,” he said.

FRANCIS SUBERU AND ADEOLU ADEYEMO

At least four people were confirmed dead at the week-

end while many oth-ers were injured when a building in Moboreje area of Ikirun town col-lapsed suddenly.

The incident, which threw the entire people in the area into mourn-ing, only spared the lives of those who went for prayers in a nearby mosque.

National Mirror inves-tigations revealed that those who died were re-laxing in the building when it suddenly col-lapsed.

Luck ran out on them as those who later came to help them did so a lit-tle too late as the walls of the building that was said to have cracked further caved in on those who were trying to help and this prevented them from rescuing the victims.

Eye witness account said the house located close to a private second-ary school and a mosque was in dilapidated condi-tion until its eventual col-lapse.

Efforts by residents of the area to rescue the victims did not yield any positive result as the vic-tims could not be reached promptly.”

Reports said the wounded were respond-ing to treatment at the Ladoke Akintola Uni-versity of Technology Teaching Hospital while their relations were mak-

ing efforts at raising funds for their treatment, but those who lost their lives had been buried by their families.

Meanwhile, rescuers yesterday in Lagos State recovered the body of one of the occupants of a Toyota Hilux van that plunged into Majidun River on Saturday.

Spokesperson in charge of the South-West Zone of the National Emergency Management Authority, NEMA, Ibra-him Farinloye, who dis-closed this to National Mirror yesterday said the recovered body was sus-pected to be that of the driver of the van, Kola-wole Ahmed.

The deceased was said to be the manager of Ikoyi Golf Club until his death. Farinloye also said that the rescue opera-tion would still continue, since some eye witnesses said there were four per-sons in the vehicle

The NEMA spokes-person in a text message sent to National Mirror said: “One body recov-ered at 8.23am, searches continue, body taken to General Hospital, Ikoro-du. Possibility of getting more bodies is doubtful but the working figure is still four according to eye witness account when the van swerved off the road.”

The message added that officials of NEMA were assisted by the La-gos State Emergency Management Agency, LASEMA, the police and the Nigerian Navy, among others.

LEONARD OKACHIE

Moses Obi-Adigwe has emerged winner of sea-

son three of Nigeria’s reality TV show, the Nige-rian Idol.

The 22-year old from Oniocha South in Delta State is the first male con-testant to win as the first and second editions were won by Yeka Onka and Mercy Chinwo, respec-tively.

As a new Idol, he was given a cheque of N7.5 mil-lion, a brand new SUV and will get recording contract

worth N7.5 million, cour-tesy of the official spon-sors, Etisalat Nigeria.

At the grand finale that held at the Dream Studios in Lagos, the first runner-up, Debbie Rise, a native of Kabba in Kogi State, went home with a brand new Kia Picanto and N1.5 million.

Asked how he felt for being the winner; Moses, who could not contain his excitement said; “This is a new beginning in my career and life. I thank the judges for believing in me

and I thank all Nigerians who have voted for me. I love you all.”

It was a night of glam-our as top Nigerian mu-sicians performed to the admiration of audience. First was the Afrobeat singer and multiple Gram-my Award nominees, Femi Kuti. He electrified the atmosphere in the studio with his scintillating per-formance. He incidentally was one of the judges.

One of Nigeria’s top fe-male artistes, Omawumi, kept the tempo high when

she performed one of her songs ‘Bottom Bellie.’ The hall went wild when the Koko Master, D’banj stepped on stage for his performance.

Earlier, past Nige-rian Idol winners Yeka Onka and Mercy Chinwo, proved to their audience that their winning was no fluke as they gave com-manding performances.

The judges Femi Kuti, Yinka Dvies and Jeffrey Daniels, commended Mo-ses and Debbie and urged them to continue to con-tinue to make Nigeria and Africa proud in their mu-sical career.

Four die in Osun building collapse, many others injured

IJEOMA EZEIKEABUJA

No fewer than 10, 000 men and officers of the Nigeria Se-

curity and Civil Defence Corps, NSCDC, would be deployed to monitor the 2013 Unified Tertiary Matricula-tion Examination, UTME, scheduled to hold on April 27 across the nation.

Officials of the Joint Ad-missions and Matriculation Board, JAMB, who dropped this hint during a parley with top management of the NSCDC, also announced that it has set May 18, 2013 for the commencement of the conduct of Computer Based Test, CBT, which is in session after the conduct of

Paper Pencil Test, PPT, Dual Based Test, DBT, on Satur-day, April 27, 2013.

The parley which was at-tended by the Deputy Com-mandant-General, DCG, Op-erations, of the NSCDC, Mr. Evans Ewerem, was held to deliberate on the role of the NSCDC in the conduct of the forth-coming 2013 UTME.

JAMB Registrar, Prof. ’Dibu Ojerinde, said it has become a tradition for the board to meet with NSCDC when the UTME examina-tion approaches just as he expressed joy on the vari-ous achievements recorded by the corps, especially the recent discovery of fake ori-entation camp for NYSC at Nasarawa, among other.

He, however, sympathised

•Computer-Based Test to hold May 18

•One body recovered from Lagoon in Lagos river accident

with the corps over the re-cent loss of their members in their line of duty.

He encouraged them to keep up the good work as Ni-gerians have come to know that they are performing well, charging other secu-rity organisations to comple-ment the good work of the NSCDC.

Issues bothering on effec-tive monitoring and secur-ing examination centres on the examination day and general conduct of the ex-amination were rigorously discussed.

The DCG Operations commended the manage-ment of the board for doing their job with vigour and all sense of responsibility. He enjoined the Prof. Ojerinde led management team to keep up the good work in JAMB even though he ex-pressed reservation as some people will not be happy

with some of the innova-tions been put in place by the board to better the lots of the Nigerian child and the educational sector.

Ewerem assured the board of the corps’ coop-eration in ensuring a suc-cessful 2013 UTME conduct, saying that all the state com-mandants of the NSCDC will be invited to Abuja for a briefing session to inform its operatives that will be de-ployed to participate in the conduct of the UTME on new innovations.

DCG Ewerem appealed to the board to cooperate with NSCDC and provide them with the names and addresses of the custodi-ans and centres to enable them strategise on how to dispatch officials to the vari-ous centres. He also sought the cooperation of the board and other officials that will participate in the conduct of the 2013 UTME to ensure a successful outing.

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Army gives reasons for creating new Brigade in OndoHAKEEM GBADAMOSIAKURE

Authorities of the Ni-gerian Army have said the creation of

the 32 Artillery Brigade and Garrison in Akure, Ondo State was to strengthen the security of the area covered by the garrison.

This was disclosed by the Brigade Commander, Brig. Gen. Mansur Dan-Ali, in Akure while speaking to journalists during the one-year anniversary celebration of the command.

He said the Chief of Staff decided to establish the com-mand in the state, noting that the state was regarded as the gateway to the southern part of the country.

He said the decision had helped to checkmate the movement of the dreaded Is-lamic fundamentalist, Boko Haram from the North to the southern part of the country, saying the brigade had added value to security in Ondo and

Ekiti States.Dan-Ali disclosed that the

command has been able to es-tablish a synergy with other security agencies in the state to ensure security of lives and property of the people.

He said it was challenging for the command to have tak-en off when political activi-ties were in top gear towards the last governorship elec-tion, but expressed satisfac-tion on the performance of men of the army deployed for the exercise.

His words: “The decision of the Chief of Staff to estab-lish this command has paid off, we have been able to block and pin down cases of secu-rity breaches, our presence in the last one year has brought sanity to our areas of opera-tion.

“Also within the year un-der review, we had a credible and acceptable election, it was the brigade that coordi-nated the security and I am proud to say that none of our men was found wanting.”

Three die, four injured in auto crashes

Afenifere endorses Aregbesola for second term

Monarch tasks FG, state on disarmament

ADEOLU ADEYEMOOSOGBO

Osun State Governor, Rauf Aregbesola, was at the weekend

endorsed for a second term in office by the state chap-ter of the pan-Yoruba socio-political group, Afenifere Renewal Group, ARG.

The group announced the endorsement after its monthly meeting held in Osogbo, Osun State, in a communiqué signed by its Coordinator and Public-ity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Oyeduntan and Kola Olabisi respectively.

The group said the Areg-besola administration has brought developmental; rev-olution in all spheres of life to the state, adding that the government has turned the state into construction sites where different types of

building of infrastructural facilities is either on-going, nearing completion or com-pleted.

The communiqué said further that there is no lo-cal government where the impact of the current ad-ministration is not being felt in the area of road con-struction or rehabilitation, adding that; “The recent state government directive that each of the 30 local gov-ernment councils and the Area Office in Modakeke-Ife should construct 10km of road in their domain has greatly improved the road network facilities in the state.

“The administration of Aregbesola has been ban-ishing poverty and unem-ployment through various means, among which are the running of a transpar-ent and accountable govern-

Ogun State govern-ment said it has expended about N3

billion on projects and pro-grammes towards attaining the Millennium Develop-ment Goals, MDGs, set by the United Nations.

Disclosing this in Abeo-kuta, the Special Adviser to Governor Ibikunle Amo-sun on MDGs, Mrs. Hafsat

Abiola-Costello, said the amount, half of which was provided by the Federal Government, was spent on health, education and sani-tation schemes since 2008.

According to her, proj-ects implemented include the construction of sanita-tion facilities in some se-lected primary schools and Primary Health Centres,

PHCs, construction of so-lar powered boreholes and distribution of mosquito insecticide nets through PHCs across the state.

Others she said are equipping PHCs as well as capacity building of PHCs, local government staff and state planning officers.

The MDGs, she explained refers to eight goals aimed

at alleviating poverty as set by the UN and agreed to by over 190 countries, including Nigeria in 2000, adding that to ensure the goals are met, the Federal Government initiated the Conditional Grant Scheme, through which critically needed funds secured from the debt relief granted the country by the Paris Club in 2005 are channeled to col-laborating states and local governments.

Ogun spends N3bn to attain MDGs

FEMI OYEWESO ABEOKUTA

At least three people have been con-firmed dead while

two others were injured in three separate road ac-cidents which occurred in Ogun State yesterday.

Two of the people, who were said to be on a mo-torbike, were crushed to death in the first accident, which occurred at Aje-gunle village, along the Papa-Alanto/Ilaro road.

The third person was killed in a head-on colli-sion involving two articu-lated vehicles in the crash that occurred along the Abeokuta-Lagos Express-way.

The Itori Unit Com-

mander of Federal Road Safety Corp, FRSC, Fatai Bakare, who confirmed the accidents, explained that the first accident hap-pened in the late hours of Saturday, when a Nis-san car with registration number: LAGOS LND 121 BH rammed into two per-sons on a motorbike with registration number: LA-GOS Q943 AGL. The two were said to have died on the spot.

The second accident, involving a MACK truck with registration num-ber: LAGOS XU 320 LND and an IVECO truck with registration number: LA-GOS XX 777 FST occurred right in front of the La-farge WAPCO Cement Factory at Ewekoro.

The head-on colli-sion which claimed the life of a man was said to have been caused by offi-cials of the Federal Road Maintenance Agency, FERMA, who diverted vehicles through a par-ticular route due to the repairs being carried out on the failed portion of the road.

Itori FRSC unit com-mander, who confirmed the incident, said two others were critically in-jured in the crash which happened around 2.00am yesterday.

Bakare, who said the driver of car was injured, described the accident as fatal, adding that the scene was horrendous.

The third accident hap-

pened around 10.00am yesterday morning short-ly after Wasinmi village along the Abeokuta-Papa Lanto-Lagos Expressway.

The lone occupant of the car with registra-tion number: LAGOS AQ 674 LND, who sustained bruises, gave his name as Kehinde Folorunsho, a produce officer with Ifo Office of the Nigerian Quarantine Service.

Bakare said the corps-es of the three dead vic-tims who are all males had been deposited at Ifo General Hospital morgue, while the four persons who sustained varying degree of injuries in the auto crashes were also re-ceiving treatment in the hospital.

L-R: Olubadan of Ibadanland, Oba Samuel Odulana; Olori Olubadan, Moriyike; founder, Sword of the Spirit Ministry, Bishop Wale Oke and Bishop of Okeogun Anglican Diocese, Rev. Solomon Amusan, at the 99th birthday thanksgiving service of the Olubadan In Ibadan, yesterday. PHOTO: NAN

ment; ensuring that state funds are used for develop-ment purposes and creation of job-friendly economic en-vironment.

“Other achievements of the administration, accord-ing to the ARG are; civil ser-vice reforms, banishment of hunger though the provision of assistance to farmers to sell their products in profit-

able markets, restoration of healthy living through provision of effective health care for all with special atten-tion to the needs of children, women and the elderly.

“The provision of free and efficient ambulance services; security of lives and proper-ty, through the inauguration of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad etc.”

HAKEEM GBADAMOSIAKURE

The Olu of Igbokoda, Oba Afolabi Odid-iomo, through his

counsel, Mr. Jiti Ogu-nye, has tasked the Fed-eral Government and the Ondo State government over a realistic and sys-tematic disarmament of ex-militants in Ijaw and Ilaje areas of Ondo State, saying this is a prerequi-site for the restoration of peace in the area.

He said such disarma-ment will put an end to the current lawlessness, arson, rape and murder in Igbokoda in Ilaje Local Government Area of the state.

The monarch called on security agencies in the state to form a synergy to dismantle a security out-

fit, Mahin Task Force in Igbokoda community to restore peace in the area alleging that the task force was responsible for all the criminality in the area.

In a press statement by Ogunye, who accused the youth of being behind the attack on the monarch re-cently, he said the attack on the monarch and the destruction of the Oba’s palace, his arrest and con-sequent detection for over a week over allegations of murder were orchestrated moves by the armed group believed to have been spon-sored by a traditional ruler, Amapetu of Mahin, Oba Lawrence Omowole.

Ogunye said the task force had attacked the monarch along with some state government officials last year.

National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 9Monday, April 15, 2013 South West

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ABIODUN NEJOADO EKITI

The Peoples Demo-cratic Party (PDP) in Ekiti State has al-

leged plan by some people to frustrate the investiga-tion into the killing of one of its supporters, Mr. Ayo-dele Jeje.

The PDP said some peo-ple had been putting pres-sure on the police to ma-nipulate the investigation.

Jeje was killed at Erin-jiyan-Ekiti a fortnight ago.

PDP Chairman in the state, Mr Makanjuola Og-

undipe, said: "We have re-ports that some people are mounting pressure on the Commissioner of Police, Mr Sotonye Wakama, and some senior security offi-cials involved in the inves-tigation of the murder of Ayodele Jeje that some vi-tal evidence be destroyed, tampered with or even ignored so that the kill-ers would go free or there would not be enough evi-dence to nail them”.

Ogundipe, however, called on the Commis-sioner of Police and other involved in the investiga-

tion not to compromise in handling the matter.

The PDP chairman, who spoke at the weekend in Ado-Ekiti through his me-dia aide, Mr Femi Omolusi, also appealed to the Inspec-tor-General of Police (IGP), Mr. Mohammed Abubakar, to ensure that his “men diligently investigate the matter and bring the per-petrators to justice”.

He said the call became imperative following the pressure being mounted on Wakama and police of-ficers in Ekiti State Com-mand to bury the matter.

Ogundipe said: "We call on the investigating team not to compromise, pervert justice or allow for any misconduct in the discharge of their duties. Those who killed Jeje, shot innocent men and women, many of who are still in the hospital, should not go unpunished.

“For the sake of justice, we are calling on the IGP to call for our statement that we sent to the Ekiti State Police Command. This is not about politics, but the murder of an innocent soul. No amount of money

or propaganda should be allowed to cover the blood of Jeje."

But the state Police Pub-lic Relations Officer, Mr Victor Babayemi Olu, de-nied that the police were under pressure to manipu-late the investigation.

Olu told journalists on phone the investigation “is ongoing “professionally, conscientiously and with the fear of God”.

The police spokesman said: “We are assuring Ni-gerians that anybody that runs foul of the law will be taken care of in accor-

dance with the laws of the land.

“I can say without minc-ing words that we are up to the task and when inves-tigation is concluded, the appropriate steps will be taken."

It will be recalled that some suspected Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) members attacked PDP members a fortnight ago, shot Jeje dead, leaving oth-ers with gunshot injury ahead of the defection of many ACN members to PDP at Erinjiyan-Ekiti the following morning.

KEMI OLAITAN AND ROTIMI FADEYI

The Bishop of Oke-Ogun Anglican Dio-cese, Rev. Solomon

Amusan, yesterday called on the indigenes of Ibadanland to remain committed to the agitation for the creation of Ibadan State.

He spoke at the palace of the Olubadan of Ibadan-land, Oba Samuel Odula-na, Odugade 1, during the thanksgiving service in commemoration of the mon-arch’s 99th birthday.

Rev. Amusan also asked the Ibadan indigenes to build a new palace for the mon-arch.

The monarch said: “The Ibadan people have a lot to do in ensuring that the hope of achieving Ibadan State be-comes a reality.

"I want to urge sons and daughters of Ibadanland to take the struggle for the creation of Ibadan State as a serious affair. The creation of Ibadan State is long overdue and we should do all within our capacity to bring it to reality.

"The people of Ibadan should also rally round to build a befitting palace for

the Olubadan. This will be a great mark of honour".

Meanwhile, President Goodluck Jonathan has con-gratulated the monarch on his 99th birthday.

Jonathan said he felici-tates with the revered Oba Odugade on his attainment of the remarkable age.

A statement issued yester-day by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati, said the President, on behalf of him-self, his family, the Federal Government and the people of Nigeria, wished the Ol-ubadan happy birthday cel-ebrations.

The President noted that Oba Odulana deployed his immense experience, knowl-edge and wisdom for the great benefit of his people since he ascended the throne.

Jonathan said he joined the people of Ibadan and the Olubadan’s friends and well-wishers across the country in looking forward with great anticipation to the monarch’s historic attain-ment of 100 years next year.

The President prayed God to grant the monarch many more years of good health and commendable service to his community and the nation.

ABIODUN NEJOADO EKITI

As Afe Babalola Uni-versity, Ado Ekiti (ABUAD) announces

its intention to begin a pro-gramme in Space Science and Technology, its founder, Chief Afe Babalola (SAN), has identified ignorance of science and technology as a major problem limiting Ni-geria’s progress.

Babalola, who said Nige-

rians had always created fa-bles and myths to create un-necessary fears around what they could not explain, noted that explorations and discov-eries in science and technol-ogy had enabled the human race to make progress.

The legal luminary spoke at Yuris Night hosted by ABUAD at the weekend in commemoration of the 52nd anniversary of when a man first went to space.

Yuris Gagarin, a colonel

in the Russian military, was the first man to go into space on April 12, 1961.

Babalola, who said the event showed that “with de-termination and inquisitive mind, man could demystify a lot of things and make prog-ress,” stressed that the uni-versity was established with sights on training its students in a manner that would chal-lenge them to make discov-eries that would change the world for the better.

OJO OYEWAMIDEAKURE

The ongoing verifi-cation of primary school teachers in

public schools in Ondo State may not yield the desired result as some offi-cials of the State Universal Basic Education Board (SU-BEB) have devised means to cover up their suspected atrocities.

The exercise, which be-gan across the state penul-timate week on the order of Governor Olusegun Mimiko, is meant to sani-tize the workforce and en-sure that teaching code is adhered to.

The exercise is to also uncover the number of teaching and non-teaching staff allegedly recruited into public primary schools without the government approval.

Sources said Governor Mimiko specifically direct-ed the committee handling the exercise to use March 2009 staff payroll and

payment voucher for the screening.

It was gathered that some (SUBEB) officials and those of the Local Gov-ernment Universal Basic Authority (LGUBA) alleg-edly recruited over 4,800 teaching and non-teaching staff into public primary schools between 2009 and 2013 without the govern-ment approval.

The sources said those recruited were made to pay N100, 000 each while those who had “godfathers” in the SUBEB and LGUBA got the job without any stress.

The sources said that some officials involved in the illegal recruitment had now devised means to en-sure that their candidates are cleared by the screen-ing committee.

In Odigbo Local Gov-ernment Universal Basic Authority, where over 200 teaching and non-teaching staff were illegally recruit-ed, the Personnel Depart-ment officials were alleged to have colluded with the

Account Section, presenting new vouchers and staff pay-roll for March 2009 and kept the original documents.

One of the sources, said: “What happened during the exercise here was very unbearable. The person-nel and account sections colluded to cover up their atrocities. Government should not have been spe-cific about the month they will base the screening ex-ercise on. The moment they got to know that the screen-ing will be based on March 2009 voucher and staff payroll, they produced new ones and kept the original document.

“They also issued out new appointment letters to these people and back dated the letters to 2007 to indicate that they were re-cruited by the last admin-istration. Some of them are relatives of senior staff of the personnel department; they were recruited about a year or two ago.

“We don’t know them as our staff. They don’t

Ekiti killing: PDP alleges plan to frustrate investigation

Be committed to agitation for Ibadan State –Bishop

ABUAD to begin programme in space science, technology

•Jonathan greets Olubadan at 99

Manipulation mars teachers’ verifi cation in Ondo

L-R: Community Engagement Advisor, Chevron Nigeria Limited, Mr Thomas Akagbosu; Director General, Office of Economic Development and Partnerships, Dr. Charles Akinola; Manager Policy, Government and Public Affairs, Chevron, Alhaji Umaru Ribadu and Osun State Governor, Alhaji Rauf Aregbesola, during the commissioning of a fully equipped chest clinic donated to the state government by AGBAMI Partners at the Osun State University Teaching Hospital in Osogbo, at the weekend.

come to office. They only came for the screening and they were all cleared. If you check the Odigbo Local Gov-ernment Universal Basic Authority staff payroll be-tween April 2009 and Decem-ber 2010, you will not find their names there. This is fraud. For the government to discover this, it should do a re-screen of all the staff and call for staff payroll and voucher from March to De-cember 2009. They should as well call for staff payroll of 2010 and 2011.”

National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net10 Monday, April 15, 2013 South West

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National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 11Monday, April 15, 2013 News

FBN Money Market Fund secures positive rating

DENNIS AGBOENUGU

A founding member and former Deputy National Chair-

man of the All Progressives Grand Alliance, APGA, Chief Onwuka Ukwa, has berated Maxi Okwu, for his comments on the late Igbo leader, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu.

Ukwa said the ghost of the late Ikemba Nnewi, will hunt Maxi Okwu till he dies.

He lambasted Okwu and

the Anambra State Gover-nor, Mr. Peter Obi, for their alleged attack on the late Bi-afran leader.

Ukwu said he was par-ticularly pained because Mr. Obi is involved in the derog-atory statements against the late Igbo leader on whose ladder Obi rose to power.

Maxi Okwu had last week in Awka, described Ojukwu as an extremist whose views were opposed to that of late Nigeria Presi-dent, Dr. Nnamdi Azikwe.

Ukwa recalled that Ok-

wu’s abuse of Ojukwu was similar to the insult by Late Dr. Chuba Okadigbo on Dr. Nnamdi Azikwe then.

He also recalled that Ok-adigbo’s insult on Azikwe hunted him (Okadigbo) throughout his political career, adding that in the same manner Okwu’s abuse of Ojukwu would haunt him except if he re-tracted the statement and tender unreserved apology.

According to Ukwa, it was even more unfortunate that Okwu insulted Ojukwu

under the supervision of Governor Obi, who he said, “was sitting there watching and never called him to or-der, even when Obi was the greatest beneficiary of the Ojukwu dynasty.”

Ukwa insisted that Okwu and his cohorts need to quickly retract that ‘reck-less statement’ in their own interests.

“It’s a serious concern to both the party and Ndigbo that Maxi Okwu of yester-day will describe our hero, Dim Emeka Ojukwu, as an

Less than a year after its launch, the FBN Money Market Fund,

managed by FBN Capital As-set Management, has been assigned ‘Aa (f)’ rating by Nigeria’s foremost research, credit rating and risk man-agement company, Agusto & Co in its first quarter rating result released recently.

In the report published on its website, the respect-ed rating company said the fund is deemed to have

“minimal to low risk of in-vestment loss due to net as-set value volatility.”

According to the report, the rating is supported by good credit quality of under-lying assets. All investments must have a minimum ‘A’ rating and at least 25 per cent of net assets are in-vested in short term Federal Government Securities.

“The fund has conserva-tive investment guidelines with respect to interest rate

risk. All investments ma-ture within 365 days, with a maximum weighted aver-age maturity of 90 days. The portfolio manager is well qualified, with over 13 years of liquidity and investment management experience.”

Commenting on the rat-ing, the Managing Director of FBN Capital Asset Man-agement, Michael Oyebola said; “We are pleased with the result of this first rating for the FBN Money Market

Fund. “FBN Capital Asset

Management has created a balanced suite of mutual fund products which are accessible to varying levels of investors, including low-income earners, in support of SEC’s mandate to drive investor participation in col-lective investment schemes; and in line with FBN Hold-ings’ Group objective of increased financial inclu-sion.”

Stakeholder fl ays Okwu over attack on Ojukwu

Olayinka’s death: CBN governor, deputy condole with Fayemi

Tribunal nullifies Idanre population figures

L-R: Rivers State Governor, Chibuike Amaechi; wife of Enugu State Governor, Clara and husband, Sullivan Chime, at the wedding of Governor Chime’s son in Enugu, at the weekend.

FG to step up work on critical road projects OLUFEMI ADEOSUNABUJA

The Federal Govern-ment has restated its commitment to

speed up action towards the completion of abandoned critical road projects across the country.

Minister of Works, Mr. Mike Onolememen, said this at the weekend while inspect-ing the 400metre long Utor Bridge along Asaba-Ebu-Uro-mi road in Delta State.

The road project was

awarded to Inter Bau Con-struction Limited in Novem-ber, 16, 2006.

He said work on the bridge was abandoned in 2009 due to financial constraints, ex-plaining that based on the viability of the road, it was revived in 2012 by the present administration.

While expressing his sat-isfaction at the pace of work done, the minister said the bridge would be delivered in 1014.

The project, he said has attained 43 per cent physical

completion and will be de-livered before the end of the President Goodluck Jona-than’s administration.

Besides, Onolememen said based on the quality of work on-going, the road would not only be delivered at the appropriate time, but also to specification.

According to him, upon completion, the road would serve as an alternative ac-cess road from Delta to Edo State while also reducing the travelling hours from Delta State to Abuja by two hours.

The minister, who said the work was going according to its design, however, urged the contractor, Messrs Inter Bau to increase the tempo of work in order to meet up with the completion date.

Earlier in his briefing, the Managing Director, In-ter Bau Construction Ltd; Mr. Nathaniel Okechukwu, promised that by year 2013 major work would have been done on the road and requested that budgetary al-location be released for early completion of the project.

Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Mallam Sanusi

Lamido Sanusi, yesterday, led some top executives of the apex bank, including the Deputy Governor, Corporate Services, Alhaji Sulaimon Barau, on a condolence visit to Governor Kayode Fayemi on the death of his Deputy, Mrs. Funmi Olayinka.

The CBN governor, who also visited the parents of the late deputy governor, de-scribed the late Olayinka as a friend whom he had worked with in the banking industry since the 1990s; adding that she was a highly resourceful professional, patriot and a woman of integrity.

Sanusi said he was sure that Governor Fayemi found her as a right-hand person, especially with the level of

transformation that the state has witnessed under the cur-rent administration.

“I know Funmi very well. She was a remarkably beau-tiful woman, whose beauty radiates from within. She was a woman of quality. She stood for high standards and I am sure that she also brought that to bear on her assignment here in Ekiti.

“I know the two of you had a good working rela-tionship, which also reflects in the transformation that has taken place in the state. You are going to really miss her.”

Sanusi, who was billed to travel for the IMF/World Bank Conference yesterday night, said he decided to visit the governor and the parents of the deceased before em-barking on the trip.

ISE-OLUWA IGE AND EMMA ONANI

The National Census Tribunal sitting in Abuja has nullified

the results of the census ex-ercise conducted in Idanre Local Government Area of Ondo state, by the National Population Commission, NPC.

In a judgement delivered by the Chairman of the tribunal, Chief (Mrs.) M. I. Obegolu, the tribunal held that the head count held between March 21 and 27, 2006, was not carried out in substantial compliance with the NPC Act.

Specifically, the tribunal agreed with the complain-ants that many parts of Idanre Local Government were not counted, even as it stated that such places that were counted were not fully and adequately ‘enumer-ated.’

The lack of proper enu-

meration was consequent upon ‘shortage of enumera-tion materials and disrup-tion of the census exercise.’

It will be recalled that the complainants by Idanre Local Government and its chairman (for themselves and on behalf of the lo-calities within Idanre Local Government Area of Ondo State), had dragged the NPC as well as the NPC Federal Commissioner for the state to the tribunal to challenge the census figure credited to Idanre.

Counsel to the complain-ants, Prof. Yemi Akinseye-George, SAN, had argued that the 129, 795 figure post-ed as the census figure for Idanre, ‘having regard to the shortage of enumeration materials and enumerators during the 2006 population census, which led to the non-enumeration of several parts of Idanre Local Government Area...is erroneous.’

extremist. I don’t see Ojuk-wu’s struggle for the cause of his own people as that of an extremist. It’s so unfor-tunate he made such care-less and disrespectful and insulting statement on a man that was given a hero’s burial a year ago.”

On the Appeal Court re-turn of Chief Victor Umeh as the APGA national chairman, and Okwu’s claim to the same position having been elected as such at a convention of the party in Awka, Anambra State

capital, Ukwa described the convention as an ‘unholy cult meeting on Sunday 1.00am at the Women De-velopment Centre, WDC, in Awka.’

He wondered if Ojukwu would have been asked to ‘sneak into WDC in dark-ness like a bandit to attend a convention,’ if he had been alive. He said the Ap-peal Court ruling which re-instated Umeh as national chairman of the party had set aside ‘that midnight out-ing.’

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SAM OLUWALANAPORT HARCOURT

Disbanded Niger Delta militant group, the Movement for the

Emancipation of the Niger Delta, MEND, has threat-ened to resume violent at-tacks on two fronts on May 31, even as the Joint Task Force, JTF, has labelled them as ‘a bunch of impostors and never-do-wells’

According to a statement issued by the group’s ubiqui-tous spokesman, Jomo Gbo-mo, this latest in its series of violent attacks, code named “Operation Barbarossa” will be targeted at large congrega-tions of Islamic adherents, Hajj camps, Islamic institu-tions and clerics who propa-gate the doctrine of hate.

The group claimed in the statement sent to Na-tional Mirror yesterday that it is undertaking the attacks on behalf of the “hapless Christians” in country. It also threatened that the attacks will not in-terfere with the ‘Hurricane Exodus’, which the group claimed it has used to launch an attack on some policemen in Nembe town, Bayelsa State on April 13.

The statement reads: “On behalf of the hapless Chris-tian population in Nigeria, the Movement for the Eman-cipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), will from Friday, May 31, 2013, embark on a crusade to save Christian-ity in Nigeria from anni-hilation. The bombings of mosques, hajj camps, Islam-ic institutions, large congre-gations in Islamic events and assassination of clerics that propagate doctrines of hate, will form the core mission of this crusade code named “Operation Barbarossa”.

“This campaign will not in any way interfere with the ongoing “Hurricane Exodus” – which on Satur-day, April 13, 2013, at about 01:00 Hrs, swept through the Ewellesuo community, Nem-

RICHARD NDOMACALABAR

About 32 hours to the National Con-vention of the Ac-

tion Congress of Nigeria (ACN), the party’s chair-man in Cross River State, Mr Hilliard Eta, has al-leged a plot by a group to frustrate the participation of delegates from his state

at the gathering scheduled to hold in Lagos.

Eta said: “We have un-covered an orchestrated plot by an unscrupulous group parading as ACN members, but who were unfortunately mobilised and sponsored by a chief-tain and major financier of the party to thwart arrangements and sub-sequent participation by

real party delegates at the April 18th National Con-vention to be held in La-gos.

“Apart from the plot to attack the delegates at the point of departure to Lagos, the group is also plotting to storm the La-gos convention ground with miscreants to carry placards and protest their alleged non-inclusion as

delegates for the national convention.

“These same persons had penultimate week stormed our State Work-ing Committee (SWC) meeting in Calabar where one of them, Mr. Francis Ekpenyong, led in the ef-forts to scuttle the out-come of the meeting.”

He said the plot “ema-nated from the incongru-

ous ambition of their sponsor in a bid to posi-tion himself for the next governorship election in the state.”

Eta said: “Such effort is a wild goose chase that will continue to end in fu-tility.”

The chairman, howev-er, urged perpetrators of such plan to desist in the interest of peace.

RICHARD NDOMACALABAR

The Federal Col-lege of Educa-tion in Obudu

has been shut by the Cross River State Gov-ernment for alleged in-debtedness.

A statement by the state Internal Revenue Service (IRS), which confirmed the closure of the school, said the college owed the gov-ernment over N543.9 million being Pay-As-Yo u - G o - Wi t h h o l d i n g Tax deductions from staff from 2004 to 2009.

The statement reads: “As part of our mandate to generate revenue for the Cross River State Government, voluntary compliance has been our watchword. Howev-er, we have been forced to effect a temporal shut down of the col-lege since all peaceful and civilized means of resolving the impasse have proved abortive.”

The IRS had earlier warned the college com-munity and students, who are supposed to re-turn to school soon, to stay away until the mat-ter is resolved.

Confirming the devel-opment in a telephone interview with journal-ists, Chairman of the IRS, Mr. Chris Ogar, said: “The amount was discovered following an audit report for 2004 to 2009 in which the col-lege has shown gross refusal to pay. The 2010 to 2012 period has not been audited.”

Ogar said that effort made by the IRS to ne-gotiate the debt with the college had, on sev-eral occasions, failed as the management always ignored the team of au-ditors sent to the school for the purpose.

He said that the school would remain shut until the manage-ment yielded to the state government’s de-mand.

Effort to speak with the school’s manage-ment was not successful as the Public Relations Officer’s telephone line was not reachable.

be, Bayelsa State, leaving the destruction of Well 62, be-longing to Shell Petroleum in its wake.”

The group however gave conditions under which it might shelve its planned at-tacks.

“We may only consider a ceasefire of “Operation Bar-barossa” if the Christian As-sociation of Nigeria (CAN), the Catholic Church and Henry Okah, one of the few leaders in the Niger Delta region we respect for his in-tegrity, intervenes. Also the assurance for a cessation of hostilities targeted at Chris-tians in their places of wor-ship, made privately or pub-licly by the real Boko Haram leadership will make us call off this crusade. We have no problems with their attacks on security agents, includ-ing the prisons, for their role in extrajudicial killings, tor-ture, deceit and corruption.”

However, in its response to the statement, the Media Co-ordinator of the JTF, Lt. Col. Clement Nwachukwu, rub-bished the claim of the group of having blown up an oil well.

He explained that the oil well had been sabotaged by some criminals involved in oil theft and that his outfit had earlier reported a spill form the site.

He accused the group of trying to create fear and pan-ic in the Niger Delta for their pecuniary interests.

He also warned members of the group to desist from these acts, saying their cups are full and the law will catch up with them soon.

He said: “First, it must be made clear that the authen-tic MEND as we all know went into extinction since the emergence of the Niger Delta and the freedom fight-ers from the dark days of turbulence in the region and quite a good number of them are partnering with their various states and communi-ties for development. Those attempting to christen them-selves MEND today are im-postors and a bundle of nev-er-do-wells who want to be accorded undue recognition at the expense of the peace currently being savoured in the Niger Delta. The lack

of focus and genuineness of intention of this gang seek-ing to hide under the name of MEND is apparent in its statements as it continues to contradict itself.

“You recall that it had ear-lier claimed to be acting un-der the directives of Henry Okah and now it refers to the same person as just one of the respected leaders of the Niger Delta. Now they are seeking sympathy and acceptance of the public by claiming to want to avenge for Christians.

“Niger Deltans cannot be deceived by the tricks of the devil, lawlessness is never a solution. Obviously their aim is to engender panic and a sense of insecurity in the region using MEND's name but we assure them that their cup is full and will soon be caught up with by the law.

“We urge all community leaders, opinion leaders and all peace loving Niger Delt-ans not to panic but rather firmly dissociate themselves from these criminals and to collaborate with the JTF and other security agencies

in ensuring that we rid our society of these criminals. The claim by those criminals of blowing up a well head is false, as our troops on patrol along Nembe Creek 1 Flow Station have earlier reported an incident of spill on water around Owelesu Communi-ty in Nembe resulting from the activities of oil thieves and a joint patrol team com-prising of JTF troops and Nigerian Navy personnel was able to trace the spillage.

“The troops observed a fresh dug out possibly for laying illegal pipeline and fresh foot prints which were traced to a small camp. Items such as hack saw for cutting pipeline, three shovels, food items, cooking pots, sleep-ing mat, foot wears, bags of pure water and clothes were found in the camp. It was sus-pected that some miscreants were trying to open up a new illegal loading point.

The camp has been de-stroyed in situ and patrols will be maintained. The oil well was shut down to avoid further spill pending repairs.”

MEND threatens to attack mosques, Islamic institutions

ACN alleges plot to scuttle national convention

Cross River shuts education college over N543m debt

L-R: Vice-Chancellor, Western Delta University, Prof. Peter Hugbo; Delta State Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan; deputy governor, Prof Amos Utuama (SAN) and the state House of Assembly Speaker, Hon. Victor Ochei, during the university's 1st convocation ceremony in Oghara, at the weekend.

•They’re a bunch of never-do-wells, says JTF

National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net12 Monday, April 15, 2013 South South

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L-R: Factional National Chairman of All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA), Chief Maxi Okwu and National Secretary, Dr. Sagir Maidoya addressing a town hall meeting in Abuja, yesterday. PHOTO: NAN

2015: No alternative to PDP, says Yuguda

Admit your ineptitude, PDP tells Fashola

ACN tasks FG on oil theft

AYODELE OJO

As part of efforts to resolve the crisis rocking the Peoples

Democratic Party (PDP), former President Olusegun Obasanjo and the chair-man of the party’s Board of Trustees, BoT, Chief Tony Anenih will meet today in Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital.

Anenih will lead a high powered delegation of the PDP BoT to the former

Peoples Democratic party (PDP) for now in the admin-istration of the country.

Hedismissed with a wave of the hand the suggestive threat of the yet to be regis-tered All Progressive Con-gress (APC).

Yuguda said this while responding to a speech by the leader of the Forum of State Secretaries of the PDP in the 19 Northern states, when the forum paid him a courtesy visit at the Government House, Bauchi at the weekend.

Yuguda said: “The inter-nal crisis rocking the oppo-sition parties is enough for them to grapple with to pre-vent them from thinking of how to win elections.”

In a press statement is-

OLAJIDE OMOJOLOMOJU

Bauchi State Gover-nor Isa Yuguda has said that there is no

alternative to the ruling

said that the state will need N27 billion to fight ocean surge in the next three years while his Com-missioner for the Envi-ronment, Tunji Bello had declared that Lagosians in some parts of the state must relocate to avoid flood after expected rains.

The PDP said that the perennial flood in Lagos is caused by the sand filling of the Atlantic Ocean for the Eko Atlantic Project.

amongst the populace.The PDP said this while

reacting to the state gov-ernment’s declaration that it needs N27 billion in the minimum to con-trol flooding in the Cen-tre of Excellence and its directives that residents in some parts of the state must vacate their homes to escape flooding as pre-dicted this year.

Governor Babatunde Fashola had on April 10

OLAJIDE OMOJOLOMOJU

The Lagos State chap-ter of the Peoples Democratic Party

(PDP) has counselled the Action Congress of Nige-ria (ACN)- led Lagos State government to admit responsibilities for the consequence of its inepti-tude and misgovernance in the state, rather than create unnecessary panic

in 2007, the two leaders have not been in good terms. So, this meeting will afford them the opportunity to sort out their differences,” a source said.

Top on the agenda is the crisis rocking the South-West PDP which has led to the removal of associates of Obasanjo from their po-sitions at national and zon-al levels.

Some of the political associates of the former President that had been re-moved from their positions include the National Sec-retary, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola; national auditor, Chief Olabode Mustapha

and National Vice-Chair-man (South-West), Engr. Segun Oni.

Obasanjo was instru-mental to their emergence at national and zonal levels. Hence, their removal was seen as spite on the former president.

Oyinlola, a former gov-ernor of Osun State, has ac-cused the party’s national chairman, Dr. Bamanga Tukur of responsible for his travail.

Tukur also dissolved the South-West zonal execu-tives at a time the leaders in the zone were meeting in Abuja to resolve the crisis rocking the party.

Obasanjo and his associ-ates have not been happy with the development.

Efforts by the PDP gover-nors to resolve the crisis in the party have not yielded the desired result. “This has informed the meeting of today. We believe that Obasanjo has the capacity to resolve the crisis in the party. That is why a high powered delegation is meet-ing with the former leader,” the source said.

It was learnt that today’s meeting will also dwell on the perceived marginalisa-tion of the South-West in the Goodluck Jonathan ad-ministration.

president. Also, Obasanjo will play

host to some governors including Sule Lamido of Jigawa State and Ibrahim Shema of Katsina State.

Shema is leading the PDP governors’ commit-tee on reconciliation in the South-West.

An impeccable source told National Mirror that the meeting was initially scheduled to hold last week but for the former presi-dent’s trip abroad.

A source said the two

sued and signed by the Chief Press Secretary to the governor, Ishola Michael Adeyemi, Yuguda said that the PDP, as a political party will not just sit down and allow the opposition wrest power from it, saying: “We will ensure that we did those things that will make the people believe in us and continue to vote for us; we must do what they want, do things that will promote them.”

Acknowledging that the PDP has its own internal misunderstandings and misconceptions, the gov-ernor opined that they are not strong enough to break the party and “give room for the opposition to have control, but we must do the

right thing so that we will be able to face the masses during campaigns and win them to our sides at all lev-els.”

The governor therefore challenged the secretaries of the PDP in the 19 North-ern states and the Federal Capital territory (FCT) to ensure that they embark on public enlightenment of the party’s manifestoes.

Yuguda expressed opti-mism that “we are going to storm the South-West very soon and our target is to get back the area in the 2015 general elections; the peo-ple there have tasted other parties and have come to re-alise that they missed a lot by not voting for the PDP in the last general elections.”

leaders will use today’s meeting to resolve their po-litical differences, particu-larly on the chairmanship of the PDP BoT.

Even in the recent con-test for the PDP BoT’s chairmanship, the former president was said to have backed the former national chairman of the party, Dr. Ahmadu Ali for the posi-tion.

Anenih was embittered that Obasanjo cut his ten-ure short when the former president took over the chairmanship of the influ-ential and respected board in 2007.

“Since the development FELIX NWANERI

The Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) has urged the Fed-

eral Government to step up measures to curb the rising cases of crude oil theft and pipeline vandal-ism in the Niger Delta to avoid worsening the coun-try’s economic woes.

In a statement issued yesterday by its National Publicity Secretary, Lai Mohammed, the party said oil theft and pipeline van-dalism, the cost of which has been put between $6 and $12 billion per an-num, have reverted to the pre-amnesty period, when oil theft peaked at about 350,000 barrels per day.

The ACN said it is partic-ularly worrisome that the relative peace witnessed in the Niger Delta following the amnesty programme seems to have waned, going by available statistics, say-

ing: “We are particularly concerned that the Nembe Creek axis seems to have been the worst hit by the criminal act, despite being the operating base of a key former militant who has cornered a lucrative Feder-al Government contract to protect Nigeria’s coastline from the same bunkering activities that are now get-ting out of control.”

The party added that without prejudice to what-ever solutions that key stakeholders may prof-fer to the criminal act of pipeline vandalism and oil theft, it is important for the security agencies oper-ating in the Niger Delta to ginger up their efforts to safeguard lives and prop-erty in the region, saying that government must re-commit itself to enhanc-ing security of investment in the region, while at the same time tackling head-long the grinding poverty in the oil region.

Obasanjo, Anenih meet today over PDP crisis

PoliticsNational Mirror

www.nationalmirroronline.net 13Monday, April 15, 2013

Ministerial appointment: Tukur’s red card for technocrats 14

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After elections come the time for booty sharing. In Nigeria, the struggle for power heightens

even more when ministerial appoint-ments are imminent. It is usually a time when the politics of prependalism is usually put to play; when the President dangles the carrot to the faithful; when loyalty are often rewarded.

In Nigeria’s political clime, the ruling political party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) since 1999 has been saddled with the responsibility of making appoint-ments into key offices such as the min-istries, parastatals and agencies boards. There are numerous of such appointments on the offer but it has also been noted that the beneficiaries of such appointments are mainly politicians from the ruling party, relatives and friends of power brokers as well as a group of intellectuals usually re-ferred to as technocrats.

Technocrats are a few ministers or head of government agencies in government who are not career politicians. In fact, in some cases they may not even be members of political parties at all. They are instead supposed to be “experts” in the fields of their respective ministries. So, the clas-sic example is that the Finance Minister would be someone with an academic and professional background in Economics or who has worked with notable financial in-stitutions such as International Monetary Fund (IMF) or World Bank but has not pre-viously run for elective office or been heav-ily involved in election campaigns.

The prevalence of these people in gov-ernment has been justified in several in-stances as they often form the backbone or think-tank of the administration and have often piloted the policies thrust of the government, trying as much as possible to insulate the government and its intrinsic policies from the encroachment of career politicians.

But these roles of the technocrats have been questioned by the career politicians who believe that in spite of their contri-butions to the government, their roles in party politics should as well, be defined.

Deputy Senate Leader, Senator Abdul Ningi (Bauchi Central), at a recent func-tion in Bauchi had reasoned that politi-cians work before and during elections and at the end of the day, those who become ministers are non party members with no loyalty to the party, just as he said that key ministerial slots are being enjoyed by non-politicians. His observation was believed in some quarters to be valid as ministers, par-ticularly, the cadre mentioned above have constantly avoided political gatherings and have often carried themselves as a special breed and favoured few, whose positions in government are sacrosanct and protected.

Apparently reacting to the observation

of Senator Ningi, the National Chairman of the PDP, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur recent-ly said that henceforth any Nigerian who fails to produce membership card of the party will be denied ministerial appoint-ment.

Answering questions from leaders, stakeholders of the PDP from the North-East, Tukur who was angry that ministers from the zone shunned the meeting, howev-er warned that there must be total loyalty from members to the party, reiterating that the party is supreme and bigger than any individual irrespective of his or her status.

He said: “We must be loyal, we must sup-port our party; we must show commitment to our party, our leaders and leaders of the party. We are here to appeal to you that we must put our differences behind us. We should resolve our problems, differences and we must continue to serve our people, we have a very beautiful manifesto.”

On members producing party cards to be ministers subsequently, Tukur said: “No minister will get cleared without the party card. You must be a card carrying member, you pay your dues, we know you, the people know you, the governor knows you and you are registered and known in your ward. Let us have a disciplined party; we must move from the ordinary to what is better.”

Tukur’s position arose from frustration that ministers serving in the PDP-led Fed-eral Government shunned several meet-ings called by the party.

The meeting took place at the Bauchi State Government House with Governors Isa Yuguda of Bauchi State; Hassan Ibra-him Dankwambo of Gombe; Acting gover-nor of Taraba State, Garba Umar and the Deputy Governor of Adamawa State in at-tendance. Some senators and stakeholders were also present but ministers from the zone were conspicuously absent.

The North-East has the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Senator Bala Mohammed; Minister of Transport, Senator Idris Umar; Minister of Women Affairs, Hajia Zainab Maina; Minister of State for Finance, Yerima Ngama; Min-ister of State, Agriculture, Bukar Tijani;

the party.According to Eneukwu, “it is their par-

ty, it is their government and you can’t tell them how to run their government or what to do. It is a government of Jonathan and if they think that all ministers must carry party identity, so be it but sincerely speak-ing, it is their internal business.”

Also speaking, Mr. Daniels Richard, a political commentator and a chieftain of the PDP from Adamawa State said: “If the only qualification needed to be a minister is for one to just get a party card, then what kind of minister are we going to get? PDP is the only party in the world that to be-come a national executive, you do not have to win an election. There is nobody at that national secretariat that ran for any elec-tion. Now if you don’t need an election to hold position of course, you just get a card to be a minister; that is clearly what they are saying. So, I think it is a good idea.”

National Publicity Secretary of the pan Yoruba socio-cultural group, Afenifere, Mr. Yinka Odumakin, told National Mirror that a nation cannot be built with the posi-tion of Tukur that non-politicians will not be cleared for ministerial appointment.

“The declaration shows Tukur can-not rise above partisanship to see the big screen and that all talents needed to build a nation may not be inside a party. It also shows that governance for people like him is “come and eat” and an exclusive pre-serve of his party members only with no room for technocrats,” Odumakin said.

The late President Umaru Yar’Adua in 2007 ran a Government of National Unity, where opposition party members were part of the government. The ANPP, La-bour Party and All Progressive Grand Alli-ance (APGA) were represented at the cabi-net while the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) rejected the offer.

But President Jonathan discarded that arrangement choosing to make it a PDP affair. However, the inclusion of non card-carrying members may have added value to his government’s policies but has really not helped the ruling party. This development is now under threat but whether the President will buy the idea or not, time will tell.

The process of clearing a ministerial nominee starts with the security agencies. After a minister-nominee has passed the se-curity test, the Senate has served as a clear-ing house. But with the Tukur’s threat, will the Senate decides not to screen a nominee based on the fact that he or she is not a PDP member? Will President Jonathan or any other occupant of the office prevent tech-nocrats, who are assets to any government, from serving in his government or contrib-ute to the development of Nigeria on the strength that he is not a politician?

All these will be put to test when the President is constituting a new cabinet, in no distant time. Definitely, the Senate is made up of politicians from different polit-ical divides and may not comply with such directive, as it is against the constitution of Nigeria which forbids discrimination in whatever guise. President Jonathan is also unlikely to buy in into Tukur’s approach to governance of sacrificing competency on the altar of political expediency.

The National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Bamanga Tukur recently canvassed that only card-carrying members of the party will be cleared for ministerial appointments. OBIORA IFOH takes a look at the scenario where governance is left in the hands of only professional politicians while technocrats are left out.

Ministerial appointment: Tukur’s red card for technocrats

Tukur Okonjo-Iweala

Minister of State, Niger Delta, Dahiru Ishaku; Minister of State, Health, Ali Pate.

It will be recalled that similar scenario played out in other zones visited by the rec-onciliatory team of the PDP led by the na-tional chairman. In the South South zonal meeting during the meeting no minister was present while only the Minister of State, Defence, Erelu Olushola Obada was present at the South-West meeting held in Ibadan and only the Minister of Power, Prof. Chinedu Nebo was present at the South-East meeting held in Enugu.

Under President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration, non-card carrying mem-bers of the PDP who included the Finance Minister, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke (Petroluem), Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu (Health), Mal-lam Bolaji Abdullahi (Youths), Prof. Ita Okon Bassey Ewa (Science and Technol-ogy), Mr. Olusegun Aganga (Trade and Investment), Ambassador Olugbenga Ashiru (Foreign), and Mrs. Stella Oduah (Aviation) among others.

But some Nigerians have been reacting to the decision of the PDP to ensure that only card-carrying members are nominat-ed to be ministers. The National Publicity Secretary of the All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP), Chief Emma Eneukwu sees noth-ing wrong with that decision since the par-ty is in charge of the government hence it reserves the right to insist on ministerial nominees to be card-carrying members of

THE DECLARATION SHOWS TUKUR

CANNOT RISE ABOVE PARTISANSHIP TO SEE THE BIG SCREEN AND

THAT ALL TALENTS NEEDED TO BUILD A NATION MAY NOT BE

INSIDE A PARTY

14 Politics National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013

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National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 15Monday, April 15, 2013 Views

CALLISTUSOKE

[email protected] 08054103275 (SMS ONLY)

HeartBeat

PACIFYING THE INSURGENTS IN THE NORTH COULD WIN

FOR THE NATION RESPITE, HOWBEIT A

LIMITED ONE, AND WIN NEW FRIENDS FOR

THE PRESIDENCY IN THE REGION

THIS PILLAR OF ABUSE OF OPPORTUNITIES IS

THE ONE THAT SOUNDS THE DEATH KNELL OF MANY WORKERS WITH

PROMISING CAREER PROSPECTS

I wish it were possible to walk into President Goodluck Jonathan’s office and make him submit to some psy-

choanalysis. That way, I would have been able to know what goes on in his mind about Nigeria, her enormous challenges and the burden of leading the diverse el-ements that Nigerians are. In particular, I would have known how it feels to turn full circle to repudiate an earlier posi-tion on an issue. I am talking about the administration’s major political shift on amnesty for Boko Haram after an initial ill disposition to the idea.

For those who may want to crucify Mr. President, they should appreciate he alone carries the burden of leading this nation. The buck actually stops on his official table. For the possible amnesty deal, we now have a Presidential Steer-ing Committee to exploit its feasibility. Only the perceptive minds will correctly interpret the seemingly innocuous de-velopment as a major political shift of the administration, especially against the backdrop of Mr. President’s initial ill disposition to dialogue with people he called “ghosts”. No matter how the Pres-

Show me a man or a woman crippled in his career and I will plot for you his graph of failure. Point me a

manager outsmarted in the boardroom politics and I will relate to you his tales of indiscretion. It is normal that when we get things wrong, things just won’t go right for us. This is a law of nature. That is why we are often counselled to be focused, to be sincere, to plan and be smart in whatever we do. Our libraries and bookshelves are crowded with moti-vational books; we pray and work hard; we scheme and strategise and yet a lot are still beaten silly by rain even as they hold umbrellas over their heads. A lot still go hungry while being spoon fed. A lot still thirst for water while swimming in a whirlpool.

My understanding is that opportu-nities exist, even in a vacuum; after all nature abhors vacuum and it is our re-sponsibility to make something happen from nothing. We owe ourselves the duty to succeed in the face of all odds. For all our faculties, when properly deployed, are meant to solve our problems. So why do many of us lament of being cheated when we lay out barriers of failure and erect pillars of disempowerment on our own paths?

The first of such pillars is in the ap-plication of wrong ethics in our private and public lives. No one labelled as hav-ing a deficit of integrity is ever called to serious assignment or responsibility. We

just allow him to float on the job, caring less whether he reaches a destination or not. And when it’s time to right-size, he becomes the best candidate from the bot-tom to be shaved off. He may never cross the bridge of salvation in difficult mo-ments of decision.

This first pillar finds expression, strength and support in the other pillars. The corollary to taking up an appoint-ment or assuming a responsibility is the attitude of commitment or self-applica-tion. Unfortunately, no sooner than some are called to serve than they forget the pledge of hard work and loyalty to the organization they made while swearing to oaths of secrecy or allegiance before God and man. Easily, they are crushed by what I call the pillar of abandonment of responsibility in their attitude to work as they moonlight, or gossip around their offices, leaving their work to suffer. No boss in his right sense would give a recommendation of top five per cent or distinction to a subordinate who always disappoints or does not deliver on his as-signment as expected.

If such an irresponsible worker boot-licks or pays in kind to get to the top, he will soon be buried in the rubbles of an-other pillar that will crash on him in his abdication of authority, because while rising to the top, he did not gain the mas-tery of his vocation nor did he under-stand the depth and dynamics of his job.

However, if a worker knows his onions

A President’s burden

Pillars of disempowerment

very well, but in his application of wrong ethics on the job, he abuses opportunities and privileges, his growth will also be lim-ited. This is the case of those guilty of op-portunism. How can a man who exploits the system or others to achieve his own end benefit the system or those working with him? When his tricks are discovered, he will ever be blacklisted in the minds of others and those that hold the sword to determine the workers’ fate. This pillar of abuse of opportunities is the one that sounds the death knell of many workers with promising career prospects. Labelled as smart guys, they are usually the worst victims in the chess board of corporate politics. They are consumed in the infer-no of difficult choices and changes.

Another heavy pillar capable of crush-ing a high flier on the job is that arroga-tion of knowledge and rejection of team value. The victims are usually the best guys on the job. Such smart but unfortu-

nate guys find comfort in being called Prof or derisively labelled ‘effico’. King Solomon among their peers and subordinates, they can be found in all work settings. They trust only their own judgement, listening to no one else but themselves, and using their personal lenses, whether wide or myo-pic, to view what others around them do have to offer.

They may be intelligent, but are certainly unpopular because of their sin of arrogation. They are very poor in team spirit. In the intense heat of boardroom politics, they become the victims of gang-up and when other contenders want to deal with them, they do not hesitate to taking their names to marabouts and satanic herb-alists.

Solanke, [email protected],

is Head, Voice Of Nigeria Training Centre, Ikorodu, Lagos

[email protected], 08090585723 (SMS only)

ABDUL-WAREES SOLANKE

A

Mirror of the moment

idency has attempted to dress up the new policy twist, amnesty for Boko Haram is a done deal.

Expectedly, this thinking outside the box option has polarized the nation into three huge camps: pro amnesty, anti-am-nesty and the uncommitted. The first two camps believe they have unassailable planks for the support for or opposition to amnesty for Boko Haram. The debate will continue to rage even when it has be-come obvious that the FG stance on the issue is fait accompli and the authentic Boko Haram has rejected it.

My concern in this piece is to objectify what appears a 360 degree somersault of the Jonathan administration on an issue it had earlier rationally simulated to arrive at a position in which even its worst critics would find difficult to fault. If he had labeled Boko Haram a phan-tom group, he found justification in the

group’s opaque style, a contrast with the humanized militant groups in the Niger Delta region before now.

Many would ask why did Mr. President not use his last March visit to Borno and Yobe states to unveil his current agenda instead of the anti-amnesty effusions the people, elders and leaders of the North were treated to? By categorically de-claring he was not disposed to granting amnesty to “ghosts”, President Jonathan did not just treat these elders and lead-ers with disrespect, he denied himself the credit of being a compassionate national leader, a statesman par excellence.

The question is what could have forced the policy shift in less than one month? As they say, much water has passed un-der the bridge! First, the nation he is piloting has run into fresh turbulence with the resurgence of terror war in the Niger Delta region following the prison sentence imposed on Henry Okah, the former leader of MEND by a South Afri-can court. Recall the killing of 12 police-men in Bayelsa State, penultimate Sat-urday. It is obvious the nation’s security challenge has become more precarious following this development. It stands to reason therefore, for FG to reverse some of its earlier positions on some dicey na-tional issues to mitigate the nation’s ex-cessive exposure to risks. Pacifying the insurgents in the North could win for the nation respite, howbeit a limited one, and win new friends for the Presidency in the region. And for a President with an eye for a second term, the amnesty

gambit is the most politically correct de-cision, existentially speaking.

Jonathan might also have suddenly discovered that manifest animosity to-wards the North is strengthening the hands of the opposition in the region. The politicisation of his ill disposition to amnesty for Boko Haram has demon-ized his Presidency and his party, weak-ened the voice of the North’s bigwigs in the party and diminished their political acceptability ratings. With the prospect of APC’s registration looming in the ho-rizon, the sustained bellicosity of Jona-than towards the core interest of the power oligarchs in the North might have become too risky.

Amnesty for Boko Haram, is however, problematic. Some of the problematic arises from the very fact of the bestial-ity and mindlessness of the militant Is-lamic sect. The killings, maiming and massive infrastructural despoliation left in the wake of its serial attacks in parts of the country have no justifiable caus-ative factors. These rapacious exploits have earned the sect the image of a band of unguided Islamic fundamentalists, rebels without a cause. For a region of creeping economic disabilities, of what use are the attacks on schools and busi-nesses?

More importantly, granting amnesty to Boko Haram is akin to the opening of the nation’s Pandora’s box. This eerie sensation is on the air as the different factions of the sect, groups and individu-als have reacted differently to the idea.

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16 National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.netEditorial Monday, April 15, 2013

All the Facts, All the SidesAll the Facts, All the SidesA PUBLICATION OF GLOBAL MEDIA MIRROR LTD

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STEVE AYORINDE MD/EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

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BARRISTER JIMOH IBRAHIM, OFR PUBLISHER

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NO MATTER HOW UNIMPEACHABLE

ONE’S CHARACTER MAY BE, MEN AND

WOMEN CAN SCARCELY BE PREDICTED WHEN

SADDLED WITH ENORMOUS POWERS

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BARRISTER JIMOH IBRAHIM, OFR PUBLISHER

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YELE AKINROLABU ED OPERATIONS

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ISE-OLUWA IGE ABUJA BUREAU CHIEF

KAYODE BALOGUN JNR SM, STRATEGIC DEVELOPMENT

FRANK OBOH HEAD, GRAPHICS

A couple of days ago, some Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SANs), speaking

in different interviews with this newspaper, examined how appropriate or otherwise it is for the occupant of the office of the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) to head both the Federal Judicial Service Commission (FJSC) and the National Judicial Council (NJC), which are the creations of Section 153 (1) (e) and (i) respectively, of the 1999 Constitution (as amended). Virtually all the SANs, however, could not understand why the CJN should be heading the two sensitive offices.

The FJSC is vested with power to advise the NJC in nominating persons for ap-pointments to such offices as the Chief Justice of Nigeria, justices of the Supreme Court, President of the Court of Ap-peal, justices of the Court of Appeal, Chief Judge of the Federal High Court, judges of the Federal High Court, as well as the chairman and mem-bers of the Code of Conduct Tribunal. It also has power to recommend the removal from office of any of the above listed judicial officers to the NJC. In addition, the FJSC is empow-ered to appoint, dismiss and exercise disciplinary control over the chief registrars and

deputy chief registrars of the Supreme Court, Court of Ap-peal, Federal High Court, and all other members of staff of the Judicial Service of the Federation not specified in the Constitution.

The NJC, on the other hand, was purportedly instituted to shield the judiciary from the meddlesomeness of the execu-tive arm of government; and has power to advise the Presi-dent and Governors on judicial matters; appoint, dismiss and exercise disciplinary control over members and staff of the Council; disburse all moneys of the Council; and in addition, deal with all other matters re-lating to broad issues of policy and administration.

One of the SANs, Chief Felix Fagbohungbe, had stated, for instance, that he found it irrec-oncilable for the CJN to chair

the FJSC and NJC at the same time. “The reason is that the FJSC will recommend to the NJC. That means as the head of the FJSC, you will recom-mend to yourself also as head of the NJC”, he said, stressing the inherent unfairness and possibility of abuse in the ar-rangement. Fagbohungbe’s col-leagues, like Tayo Oyetibo and Kemi Pinheiro, among others, were also of the same opinion. Only Mallam Yusuf Ali held the position that “it does not matter the kind of people you put in those offices, it is the character of people that matters, not the responsibilities they are sad-dled with.’’

If it is widely agreed that power corrupts, and that abso-lute power corrupts absolutely, it is then puzzling, why the framers of the 1999 Constitu-tion consciously indulged in the grave mistake of literally mak-ing any occupant of the office of the CJN a judge in his/her own cause. For, no matter how unimpeachable one’s character may be, men and women can scarcely be predicted when saddled with enormous powers. Indeed, in addition to the aber-ration of the CJN’s headship of the FJSC, we equally consider it wrong for any occupant of that high office to be the chairman of the NJC. Being a judicial of-

ficer whose conduct is subject to the regulation and disciplin-ary action of the NJC, it is patently off mark for the NJC to be headed by the CJN. Indeed, it may now be better under-stood why the embattled former President of the Court of Ap-peal (PCA), Justice Ayo Salami, was at the receiving end during the scandalous face-off between him and former CJN, Justice Aloysius Katsina-Alu, in 2011.

Likewise condemnable is the practice where the membership of the NJC, a body established for the regulation and supervi-sion of the judiciary and its officers, is dominated by serving judicial officers. This seems a mockery of the real essence of establishing the body; and the development has great prospects of being counterproductive. The National Assembly should find ways of redressing these affronts on best practice through a consti-tutional amendment. The tasks of the CJN as a Supreme Court justice and head of the nation’s judiciary are enormous enough. Occupants of the office need not play visible roles like the chair-manship of the FJSC or NJC. The membership of the NJC should also be reviewed to give promi-nence to retired senior judges, reputable eminent lawyers and credible Nigerians drawn from other professions.

CJN’s headship of NJC, FJSC

ON THIS DAYRepresentatives of 124 countries and the European Communities

signed the Marrakesh Agreements, revising the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and initiating the World Trade Organization (ef-fective January 1, 1995). The agreement developed out of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), supplemented by a number of other agreements on issues including trade in services, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, trade-related aspects of intellectual property, etc.

April 15, 1994 April 15, 1970

During the Cambodian Civil War, massacres of the Vietnamese minority resulted in 800 bodies flowing down the Mekong River into South Vietnam. Vietnamese, the largest ethnic minority in Cambo-dia, have been subjected to racial discrimination at the societal and governmental levels in Cambodia since the 1950s. Vietnamese set-tlement in Cambodia dated back to the 17th century when the first settlers first established themselves in the Mekong Delta.0

April 15, 1989

Hillsborough disaster: A human crush occurred at Hillsborough Stadium, home of Sheffield Wednesday, in the FA Cup Semi Final, resulting in the deaths of 96 Liverpool fans. The 1989 Hillsborough disaster was an incident which occurred during the FA Cup semi-final match between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest football clubs on April 15, 1989 at the Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield, England. The crush resulted in the deaths of 96 people, while 766 others were injured.

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Cover

National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013 A2 18 Business CourageCourage

A Publication of GLOBAL MEDIA MIRROR LTDBARRISTER JIMOH IBRAHIM, OFR PUBLISHER

SEMIU SALAMI EDITORADEJUWON OSUNNUYI STAFF WRITERTAYO ADELEKE SENIOR REPORTER

OLATOYE RAPHAEL HEAD, PRODUCTIONSEYI OKUMODI SENIOR GRAPHIC ARTIST

BusinessCourage

Last Thursday, four Japanese automak-ers, Toyota Motor Corp, Nissan Motor

Co, Honda Motor Co Ltd and Mazda Motor Corp announced that they were recalling 3.4 million vehicles sold around the world because airbags supplied by Takata Corp are at risk of catching fi re or in-juring passengers.

The latest recall is the larg-est ever for airbags made by Takata, the world’s second-largest supplier of airbags and seatbelts, which shares on the Tokyo Stock Exchange tumbled by almost 10 per cent when the recall was an-nounced.

This is the largest since Toyota pulled back more than seven million vehicles in Oc-tober 2012 to repair faulty power window switches. The scale of the recent safety ac-tions, according to experts, underscores the risk of huge global supply chain problems as automakers increasingly rely on a handful of suppliers for common or similar parts to cut costs.

However, Toyota, Honda and Nissan said there were no reports of injuries or deaths because of the defective air-bags, which affect more than 1.3 million vehicles in the United States.

Airbags are fl exible fabric envelopes that infl ate rap-idly to cushion occupants in an accident. They were rolled out broadly in the mid-1980s and early 1990s, and are now required in most developed countries, with many vehicles offering multiple airbags.

In the current Takata re-call, the airbag for the front passenger seat may not infl ate correctly because of a defect in the propellant used in the airbag infl ator, the companies said. As a result, there is a risk of fi re starting or of pas-sengers being injured by metal fragments shooting up toward the windshield or down into the passenger foot well.

The recall covers some of the top-selling Japanese cars, including Toyota’s Camry and Corolla, and rivals like the Nissan Maxima and Honda Civic. All of the vehicles in question were manufactured

More troubletrouble for automakers

The global automobile industry suffers another major upset as over 5.2 million cars made by the top five automakers are due for recall, an increasingly compelling exercise which analysts reasoned may lower the integrity of the affected automakers and throw the industry into turmoil

By Abiodun Alade with Agency report

in or after 2000. None of the affected Camry cars was sold in the United States.

The development is cer-tainly not a pleasant piece of news for Toyota, still battling with its reputation after it re-called nearly 19 million vehi-cles globally from late 2009 to early 2011 due to unintended acceleration claims.

“The huge recall is expect-

ed to generate a good deal of unwelcome attention, partic-ularly for Toyota, as it strives to rebuild its reputation for quality in North America,” IHS Automotive analyst Paul New-ton said in a report.

Takata however said it learned of the problem from an automaker it did not iden-tify in October 2011 after an airbag deployment in Japan.

Recalled cars

Akio Toyota, CEO Toyota

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Cover

National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net Monday, April 15, 2013 A3 19Business CourageCourage

trouble automakersautomakers

It learned of a Honda accident in Puerto Rico the following month, according to docu-ments fi led with U.S. safety regulators.

From February through June 2012, Takata could not reproduce the problem in testing, but that autumn, the supplier was alerted to three additional incidents - two in Puerto Rico and one in Mary-land - according to documents

fi led with the U.S. National Highway Traffi c Safety Admin-istration.

By October 2012, Takata concluded it was possible that the propellant in certain wa-fers made at its plant in Mo-ses Lake, Washington, might be inadequately compressed, which could lead to the rup-ture, according to NHTSA doc-uments.

By March this year, it also

discovered that some wafers used in infl ators made at a plant in Monclova, Mexico, for a year ending in late Oc-tober 2002 may have been exposed to excess moisture, which could lead to a rupture, according to the NHTSA docu-ments.

Takata is aware of only six cases where an infl ator rup-tured in vehicles in the fi eld - four in the United States

elapsed time between the fi rst report of a problem and the announcement of the re-call was not unusual because companies typically search for patterns and possible causes of problems before launching a recall.

Toyota said in NHTSA doc-uments that it also received a report in October 2011 about an accident in Japan related to the issue. The automaker then asked Takata to inves-tigate, but through August 2011, no abnormalities were found with 66 recovered infl a-tors.

In September 2012, Toyota said it received reports of three vehicles in the US market with fractured infl ators, and the automaker asked Takata to study 144 parts that were recovered.

In February 2013, Taka-ta said the infl ators were cracked, possibly because of lower material density in-creasing pressure on the part, so Toyota asked the supplier to determine if a trend was de-veloping, according to NHTSA documents. On April 5, Toyo-ta decided to conduct its re-call, three days after Takata said certain infl ators could be faulty.

Takata supplies airbags and seatbelts to major auto-makers including Daimler AG and Ford Motor Co as well as the Japanese brands.

General Motors Co howev-er, said Takata is a supplier, but that the problem affected only about 55,000 Pontiac Vibe cars from model year 2003 built for the US and Ca-nadian markets. The cars were assembled at the Fremont, California, plant GM previous-ly ran in a joint venture with Toyota and were included in Toyota’s total recall number, a GM spokesman said.

BMW has an undetermined number of vehicles affected by the recall, a U.S. spokesman for Takata said.

Chrysler, Daimler, Ford, PSA Peugeot Citroen, Renault SA and Volkswagen AG said they were not affected be-cause they did not use the air-bags covered by the recall. In-dia’s Tata Motors Ltd and its Jaguar Land Rover unit said they are not affected, just like Italy’s Fiat SpA and India’s Maruti Suzuki which does not patronise Takata.

Between 2008 and 2011,

September 2011 - Honda says it will recall about 960,000 Fit subcompacts and other models globally to repair defects including malfunctioning power window switches.

March 2012 - BMW says it is recalling about 1.3 million cars for repair world-wide due to a possible problem with a battery cable cover in the trunk. The recall affects 5- and 6-Series BMWs built between 2003 and 2010.

October 2012 - Toyota announces a recall of more than 7.4 million vehicles worldwide as a faulty power window switch is a potential fi re hazard, the latest in a series of setbacks for Japan’s biggest automaker. Toyota has battled its way back from multiple diffi culties since 2008, including a series of recalls involving more than 10 million of its vehicles in 2009-11, and supply chains crippled by the tsunami in Japan and fl oods in Thailand.

November 2012 - Toyota says it will recall 2.77 million vehicles worldwide, including some of its popular Prius hybrid cars, for steering and water pump problems.

January 2013 - Toyota announces a recall of nearly 1.3 million cars globally for two separate defects, including 752,000 Corolla and Corolla Matrix vehicles in the United States to fi x airbags that could be deployed inadvertently.

April 2013 - Hyundai Motor Corp and its Kia Motors affi liate are recalling more than 1.8 million cars and SUVs in the United States to address a poten-tially faulty switch and a loose headliner, according to U.S. safety regulators.

April 2013 - Four Japanese automakers - Toyota Motor Corp, Honda Motor Co, Nissan Motor Co and Mazda Motor Corp announce they are recalling a total of around 3.4 million vehicles worldwide due to defective airbags supplied by Takata Corp.

Details of some recent major recallsJanuary 2010 - Toyota issues a series of recalls covering 5.6 million vehicles

in the United States due to sudden acceleration in some vehicles. March 2010 - GM says it is recalling 1.3 million compact cars covering the

2005-2010 model year Chevrolet Cobalt and 2007-2010 Pontiac G5 in the U.S.; the 2005-2006 Pontiac Pursuit sold in Canada; and the 2005-2006 Pontiac G4 sold in Mexico.

June 2010 - GM announces the recall of 1.5 million trucks, crossovers and cars from model years 2006-2009 as the unit that heats the windshield washer fl uid could catch fi re.

August 2010 - Toyota recalls 1.3 million Corolla and Matrix cars from 2005-2008 model years in the United States and Canada.

October 2010 - BMW voluntarily recalls 350,000 cars worldwide due to pos-sible brake problems. The problem affects brand 5, 6 and 7 Series models built since 2002.

October 2010 - Toyota will recall a total of about 1.66 million vehicles, mostly in Japan, the United States and China, for problems involving brakes and fuel pumps.

January 2011 - Toyota says it will recall more than 1.7 million vehicles world-wide, bringing its total for recalls to nearly 16 million since late 2009 and dealing a blow to its efforts to restore its reputation for quality.

May 2011 - Honda expands earlier recalls of Honda and Acura vehicles over airbags that could deploy with too much pressure, causing injuries or fatalities, adding more than 833,000 vehicles from model years 2001-2003. This is the fourth time Honda has widened its airbag recall, fi rst announced in 2008. The number of vehicles affected is now 1.65 million.

and two in Japan - as well as six cases in salvage yards in Japan, according to NHTSA documents.

In July and August 2012 in Japan, at scrap yards where airbags were being recycled, offi cials noted that airbags in some Honda vehicles de-ployed “strangely,” adding to the probe, a U.S. spokesman for Honda said.

Industry offi cials said the

Honda, Nissan, Toyota, and Mazda are all affected by the same airbag recall

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CoverHonda was forced to recall about 2.8 million vehicles af-ter fi nding a defect with driv-er-side airbags supplied by Takata. “When the last recall took place, we inspected ev-erything such as the site of manufacturing, but we were not able to identify this prob-lem,” said Hideyuki Matsu-moto, another spokesman for Takata.

Outside the faulty airbag recall, Business Courage learnt that another 1.8 mil-lion cars and SUVs manufac-tured by Hyundai Motor Corp and its Kia Motors affi liate in the US are currently being recalled to address a poten-tially faulty switch and a loose headliner.

Hyundai is recalling 1,059,824 cars and SUVs and Kia is recalling 623,658 vehicles from model years 2007 through 2011 to replace a switch that could malfunc-tion and increase the risk of a crash, according to docu-ments fi led with U.S. National Highway Traffi c Safety Ad-ministration.

A Kia spokesman in the

United States however said the company was not aware of any accidents or injuries related to the issue and did not have any information on whether the recall was be-ing done in other countries. A Hyundai spokesman in the United States said there had been no reports of accident or injuries.

In addition, Hyundai is recalling 186,254 Elantra cars from model years 2011 through 2013 to apply ad-hesive strips to prevent the headliner from becoming dis-placed during a side curtain airbag deployment, the NHT-SA said. The Hyundai spokes-man said there was one report of a minor injury, a cut ear, related to the issue.

In the larger recall, the malfunctioning stop lamp switch may cause the brake lights not to illuminate when the brake pedal is depressed, or may cause an inability to deactivate the cruise control by pressing the brake pedal, the NHTSA said.

The switch may also cause intermittent operation of the

push-button start feature, prevent the shifter from being moved out of the park posi-tion, allow the driver to move the shifter out of park without applying the brake, or cause the electronic stability con-trol malfunction light to illu-minate, according to NHTSA documents.

Failure to illuminate the brake lights or disengage cruise control could increase the risk of a crash, while dis-abling the brake-transmission interlock could result in a vehicle rollaway, the NHTSA said.

The affected Hyundai mod-els include 2007-2009 Accent cars and Tucson SUVs, 2007-2010 Elantras, 2007-2011 Santa Fe SUVs, 2008-2009 Veracruz SUVs, 2010-2011 Genesis coupes and 2011 So-nata cars, according to the NHTSA.

The affected Kia models include 2011 Optima cars, 2007-2010 Rondo crossovers, 2007 Sedona minivans, 2007-2011 Sorento crossovers, 2010-2011 Soul cars and 2007-2010 Sportage SUVs.

Takanobu Ito, CEO HondaBC

Auditor’s report indicts UC RUSAL on ALSCON’s assets By Tola Akinmutimi/ Abuja

In what appears to be another sordid revelation in the

management of the multi-billion naira Ikot-Abasi based Aluminium Smelter Company of Nigeria (ALSCON), KPMG, the external auditors to the company has raised serious concern over the current status of the company.

The auditor’s report in the company’s Financial Statements and Audited Accounts for the year ended December 31, 2011 stated that the company spent N2.4 billion on administrative expenses in 2011 comprising of N586,464,000 as staff cost; N126,759,000 on travel and freight expenses; N192,000 on Board expense and N199,794,000 as net foreign exchange loss, among other expenses.

The huge recurrent and overhead expenses, according to the report, becomes more startling given the fact that the company produced only 14,920 metric tonnes of ingots as against 17,541 metric tonnes in previous year with the turnover decreasing by 15 per cent from N4.6 billion in 2010 to N3.9 billion in 201.

Although the auditors noted that the company’s loss before taxation in 2011 decreased by 94 per cent from N4.5 billion in

2010 to N0.27 billion in 2011, it attributed the improvement to “a decrease in cost of sales which resulted from write-back of prior year cost of sales adjustment and inventory adjustment passed during the year to correctly state the cost of sales and storeroom supplies.”

The auditors expressed dissatisfaction with the decision of the management to grant it access to some assets that were classifi ed as obsolete by the company’s management, even as they could not account for the whereabouts of some equipment valued at N5.9 billion when the auditors demanded to know.

We were not provided with suffi cient appropriate audit evidence as to the need to recognize a provision for stock obsolescence irrespective of the fact that some of the items have remained unused for several years.”

Besides, the auditors claimed that they were “also unable to carry out alternative audit procedures to obtain suffi cient appropriate audit evidence due to the inability of the company to determine stock obsolescence. Consequently, we were unable to determine whether any adjustment to this balance is necessary”

Similarly, the 2011 audited accounts’ report also indicated that the their attempts to carry our physical assessment on the company’s butts (casks or barrels) carried in the books of the company at N0.4 billion as

at December 31, 2011 did not yield any tangible result as UC RUSAL management could not provide any information where the assets were located in the premises.

It was reliably gathered that at the completion of the plant by Reynolds of America, the equipment were not only of world class quality but that several parts were brought in to keep the company running. Those assets were said to be in their cartons un-tampered with until the plant was sold to UC RUSAL.

Curiously, the same equipment were classifi ed in the 2011 as highly depreciated in value.

Expert tasks operators on cooperation for effective insurance market

The Deputy Director-General, Chartered Insurance

Institute of Nigeria (CIIN), Kola Ahmed has identifi ed cooperation among insurance companies and brokers as a major requirement to revamp the insurance market.

Ahmed told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos that collective efforts would reduce problem of rates cutting and ensure that brokers paid premium they collected to

insurance companies.“We need collective efforts

and cooperation to operate in a better market. Adequate collaboration among insurance operators will give the industry good projection before the insuring public,” he said.

According to him, some unethical practices among some insurance operators like rate cutting and non-remittance of premium are not supposed to be found in the industry.

He stressed that such acts were unhealthy for growth of industries generally. “It is wholly within the power of insurance companies to generate or cut rates. No broker has the right to do so. That is why underwriters know the brokers they deal with so that if they offer the price they want to sell a policy, the broker can be able to accept or reject it,” he said.

“With this process, there will be consensual agreement on the rate of different insurance products in the market,” he

added.Ahmed said that the

industry was being called a brokers’ market because brokers had a lot of infl uence in protecting the interest of their clients.

He said that in spite of this, insurance companies could still join forces to foster a unique insurance market.

According to him, with this development the issue of withholding premium and clients not willing to pay premium for any reason will be a thing of the past.

Dangote foundation donates N79m to UNICEF’s fight against measles

The Dangote Foundation has contributed $500,000

(N79.15 million) through the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) to support the government’s response to the recent measles outbreak that affected many states in Nigeria.

The donation was announced at the weekend in Lagos during a visit to the offi ce of the President of Dangote Foundation, Aliko Dangote by a delegation of the UNICEF led by the Country Representative, Jean Gough.

Gough lauded Dangote Foundation saying, “Public/private sector interventions such as these in the health

Ahmed

News

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sector and other sectors such as water, early childhood development are the way forward for Nigeria to improve the well-being of Nigeria children.”

The grant is a major contribution to government’s fi ght against measles which is among the leading causes of child deaths in Nigeria, especially in areas where immunization coverage is low. As we are aware, the trend of measles follows a seasonal pattern with periods of high transmission (January to June with peaks in March) and low transmission (July to December).

The UNICEF Representative commended the Foundation and Dangote for the exemplary leadership being provided in Nigeria’s effort to tackle vaccine preventable diseases such as Measles, Polio eradication and improve primary health care services.

A total of 16,809 suspected measles cases have so far been reported across 614 Local Government Areas in Nigeria. In collaboration with World Health Organization, and other partners, UNICEF has provided support to government with resource mobilization as well as in the provision of technical support.

The grant from Dangote Foundation, Gough pointed out, will support the measles campaign of the Federal Government through its Ministry of Health and the National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA).

The grant is specifi cally for the procurement of 1.7 million doses of measles vaccine and the gesture clearly demonstrates the key role the private sector can play working in partnership with government and other partners in mitigating public health problems in Nigeria.

Dangote said the issue of health and safe living was a core responsibility in the discharge of the corporate social responsibility of the Foundation pointing out that “we have a common synergy with UNICEF in the areas of health, education and nutrition and we hope that our efforts will encourage even more

private sector engage with on-going efforts to improve the well-being of Nigerian.”

IT, vital tool in achieving good governance – Expert

The President, Information System Audit and Control

Association (ISACA), Abuja chapter, Ikani Yunusa has said that Information Technology (IT) was a key tool in achieving good governance.

Yunusa said that the use of IT in governing processes at all tiers of government would promote accountability and transparency.

``Information technology and good governance share a lot. Today, IT is a global stuff and vital tool for achieving accountability and one key ingredient of good governance is accountability. This is one of the reasons why most government establishments including Ministries, Departments and Agencies where IT have been employed, now witness more accountability and transparency,” he said.

He expressed optimism that Nigeria would be at its desired position in terms of IT in the nearest future if the country continued to embrace IT.

Yunusa also advised government at various levels not to adopt IT blindly but to apply it in a proper way.

``If we must develop rapidly, we must be able to manage IT from all ramifi cations, including the functional and security perspectives. We should also be concerned about the risk aspect of it and if we manage it holistically, at the end of the day everybody will be better for it,’’ he said.

The president also advised government and Nigerians to take advantage of the

association’s competence in IT to build their capacities by applying IT in different areas of human endeavours.

Expert charts roadmap to effective presumptive tax implementationTola Akinmutimi, Abuja

Nigeria’s current efforts targeted at exploring the

opportunities of the yet-to-be introduced presumptive tax regime will only achieve the desired results if good governance exemplifi ed by prudent and accountable use of tax revenue is adopted, a renowned expert in taxation law, Professor Dakas CJ Dakas (SAN), has said.

In addition, the legal expert also believes that relevant insights from the experiences of other countries that have adopted the regime as well as use of the right technology are essential to the success of the new regime which is targeted mainly at informal sector individual and corporate taxpayers.

Dakas, who made the submissions in his paper at the one-day Sensitisation Workshop for stakeholders on the presumptive tax regime organised by the Federal Inland Revenue Service and the Joint Tax Board in Abuja last Thursday, explained that the regime promised socio-economic gains for the country in view of its potential for high revenue yield, ease of administration, capacity to engender horizontal and vertical equity and transparency and accountability.

While taking participants through the legal provisions that supported the introduction of the new tax regime as provided for in section 6 of the Personal Income Tax (Amendment) Act, 2011, which introduced a new subsection (6) to section 36 of the Principal Act, he however advised for a thorough review of the Draft Regulations among all stakeholders with a view to creating optimum awareness about the obligations of taxpayers and tax administrators when it becomes operational.

He said: “effective administration of the presumptive tax system in Nigeria, with relevant insights from the experiences of other countries (especially the developing economies of Africa South of the Sahara, is key to its success.

“Nigeria should in particular, opt for a presumptive taxation method (or a combination of methods) which has potential for high revenue yield, is less cumbersome to administer;

engenders horizontal and vertical equity’ is not fraught with corruption; and engenders a regime of transparency and accountability”, Dakas advised.

In his keynote address at the forum, the Acting Executive Chairman of FIRS, Kabir Mashi, said the proposed Presumptive Tax Regime (PTR) would improve access of the tax system to taxpayers in the informal sector.

Presumptive taxation is a form of tax regime fashioned out to bring taxpayers operating in the informal sector and keeps no records of their transactions into the tax net.

It is predicated on a taxpayer’s presumed, not actual income, which may not be easy to determine because they don’t keep records.

“It is our belief here in FIRS that if we are able to implement a workable presumptive tax regime, it will create improved and easy access to the large pool of taxpayers in the informal sector and bring them into the tax system.

This will enable us to not only grow the tax base across the three tiers of government, but more importantly improve tax collection from non-oil tax revenue. If we are able to do this successfully, we will be contributing to the overall development of the Nigerian tax system and the Nigerian economy,’’ he said.

According to him, the agency resolved to adopt a hybrid model in developing a workable presumptive tax regime after having looked at the experiences of others and we have tried to tailor this to our own local circumstances.

The PTR is a response to section 6 of the Personal Income Tax (Amendment) Act, 2011, otherwise known as PITA (Amendment) 2011, which introduced a new subsection (6) to section 36 of the Principal Act, as follows: “Notwithstanding any of the provisions of this Act, where for all practical purposes the income of the taxpayer cannot be ascertained or records are not kept in such manner as would enable proper assessment of income, then such manner a taxpayer shall be assessed on such terms and conditions as would be prescribed by the Minister (of Finance) in regulations by order of gazette under a presumptive

tax regime”.

India to establish Textile Institute in Kaduna

The Indian Government has said that it would establish

a textile institute in Kaduna State.

Dr Milan Sharma, Head, Africa Initiatives and Industry Research of IL&FS Cluster Development Initiative Ltd., disclosed this when a delegation led by the Chairman, Textile Manufacturers Association of Nigeria, Walid Jibrin, paid a courtesy visit to Governor Mukhtar Yero in Kaduna.

She said the institute would provide opportunity for Nigerian youths to acquire skills in operating textile machines and to manufacture textile materials.

According to her, once the state government provides a plot of land, the institute will commence a six-month training programme with an initial intake of 30 students.

She said the Indian Government would fund the establishment of the institute.

Sharma stressed the textile potential in the country and its recognition as a renowned producer of cotton and a base of textile industries.

She said that the choice of Kaduna State was due to its “reservoir of textile industries” and the gradual return of peace and stability to the state.

Governor Yero assured the delegation of the support of the state government.

He urged the group to immediately go into discussion with the Commissioner for Lands and other government offi cials to decide on how the state government could collaborate with the Indian interests.

“Kaduna State is reverting back to its normal position as one of the safest and most secured states where you can do business in Nigeria. Kaduna has always been a textile industry town most of which are closed down due to problem of power, but the Federal and State Government are working hard to produce enough power for the industries.

CIIN to partner NAICOM on insurance awareness, enforcement

The President, Chartered Insurance Institute

of Nigeria (CIIN), Dr Wole Adetimehin, has said that the institute would continue to partner the National Insurance Commission (NAICOM) to create insurance awareness among Nigerians.

Chief of Lagos Field Offi ce of UNICEF, Ms Sarah Beysolow, President of Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote, UNICEF Country Representative, Ms Jean Gough, and the National Primary Health Care coordinator for South West, Dr. Oladimeji Olayinka, during the courtesy visit by UNICEF delegation and the presentation of $500,000 by Dangote Foundation to UNICEF for the fi ght against Measles outbreak break

Kabir Marshi, Acting CEO, FIRS

Yunusa

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Adetimehin who spoke in Lagos at the weekend, said that the awareness campaign would not stop until insurance consciousness became part of every Nigerian.

According to him, awareness campaign on insurance can never be enough and the industry needs to do more if operators are to tap in on its results to grow premium income.

“Besides awareness, the industry should emphasise enforcement, especially of the compulsory insurance products under the law. This is beyond CIIN as such, while pursuing enforcement, the institute has to go partnering with NAICOM,” he said.

Adetimehin said that to enforce the ‘No Premium No Cover’ policy, the industry needed to be aggressive to get things done.

He said that the institute would continue to focus on its primary goals of providing skills and knowledge required for professional and ethical dispensation of insurance services.

The CIIN president said that the institute was being transformed and had been provided an IT platform to enhance its training capabilities.

He said that the development of the Institute’s College of Insurance was nearing completion, adding that once it was commissioned, it would focus on developing professionals.

According to him, the institute needs textbooks and professionals who will teach in the schools in view of its campaigns for insurance as a subject at the senior secondary levels 1 and 11.

He said that the curriculum for the college was being developed to suit the industry and academic needs

Ecobank links 2012 performance to integration, acquisition in Nigeria, Ghana

Ecobank Transnational has said that its performance

in 2012 was the result of its successful integration and acquisition in Nigeria and Ghana.

The bank’s Chief Executive Offi cer, Thiery Tanoh, stated

this at a forum of investors and fi nancial market operators of the West African Monetary Union in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire.

The bank recently announced that it realised a consolidated net income of $287 million in 2012, an increase of 39 per cent compared to the result of 2011.

``This performance is the result of a successful integration of our acquisitions in Ghana and Nigeria which has resulted in net increase in our market share in the two countries. We also link this success with the demand for retail banking services in the 33 African countries where we operate,’’ he said.

He said that the bank was focused on delivering cost effi ciencies, while maintaining high levels of service and innovation.

Tanoh expressed confi dence that 2013 would be another year of progress, saying: `` we are ready to further strengthen and develop the group to the benefi t of our stakeholders.

The Ecobank boss said that there was need to develop Intra-African trade for the region to grow in terms of volume of business activities.

Ecobank Group is listed on the stock exchanges in Lagos, Accra and Abidjan with 18,375 employees in 1,206 branches.

Nigerian, Turkish businessmen to strengthen ties for increased productivity

President, Association of Businessmen and Investors

of Nigeria and Turkey (ABINAT), Yavuz Zemheri, has expressed optimism that trade volume between Nigeria and Turkey will increase in 2013.

Zemheri who expressed this optimism in a statement promised that businessmen and investors in the two countries would strengthen their trade ties this year to assist the Nigeria’s Transformation Agenda.

The Turkish businessman said that Turkey was passionate about assisting Nigeria in achieving its Transformation Agenda and therefore needed more collaboration from Nigerian businessmen.

“In line with the current Transformation Agenda of Nigeria’s present administration, we are organising a business summit in Istanbul, Turkey, which is scheduled to take place in May 6 to May 12, 2013. The business summit is highly professional and is especially for Nigerian businessmen. It will further strengthen the socio-economic relationship between Nigeria and Turkey. ABINAT works in collaboration with National

Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Mining and Agriculture as well as the Nigerian Investment Promotion Council to boost business ties with both countries”, he said.

Zemheri said that the collaboration would improve product groups to make the event more promising for Nigerian companies.

According to him, the targeted sectors for improvement are construction and construction materials, agriculture, furniture, energy, textile machinery and auto spare parts.

It would be recalled that Mustafa Sever, the Deputy Minister of Economy in Turkey, had projected a fi ve-fold increase in the trade volume between Nigeria and Turkey in few years time.

Experts advise CBN on constant examination of banks

Some fi nancial experts have advised the Central Bank

of Nigeria (CBN) to constantly monitor the fi nancial positions of banks in the country to ensure a sound banking system.

Deji Okeowo, Managing Director, Fidelity Security Ltd., said that constant examination of books of each bank would enable the CBN to know the health of a bank at any given time.

He said that this examination would ginger the banks to be on their toes and boost the confi dence of customers and investors in the fi nancial sector.

Uche Ikeazor, Fund Manager, Diamond Security Ltd., said that such step would save the fi nancial sector from another round of liquidity crisis.

“The ability of CBN to successfully examine commercial banks will help to attract new investors to the banking system,” he said.

Ayodeji Fagbenle, General Manager, Cash Craft Assets Management Ltd., said that the step would strengthen the fi nancial sector ahead of new market challenges. “If at the end, CBN declares the fi nancial sector buoyant, it will attract new investors,” he said.

Investors task Nigerian, Portuguese authorities on direct air link

Nigerian and Portuguese investors have expressed

concerns over the absence of direct fl ights to and from both countries.

The investors said such fl ights had become imperative in the drive to boost economic ties and encourage investors to take advantage of vast economic which abound in Afria’s second largest economy.

They spoke against the backdrop of renewed efforts to promote trade and investment between both nations at the ``Nigeria Day Investment Forum’’ jointly organised by the Nigerian embassy, and the Nigeria-Portugal Business Friendship Association.

Some of the investors who spoke to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) said direct fl ights from both nations would further encourage investors to explore the opportunities abound in Nigeria.

Luis Varela, President of the Lisbon-based Golf Resort Hotel said that regular fl ights operated by Portuguese and Nigerian airlines will be very useful in facilitating business trips, as it will address the challenge of connecting fl ights from other parts of Europe’’.

Varela said in the hospitality business which he operates, and tourism would be easily promoted with more regular and direct fl ights.

Similarly, Pedro Chaves, Chairman of ``de Engenhania Lda’’, said that direct fl ights from Portugal to Nigeria would also bridge the gap limiting investors from engaging effectively with their Nigerian partners.

Chaves who recalled the relationship between both countries during the time of early Portuguese explorers said ``this was even before the advent of airplanes, so with technology, the world has become a global village where direct fl ights are possible with the right arrangements in place’’.

He also stressed the need for simplifi ed business visa process in order to deepen economic ties.

Nigerian Ambassador to Portugal, Ijeoma Bristol said that both countries would reopen negotiation on the Bilateral Air Services Agreement (BASA) in September.

However, Adebisi Shonubi, Managing Director of Nigeria Inter- Bank Settlement System said the volume of passengers would determine such direct fl ights, noting that ``no company will invest in a venture without expecting returns on investment’’.

Shonubi, who also head the Nigeria-Portuguese Business

Friendship Association further called for a joint fl ight that would have a stopover in Nigeria adding through plan, ``when the volume of passenger increases, can then press for direct fl ights’’.

GTBank unveils social banking service on Facebook By Udo Onyeka

Guaranty Trust Bank has once again raised

the service bar for Nigerian fi nancial institutions with the recent unveiling of its ‘Social Banking ‘service on Facebook .

The bank’s Managing Director, Segun Agbaje said the new offering, which is the fi rst of its kind by any Nigerian bank allows the public to open GTBank accounts and get customer service support on Facebook.

He said that with over 44million internet users and 99 million mobile phone users, branch is no longer very important,” what is important is using various channels to deliver quality service to your customers”.

“ The bank’s objective is to engage the public where they work, live or play and the new service would enable persons on social networks like Facebook commence a banking relationship and perform transactions 24/7, safely and conveniently, without having to leave the platform.

“This novel service presently allows people to open GTBank accounts and get customer service support on Facebook and in a couple of weeks, we will introduce new service options that include money transfers, airtime purchases and bills payments”, Agbaje said.

The bank’s General Manager , Head , e- products, Bolaji Lawal said that GT Bank is the fi rst Nigerian institution to have recognized online/social channels as an emerging service point and has over one million followers on Facebook.

Sanusi Lamido, CBN governor

Adetimehin

Agbaje

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management across the globe.General Manager in charge

of Public Affairs of NPA, Captain Ebubeogu Iheanacho, who spoke in Lagos, noted that the basic tenet of the port reform programme was to provide a platform for government ownership of port infrastructure and the transfer of cargo operational responsibilities to the private sector.

This is with a view to improving effi ciency, attracting private investment and freeing public resources for social services.

The port concession programme was adopted to because of its relevance to the emerging trend of globalisation phenomenon and its apparent features, among which include emergence of larger vessels in response to economy of scale with greater cost-effectiveness, speed, improved cargo-handling technology and reduced unit freight cost”, he noted.

Other features of new trends in port management include the emergence of internationally acclaimed maritime terminal operators with specialised technical expertise in cargo handling, port competitiveness and fl uid movement of goods across international frontiers and offshore manufacturing etc.

According to him, the idea of restructuring the seaports, which is also in consonance with the Federal Government’s economic policy, is to grow an economy that is robust, public-private sector driven locally and globally competitive and effi cient.

“The port reform programme was therefore designed to make the ports competitive, innovative and capable of attracting private sector investments”, he said.

The port reform programme had stripped NPA of its cargo handling functions and gave same to private terminal operators, who are believed to have more expertise in the handling of cargo.

Under the new dispensation, the authority is charges with such responsibilities as port planning, licensing and control, technical regulations, marine services, channel management and port labour services.

He said the bank recently introduced GTBank Mobile Money, a highly secure application that allows customers and non GTBank customers perform transfers and payments from their mobile phones to any mobile phone subscriber within the country.

“The bank’s internet banking platform is one of the most robust in the industry, supporting a wide array of service offerings that include bills payments, own and third party transfers and foreign exchange transfers to any bank account in the world.

The bank’s alternative banking channels were given a Payment Card Industry Standards Council (PCISSC) certifi cation late last year, implying that the channels meet acceptable technical and operational requirements to prevent credit card fraud, hacking and other security vulnerabilities,” Lawal said.

NCS seeks synergy among regulatory clearing agencies

The Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) has called

for enhanced synergy among government’s regulatory agencies involved in cargo clearance at the ports to achieve the 24-hour mandate on cargo clearance.

Wale Adeniyi, National Secretary of the customs service who made the call stressed the need to improve the level of inter-connectivity among all the regulatory agencies, adding that the inter-connectivity existing among the agencies was at present low.

``There is need for higher level of synergy among all the agencies of government in the ports. It is not enough for one person to make progress; it will be better when the agencies make progress and they are interconnected with themselves. So, the level of the inter-connectivity is still very low and we need to improve the inter-connectivity and this is why customs is taking the lead in the issue of creating a single window environment. So, it will be easier for all the agencies to approach the issue of port clearance collectively,” he said.

Adeniyi also urged the government to give the customs the mandate to enable it to overcome the challenges hindering the success of the single window platform.

``It requires political will from government. We need support from government, we need clear understanding and we also need a mandate. Customs needed to be given a mandate, so we’ve started to build common understanding

of all the agencies. We had workshops with them; we have reviewed our business processes; we have agreed that our processing are not fast enough currently and we need to improve them,” adding that the agencies have also agreed on what we need to do to improve them and they are gradually working on this.

Lagos records 61 per cent budget performance in first quarter

The Lagos State Government has said that

it had achieved 61 per cent performance in the fi rst quarter implementation of the state`s budget.

Governor Babatunde Fashola who disclosed this said that although the performance was slightly lower than the 65 per cent recorded in the corresponding 2012, it was still within the mark of effective budget implementation.

Fashola noted that paucity of funds had affected the implementation, but gave the assurance that government would do its best to achieve a remarkably improved performance by the end of the year.

“Yes, we have just received the fi rst quarter report for 2013 on the budget performance and the result was a 61 per cent budget performance, slightly down from performance in the fi rst quarter of 2012, which was 65 percent. In spite of the fact that the budget was dedicated to the completion of existing projects, and given the many variables like infl ation and the rest, I think we are well on the mark. I am satisfi ed with the performance and I think the capacity will improve in the second quarter; but then, that will be subject to funding because that is the major challenge we have had to deal with. But in terms of the impact, it all speaks for itself: Fitch rating for the state`s economy from stable to positive, from improved service delivery extending to Saturdays and so on,” he said.

The governor said that there is a total output for service delivery which is what a budget should do to connect with reality in terms projects

Abdullahi

that are coming to completion, in terms of housing, school projects and so on. “I am comforted that things are heading in the right direction and we remain committed to improving upon the 2012 overall performance of 89 percent at the end the year,``, he said.

Fashola said that no development could be achieved in an atmosphere of disorder and insecurity and urged residents to respect the laws to achieve progress.

The governor restated the commitment of the state government to the improvement of lives of residents through the delivery of meaningful projects and services.

Ben Akabueze, the Commissioner for Budget and Economic Planning, also told newsmen that the budget had so far done well in the area of revenue generation.

He said the government would intensify efforts on the completion of ongoing projects, to signifi cantly improve performance over the remaining three quarters of the year.

The commissioner urged residents not to see the budget as a government affair, saying they must own it and contribute to its success by paying their taxes promptly.

We will not compromise Nigeria’s seaports security – CPStories By Francis Ezem

The newly appointed Commissioner in charge of

the Nigerian Ports Authority Police Command, Sherifat Disu-Olajoku has said the force will not sit down and watch some individuals compromise the safety of lives and property at the seaports.

The command had last week raided the Tin Can Island Ports, known for the high density of touts and other miscreants within the port vicinity and arrested no fewer than 64 people for allegedly loitering around the ports.

Disu-Olajoku, who made the assertion when she visited the Executive Vice Chairman/CEO, ENL Consortium, Vicky Haastrup, said that the practice of having too many people who do not have any business around the port environment was no longer acceptable, BC

warning that offi cers and men of the command would henceforth clampdown on such people and other miscreants.

Olajoku, who expressed displeasure at the high human and vehicular traffi c at the seaports in Lagos, insisted that no responsible organisation such as the Nigeria Police Force would sit down and allow that to continue.

“In addition to beefi ng up security at the ports and environs, priority will also be given to traffi c control on the port access roads to ensure smooth fl ow of traffi c in and around the port area. The traffi c congestion in and around the ports is usually caused by indiscriminate parking of trucks and this culture will no loner be tolerate as it is not in the best interest of the Nigerian economy”, she insisted.

“Security should concern everybody and that is why we are going round to sensitise stakeholders to partner us and rally round us to ensure enhanced security. For the criminals, I will do everything within my powers to get rid of them and their nefarious activities because I am not a friend to criminals or lawless people”, she further warned.

It was gathered that the command is concluding plans to revive the Port Police Bomb Disposal and Canine Units as part of measures to enhance the security of lives and property in and around the seaports.

“When I assumed duty about six weeks ago, I observed that people just wake up and head for the ports even when they have no business being there. They loiter around the port premises and constitute security risks to the system. We will no longer tolerate such acts. We will carry out these raids from time to time and it will be a regular exercise until we rid the port premises of undesirable elements”, she also warned

She however solicited the support and cooperation of the stakeholders especially Seaport Terminal Operators Association of Nigeria (STOAN) with the Port Police, arguing that Police alone cannot provide security without the cooperation of stakeholders in the maritime industry.

Port reform conforms to international standards – NPA

More than eight years after the conclusion of port

reforms tailored towards the Port of Antwerp, Land Lord model, the Nigerian Ports Authority has said that the adoption of the scheme was in line with modern trends in port

Fashola

Olajoku

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Global News

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Cyprus appeals for extra bailout assistance

Cyprus president, Nicos Anastasiades has said he

will appeal for extra assistance from the European Union. As at Thursday last week, it was obvious that Cyprus would need to raise an extra six billion euros ($7.8bn; £5.1bn) to secure a 10bn euro bailout from Brussels and the IMF.

Anastasiades is urging EU leaders to change their policy towards Cyprus, but he is not asking for more money.

He made the announcement ahead of a meeting of eurozone fi nance ministers in Dublin.

According to a draft document prepared by the country’s creditors, the cost of the rescue has risen to 23 billion euros from 17.5 billion euros, with Cyprus now having to fi nd 13 billion euros of this.

The ministers meeting in Dublin said that the 10 billion euro part of the bailout that will come from Europe and the IMF is now set to be approved by the member states’ national parliaments.

That could happen by the end of the month and, if the IMF also gives the go-ahead, the fi rst bailout money could be released by mid-May.

A Cypriot offi cial in Dublin told BBC that for its part, Cyprus is not seeking more bailout money, but is rather seeking help from EU to reduce the burden of the conditions to make the bailout possible.

Meanwhile, the German government said that the size of the eurozone bailout would not rise.

“The contribution from international creditors will not change,” said German government spokesman Steffen Seibert, noting that 10bn euro package was “already very large”.

President Anastasiades said he had already spoken to EU Economy and Euro Commissioner Olli Rehn ahead of the Dublin meeting.

He also said he would also be writing to European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso and to EU President

Herman Van Rompuy.“The letter to Mr Barroso

and Mr Rompuy will refer to the need for EU policy to change towards Cyprus by giving it extra assistance, given the critical times we are going through as a result of the economic crisis and the measures imposed on us,” Anastasiades said.

The fi nance minister of Luxembourg, Luc Frieden, said on Friday that Europe and the IMF could not increase their 10bn euro share of the bailout. “I believe the policy will be that the volume will remain at 10bn [euros],” he told a German radio station.

Late on Thursday, a Cypriot government spokesman confi rmed that one fundraising option being considered was the sale of some of the country’s gold reserves. “The Cypriot government put various options forward, including this,” Christos Stylianides told a news conference.

He blamed the gulf between the original bailout total and the new 23 billion fi gure on the previous administration and the time it took to negotiate a bailout, delays which pushed the cost of recapitalising its banks much higher.

JP Morgan makes record quarterly profit

JP Morgan’s quarterly profi ts have risen 33

per cent to a record of $6.5 billion (£4.23bn), helped by a reduction in the amount it set aside for bad debts.

The bank reported a strong performance across all businesses.

Retail banking deposits rose 10 per cent, new mortgage orders rose 37 per cent and the company said it had kept the top spot for earnings from investment banking.

JP Morgan said it had cut mortgage loan loss reserves by $650 million and property asset reserves by $500 million.

Jamie Dimon, chairman and chief executive of the bank said the results were helped by an improving US economy. “All our businesses had strong

performance, and our client franchises did exceptionally well,” he said.

“We are seeing positive signs that the economy is healthy and getting stronger. Housing prices continued to improve and new home purchases are also starting to come back. We also saw strong performance in our credit card portfolio, with net charge-offs remaining near historic lows, another sign that consumers are healthier and more confi dent,” he said.

He added, though, that the growth in demand for loans had slowed during the fi rst three months of the year and that small businesses remained “cautious” about the recovery and were nervous about possible changes to tax rates.

He said this was making some of them reluctant to invest

Australian $40bn LNG project shelved

Australia’s second biggest oil company, Woodside

Petroleum, has put a $40 billion (£26bn) proposed liquefi ed natural gas (LNG) project on hold.

The project would have processed gas from the Browse Basin, in Western Australia, into LNG for export to Asian utilities.

Woodside said the decision to put off the project was a commercial one.

The project had faced opposition from environmental groups concerned about potential damage to the area.

The company said it would look into alternatives including a fl oating liquefi ed natural gas facility instead, along with joint venture partner Royal Dutch Shell.

The Woodside project was one of dozens of gas export terminals planned in Australia.

However, analysts said the decision to put the project on hold was another setback for the fl edgling industry.

Wages in Australia and the strong Australian dollar have made LNG projects extremely costly. The Woodside project was one of the most expensive in the world.

The country also faces competition from other LNG resources discovered in Canada, the US and east Africa.

However, Australia is projected to become the world’s largest supplier of natural gas, overtaking Qatar, by the end of the decade.

Google builds data-after-death tool

Google will allow users to decide what happens to

their data after they die or become inactive online, the fi rst major company to deal with the sensitive issue.

The feature applies to email, social network Google Plus and other accounts.

Users can choose to delete data after a set period of time, or pass it on to specifi c people.

Internet users around the world have expressed concern about what happens to their data after their demise.

“We hope that this new feature will enable you to plan your digital afterlife - in a way that protects your privacy and security - and make life easier for your loved ones after you’re gone,” Google said in a blog post.

California-based Google also owns YouTube, photo-sharing service Picasa and Blogger.

Google said users can opt to have their data deleted after three, six, nine or 12 months of inactivity. Alternatively, certain contacts can be sent data from some or all of their services.

However, the company said it would text a provided number or email a secondary email address to warn users before any action is taken.

People are increasingly placing content on social networks and data storage facilities hosted in cyberspace, or the “cloud”.

Other companies have also attempted to tackle the questions that arise after a person’s death. Facebook, as an example, allows users to “memorialise” an account.

Global PC sales tumble

Global sales of PCs fell 14 per cent in the fi rst three

months of the year, the biggest

fall since research fi rm IDC started tracking the industry in 1994.

IDC said 76.3 million units were shipped, a fi gure that underlines the appeal of tablets and smartphones as alternatives to PCs.

The fi rm said Microsoft’s latest version of Windows had failed to revitalise the industry.

Similar analysis by another research fi rm, Gartner, found a fall of 11.2 per cent.

IDC said that while recession had played a part in companies putting back the renewal of their PCs, the latest Windows software failed to inspire the market.

The fi rm’s vice president, Bob O’Donnell, said: “Unfortunately, it seems clear that the Windows 8 launch not only didn’t provide a positive boost to the PC market, but appears to have slowed the market.”

Windows 8 is designed to work well with touch-sensitive screens, but the displays add to the cost of a PC. Together, the changes and higher prices “have made PCs a less attractive alternative to dedicated tablets and other competitive devices,’’ O’Donnell said.

According to Gartner, global PC shipments fell below 80 million units for the fi rst time since the second quarter of 2009. “Consumers are migrating content consumption from PCs to other connected devices, such as tablets and smartphones,” said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner.

IDC also said that, traditionally, companies replaced PCs every three years, but that during the economic downturn this was more likely to be every fi ve years.

“This is horrifi c news for PCs,” said BGC fi nancial analyst Colin Gillis. “It’s all about mobile computing now.”

Hewlett-Packard, the world’s largest maker of PCs, saw a 24 per cent fall in shipments in the fi rst quarter compared with the same period a year ago.

China’s Lenovo Group, number two in the market, is benefi ting from sales to fi rst-time buyers in China and other developing countries. Its sales held steady, IDC said.

Anastasiades

Dimon

Michael Chaney, chairman of Woodside Petroleum Ltd

O’Donnell

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Continued on pg A10

By Adejuwon Osunnuyi

Akin Kekere-Ekun had everything going for him as a young Lagos boy. Born in the early

50s into one of the most cel-ebrated families in Lagos, Akin, as he is fondly called, had good upbringing, imbued with humil-ity and attended some of the best schools both in Nigeria and outside the country. Despite his robust family background, Akin never allowed all that beclouded his sense of personal conviction. Rather, he effectively tapped into the opportunities provided by his family’s rich background as a stepping stone to achieving his own desires.

At a very young age, Akin displayed unqualifi ed brilliancy and hard-work so much that when he enrolled for his elemen-tary education at the Ansar-ud- Deen College, Isolo, Lagos, he was usually at the head of the school’s Literary Debating Soci-ety during which the school won many laurels.

Even as a youngster, his aca-demic brilliance was so evident that he was usually singled-out, among many of his contem-poraries walking through the streets of Lagos. “I remember walking on a street in Surulere in those days and somebody said “Oh! That’s Kekere-Ekun going. In those days, we were able to do things that people recognized you for and that to me was good enough at that age,” he recalled in one of his interviews.

In the larger Kekere-Ekun family, education is paramount. Little wonder that through a healthy educational rivalry that had prevailed in the family, ear-ly in life, Akin was able to dis-cover his talent as he was a bril-liant and courageous student. “I can’t do anything than go for education. That is what my family is known for. You must be educated. My siblings are all graduates, my cousins; you know we were competing so to say. But it was very good rivalry. If somebody was doing some-thing, you either had to do it or do something better than that. And the kind of parents I had, my father helped people who were not even our own siblings. I’m very inquisitive as a person. I want to know what is happening around me. I don’t think there was a time I was going along the wrong path, then changed. I think I just took them as they came. There wasn’t a decision that I took that I can say that was a result of missing the road as it were.”

After passing out of An-sar-Udeen College, the young Kekere-Ekun moved to the Fed-

An enterprising managermanager

He was born into a respectable, and by all ramifications, a very comfortable Lagos family, but he is one man who never allowed the affluence of his parents to becloud his sense of personal conviction. He is Akin Kekere-Ekun, former managing director, Habib Nigeria Bank Limited and former chairman, Technical Committee, National Council of Privatisation

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eral School of Science, Onikan, where he fi nished in 1973 and thereafter travelled to the Unit-ed States of America, where he did his fi rst degree in Biological Science and Physiology as a mi-nor at Oklahoma State Univer-sity.

He returned to Nigeria in 1977 for the compulsory Nation-al Youth Service at the School of Nursing in Jos, Plateau State.

Regarded even as a young-ster to be a creative and restless personality full of enterprising ideas and elephantine ener-gies, Akin, even while doing his primary assignment as youth corps member at the School of Nursing, still worked his way into the world of broadcasting. He was engaged as a newscast-er with the Plateau Broadcast-ing Corporation, even as he also served as a Laboratory Assis-tant at the University of Jos.

Though his father had de-sired the young Kekere Ekun becoming a medical doctor, which led him into acquiring degrees in Biological Science and Physiology, his heart was clearly somewhere else. He craved for a successful career in the fi nance world. “My father had wanted me to be a doctor but I think I just took things as they came. When I was serving, I realized that with a science de-gree, I wasn’t going to be very happy and probably would have ended as a lecturer. It didn’t mean much to me and I felt at that point, “look, let me take an MBA which could cut across the world’s industries. That was why I went for an MBA looking at Marketing and Finance,” he said.

A week after he fi nished the youth service, he returned to the US, this time, at Long Is-land University in New York for his Masters Degree in Business Administration and later got a PMD from Harvard Business School, Boston.

Though he did not become a medical doctor like his father had wished, in the corporate world, Akin has been a well re-vered fi nancial surgeon, turn-ing around institutions with his great brilliance and courage. Today, Akin is an Eisenhower Fellow with vast experiences in various sectors of the Nigerian economy.

In January, 1980, he trav-elled to Belgium for training having secured a job as a Prod-uct Marketing Manager while writing his fi nal papers at Long Island. He, however, left the job eight months after resuming af-ter he discovered that the job was more or less like a one-man show.

His working sojourn also took him to Rank Xerox but he spent only six weeks before he resigned because of what he de-scribed as his discovery that the British Managing Director at

that time didn’t like the idea of being brought into the compa-ny by the then Chairman, Dele Fajemirokun. “It wasn’t very easy. But I had to leave at that point,” he recollected.

Coincidentally, around the period that he left Rank Xerox, the Lagos State government cre-ated the Lagos State Broadcast-ing Corporation (LSBC), and so he joined alongside Dele Alake, Segun Babatope and Kayode Adeleye. Again, he didn’t stay long as he only spent three months before he resigned to join Capital Trust Brokers which was then affi liated to the Nigerian Stock Exchange.

Again, Akin’s stint at Capi-tal Trust Brokers lasted only

two and a half years before he moved up to the then Habib Bank.

Having joined the bank as a manager, he rose through the ranks and was sponsored by the bank on many trainings abroad. In 1993, he went to Philadelphia for a Fellowship Programme bothering on issues of exchange rate mechanism for economic growth and development and three years after, in 1996, he was sent to Harvard University for a programme in Manage-ment Development.

Unlike many of his peers then who always enjoyed mov-ing around various banks at dif-ferent time in search of juicier appointments, Kereke-Ekun re-

mained stuck with Habib Bank, the decision which ultimately paid off for him as he rose to be-come the bank’s managing di-rector. “I was invited a couple of times to come and be Executive Director or Deputy Managing Director of some organizations but I just looked at what was going on for me then. In Habib Bank, there was an attraction. As a member of staff, you were part owner also. I had quite a sizeable amount of shares as a staff. I didn’t just look at the package outside; I also consid-ered the stability of the bank and the culture of conservatism. I mean it sort of fi ts my kind of person. I’m basically a conser-vative person,” he recalled.

According to him, most people move out of one job to another principally for money. “It wasn’t all about money for me. There are many things one could get from working in a place other than money. Happi-ness is very important to me. I was happy working there. I was happy leaving my home and go-ing to offi ce at the bank, prob-ably because of the people I worked with.”

Those who claim to know him fairly well say Kekere-Ekun is a very reserved and cultured individual who speaks with me-thodical reticence, a man who strictly believes in the laid down procedures. He works in line with the system.

However, unknown to many, his journey into Habib Bank, where he later held sway, was not without its thorny experi-ence. While he had hoped that

having graduated and worked for six years earlier, he would be given a top position in the bank hierarchy, the then Pakistani Assistant General Manager who interviewed him didn’t think he should get anything higher than an offi cer. He simply didn’t just reckon with his experience. “My experience in the corporate fi -nance, Capital Trust Brokers, a stock broking fi rm, was taken into consideration at the point I was interviewed. The former Minister of Agriculture, Adamu Bello, was the Deputy Managing Director of Habib at the time but the Pakistani Assistant General Manager who interviewed me didn’t think I should get any-thing higher than an offi cer,” he

recalled.For him, after graduating

in 1977 and working for about six years, a Banking Offi cer ap-pointment was not a good idea. But then, Bello, whom himself was a stock broker at a time “changed it and I was made a manager as against other peo-ple. At the point I came, I was actually the second most senior Nigerian after Adamu Bello, al-though the gap was very wide,” he said.

For a man imbued with courage and determination, Kekere-Ekun never feel intimi-dated by his emergence as one of the youngest bank CEOs in the country then. To him, there is no small boy in the hierarchy of banking. If he had his way, based on his outstanding per-formance as a bank CEO, he would have rather recommend-ed younger bankers becoming

Molade Okoya-Thomas, Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos and Kekere-Ekun during the 17th Convocation Ceremony of LASU

It wasn’t all about money for me. There are many things one could get from working in a place other than money. Happiness is very important to me. I was happy working there. I was happy leaving my home and going to offi ce at the bank, probably because of the people I worked with

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banks’ CEO, a stand which the current Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, Sanusi Lamido aligns with. “You see, there is no small boy in the hierarchy of banking. For you to be Manag-ing Director of a bank, you must have certain qualities because you cannot just be a Managing Director of a bank without the approval of Central Bank of Ni-geria. You may be young look-ing, but you may have acquired a lot of experience. We know one another in the industry and we accord one another appropriate respect,” he was quoted as say-ing sometimes ago.

Kekere-Ekun says he does not deal with people from the age perspective but rather, what one can contribute. “We shouldn’t look at people as be-ing too young or being too old. Like people look at a certain per-son and say ‘why did they make him this, he is too young to be this’. Is he working well, is he able to execute what he is sup-posed to execute in a respect-able manner and most of these people account for themselves positively, few may not be able to handle it well but most bank MD’s I know have done very well. When you start looking at them as young, young, young it’s just a few that are excited. You don’t need to be a Methuse-lah to run an organization,” he had noted.

In 2001, Kekere-Ekun’s managerial acumen was seri-ously put to the task with very stiff competition coming from the “second generation” banks, but then, he, with his wealth of experience, was able to turn the situation to an advantage for the bank. At that time, the trend was to deploy state-of-the-art information technology towards improving customer service, however, Habib Bank was a “laggard” in this regard, as most of its branches were not on line. But in spite of this, the bank had its strong points. It was conservative and gave

its customers personalized ser-vices. This paid off as most cus-tomers wanted a bank which could “conserve” their hard-earned wealth.

Aside the outstanding career he had at the defunct Habib Bank, Kekere-Ekun also played a very vital role in the success story of Africapital Management Limited (AML), where he serves as a director. Africapital Man-agement Limited is an institu-tion which provides fi nancial and investment advisory ser-vices to a diversifi ed client base, which includes corporations, fi nancial institutions, govern-ments, state owned enterprises and high-net-worth individuals.

Its pragmatic solutions based approach to the opportu-nities and challenges facing its clients ensure that they achieve their objectives. AML’s fi nancial advisory service focuses on sev-eral business segments com-prising the infrastructure, oil & gas, fi nancial institutions, me-dia and telecommunications, real estate and industrial sec-tors while it remains committed to developing key relationships with clients and uniquely posi-tioned in providing them with a broad range of services on the basis of its vast advisory, re-structuring and reorganization, principal investing, infrastruc-ture and industrials platform. AML also provides unrelenting commitment to ensuring its cli-ents achieve the best possible outcome for their strategic and fi nancial growth objectives.

Perhaps, in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the private sector, Akin Kekere-Ekun was in 1999, appointed by former President Olusegun Obasanjo as chairman of the Technical Committee on Priva-tization.

Kekere-Ekun believes priva-tization is the best for the coun-try as he notes that business is best driven when it is led by the private sector. “Given the fact that the approach we used

from 1999 is quite different from what we had used hith-erto, I think I would say so far, the programme has been satis-factorily run. We would do a lot better if we could enlighten the public, letting them know that this is the way to go because government has no business doing that.

You know they came into it when the Nigerian public was not ready; we were not fi nan-cially ready to take up those en-terprises. But I think we have people who could run these en-terprises and own them. Hith-erto, people did not think that they could own those enterpris-es. They treated them with dis-dain, they were owned by gov-ernment,” he had noted in the course of his assignment then.

In 2003, he was appointed chairman of USP Communica-tions Limited, one of the leading advertising companies in the country. He had stepped into the shoes of Bashir el-Rufai who had resigned his chairmanship of the company. Shortly after he became the Chairman, Akin Kekere-Ekun brought in again his wand of change as he led the company transformation, which saw it dropped its toga of advertising or marketing com-munications while donning that of brand management consul-tancy.

Kekere-Ekun had expressed regret that of the 100 brands of

the world, none is from Africa. With this development, USP be-came the fi rst brand manage-ment consultancy in Nigeria. By the same token, the company had to resign its membership of the Association of Advertising Practitioners of Nigeria (AAPN) so as not be seen anymore as an advertising agency.

The company, which came into existence in 1998, was formed by the trio of Muyiwa Kayode, Dada Ajai-Ikhile and Kunle Ajose.

Also, in 2003, Kekere-Ekun became the chairman of Ex-press Discount Limited, one of Nigeria’s leading discount houses, succeeding Moham-med Nanono, who had retired from the board of the company. Kekere-Ekun’s appointment was by virtue of his position in Habib, which was then, one of the institutional shareholders in Express Discount Limited.

Educational institution is another area where the wealth of experience of Kekere-Ekun has been greatly tapped. In 2004, former Governor of Lagos State, Bola Ahmed Tinubu ap-pointed him as the Pro-Chan-cellor and Chairman, Governing Council of the Lagos State Uni-versity and had the compliment of some of the best corporate titans like Wale Tinubu, MD Oando Plc, Dr. Toyin Phillips a former Director UBA Plc and

Fola Adeola , former MD of GT Bank to work with.

Having left LASU as the Pro-Chancellor and Chairman, Governing Council, current-ly, Kekere-Ekun is a member of Board of Trustees of ABTI-American University of Nigeria, the fi rst Nigerian university to be established with an Ameri-can structure and curriculum.

Kekere-Ekun, an Eisen-hower Fellow, also served as a member of Dr Kalu Idika Kalu-led 22-man panel on refi ning operation and output in the country set-up by the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke in 2012. The National Refi nery Special Task was set-up to conduct a high level assessment of Port Har-court, Warri and Kaduna Refi n-eries, review all past reports and assessments and produce a Di-agnostic Report complete with a Change Journey Map, among other responsibilities.

He had also served as Chair-man, Committee on Review of the Management of National Hospital for Women and Chil-dren, Abuja.

Married to Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, a Supreme Court judge, Akin, though, highly hardwork-ing, is said to be an introvert and a member of the old school bankers who believe in conser-vative lifestyle in and out of the banking hall.

Kekere-Ekun

Few may not be able to handle it well but most bank MDs I know have done very well. When you start looking at them as young, young, young it’s just a few that are excited. You don’t need to be a Methuselah to run an organization

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Management Principles

ThebuddingEntrepreneurs

Principles for successful cash flow management

The prayer of many is to gain a lucrative job after graduating from

the higher institution. Many will easily and readily jump at the offer of a white collar job from the oil and gas industry, the banking sector, hospitality business, engineering outfi t or computer companies. The civil service is another avenue that not many would turn down. And very a few will dare to quit such job to venture into an unknown endeavour, all in the name of entrepreneurship.

Well, that cannot be said of Sunday Adeyooye, a graduate of instrument engineering who left a lucrative job in one of the pioneer computer companies in the country to go into livestock farming, at a time, many were leaving farming for the white collar job. Adeyooye quit the serene ambience of high brow Broad Street, Lagos where he worked with NCR Plc, one of the pioneering computer companies in the country for the less fancied Lagos suburb of Egbeda.

Such a decision was considered absurd by many but for Adeyooye, it appeared that there was nothing to it, particularly as he appeared to have seen enough of the corporate world and had decided to pursue a different career path. Nothing could hold him back from pursuing his love; the comfort of his offi ce, the prestige of working

Reaping reward of perseveranceperseverance

in an air-conditioned offi ce, the retirement benefi ts, the promise of promotion and increment in salary were all dwarfs before his “giant” goal.

Adeyooye told Business Courage that he started the farming business not by conveniences but born out of the desire to follow a path that he strongly believes in- self empowerment. “I also like to take challenging jobs, so after fi fteen years of working with one of the pioneering Computer companies in the country, NCR Plc, I decided to quit and start my own business. I did the feasibility studies and I realized that I can live comfortably with one thousand birds,” he recalled in an interview.

Expectedly though, the journey was not as easy as he had predicted. He had hoped to start by raising 1,000 birds but there were turbulent moment on the way, so Adeyooye could only start with fi fty birds in one of the six fl ats in his apartment. Then, each day old chick cost sixty naira, making a total of three thousand naira with which he started with, that is aside other expenses in setting up the poultry and feeding the birds.

Like every other business, there was the fear of failure as many known livestock entrepreneurs were closing shops so fast at the time. Many of them were in debt and could no longer service their loans while others saw their long term savings and pension

going down the drain to the unfriendly disposition of the government to the agriculture sector at the time.

“Ultimately it was there, the fear that it might fail, especially when I look at other farmers around and see how they packed up between two to three years. Though I do ask myself then, will I also pack-up? But I was not discourage, rather, it propelled me to take it as a responsibility to fi nd out why they packed up from the business, what went wrong and at what point did they fail?” he said.

However, in the course of his enquiries, Adeyooye said that he realized that many of the poultry farmers then started the business without having enough knowledge and understanding of the industry. “They ventured into it because somebody was doing it or because they heard that someone was making money from it. It was more like a hobby to many or a way of keeping one busy to some. They lacked the requisite knowledge, especially on the risk involved in the business,” he said.

To him, many businesses fold up today because the owner

He left a supposedly high paying job in one of the pioneer computer companies then, NCR Plc, after about fifteen years of diligent service to plunge into livestock farming at a time when agriculture was considered a job for the never-do-wells. With a determination to make a success out of his entrepreneurial desire, he brushed aside criticisms from friends and families who could not understand why he left the comfort and serenity of a highbrow office for the filth and stench of a poultry farm. Today, however, the poultry business which Sunday Adeyooye started with just fifty birds in one of the six flats in his apartment has grown so well that it has become a money spinning venture for him and also, a veritable source of employment for many

By Abiodun Alade

Managing cash is basic to the success of all business but this could be a bit of struggle for many businesses from sole proprietorship to large corporation. Why?

Business is dynamic and balancing the timing of unpredictable revenue against the predictable consumption of cash by fi xed expenses coupled with unpredictable variable expenses can create a cash fl ow crisis. An easy solution is to just borrow more money but that only pro-vides a short-term solution to what might be a chronic problem of reigning in expenses to the revenue that your business is producing.

Discussed hereunder are fi ve basic principles that can help you establish good business prac-tices that will allow you to keep abreast of your cash fl ow position and enable you to take neces-sary action and managed your cash successfully.

Revenue/expense budgetDevelop a budget that time phases your cash (expense) needs. This may need to be down to

the day (i.e. cash for payroll) and not just bucketed by month. This then helps you determine how much revenue you need to sell and then collect payment on in time to make payments. Review your budget with other business professionals to get their feedback as to its believability. Their initial comments may hurt but your still working on paper and not spending money. Stress your plan for corner conditions (low sales, unexpected expenses, delays in receivables) and understand how your budget may or may not respond under those conditions.

Collection of receivablesThe critical element in managing cash is to understand what collection obstacles may occur

that could delay the arrival of cash to pay for necessary expenses. A common mistake is not rec-ognizing that a (valuable) client may choose at their discretion to extend and delay payment. Hav-ing an effective collection process that is prepared to contact clients “prior” to the payment date to make sure that the client organization is scheduled to make payment and that nothing is amiss. Do not let this become a confl ict avoidance issue. Remember you are in business and the collec-tion process, done professionally, can be painless – most of the time!

Adeyooye

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Personal Finance

ThebuddingEntrepreneurs

BCBC

lacks adequate knowledge of the risk involved and how to tackle it. “There will be a time of challenge for any business. For instance, many in the husbandry business do fail because once they start making money in the business; they spend it without saving for the challenges that might come up. It is not ideal for you to take loan to tackle challenges in this business,” he said.

At the time he started, Adeyooye admitted that he had to nurture the fi fty birds with very little return on the investment. It was a real test of perseverance, dedication and commitment to his goal. It was as if the birds will not survive

and with many doubting his ability to make head way in the business, Adeyooye believed in his dream and stayed true to his goal because he was driven by the love for his job and the urge to meet the needs of others. “Some people came and told me that with this particular disease or the other, the farm will be wiped out and you will lose everything”.

Rather than get discouraged, he held on jealously to his dream and gave adequate care to the birds because “they are lives and the ability to keep them safe and healthy would determine the productivity and eventual return on my investment.”

Today, about 14 years after take-off, Adeyooye’s agro-business has grown so phenomenally. From 50 birds which he started with, he now has about six thousand birds and also runs thriving fi sh ponds to boast his income.

According to him, with the level which his agro-business has attained, what gives him joy and satisfaction is not the money he makes from the business but the fact that the little seed he sowed over fourteen years ago is now a source of income and livelihood to many-starting from his immediate employees who are youth and might have resulted into heinous act if not for the opportunity. The customers of the farm majorly married women who depend on the sale of the products of the farm-fi sh and egg to put food on the table of their respective families and the suppliers of the materials he make use of in the day to day running of the farm, whose business might suffer loss without patronage.

To Adeyooye, starting small and growing it big is the best way to go in the livestock business because according to him, taking loan might be detrimental due to the long gestation period of the business. The cornerstone of his growth is his love for the job he is doing so he can withstand the perceived “fi lth” in the business.

From his experience, the Chief Executive Offi cer of Sun Ados Farm says would-be-entrepreneur need to love what they do and persevere. “I chose farming because of my love for it and that is what every entrepreneur needs to have. They must love what they are doing, otherwise, when challenges come or the business did not go as they had expected, they will quit. Your fi rst priority should not be how to make money from the business but how to grow it. Then you must be dedicated to what you are doing and committed to its goal. Dedication and commitment involve you learning more and more about the business every day,” he said.

Adeyooye said that it amazes people the fact that he reads journals, manuals and other books that deal with farming. “They thought that it is not necessary but you need to constantly update yourself. And every entrepreneur must be hard working. The temptation not to be is always there because you are the boss but if you don’t resist that temptation, the business might crumble in no distant time. You must ensure that you are putting in your best to the business and the place of God cannot be wish away. You must rely on Him,” he said.

Importance of NoToo often, we are hungry for business or excited about

a new client and make allowances, become too aggres-sive in pricing or scheduling a project, or committing to a poorly defi ned project. The end result is that you devalue the value that you offer the customer. What you rational-ize as a good concession at the time to get the order makes it a costly product/project to deliver. Because of the over commitment you consume opportunity and delivery time on a low margin piece of business that may end up becom-ing a collection problem when other business was available

that would have come in with full margin and paid on time.

Negotiate ExpensesA number one priority is to minimize your expenses by ef-

fective purchasing. When you need something in your busi-ness, remember that there are all kinds of ways of purchasing it – at different prices. Online auction sites can be very effective in reducing the cost of a business item by over half the local street price. Used equipment is also a great way to conserve cash. That approach may be a problem for you or a few of your employees using something that is refurbished or shows signs of wear but still has a useful life left but it protects cash. Tough negotiating on recurring costs (rent, advertising, etc.) is basic to containing cost and relieving pressure on cash fl ow.

Cash fl ow dashboardDoing all of the above does not get you to a point where you

are through. Managing cash fl ow is a daily discipline. How severe your cash fl ow situation is determines the intensity in which you monitor key performance indicators (KPI’s) or met-rics. If you are in good shape, then it may be as simple as monitoring incoming orders, shipments and deposits. If you are on a roller coaster then you may need to include watching each receivable, bank balance, when you pay payroll (even yourself), what your payable situation is, etc. Keep a dashboard active so that you can always dial it up or down when you need it. Creat-ing it during a crisis is not easy to do.

The whole concept of branding is foreign to many small businesses. They view it as something that only matters in the ivory towers of global corporations.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Branding is all about making your business memorable, and it’s the small business rather than the big one that’s likely to get lost in the shuffl e.

Here are fi ve core concepts that small business owners should know about branding.

Repetition and consistency are paramountAny parent knows that when you say something once it sel-

dom sinks in. And, parents who send mixed messages confuse the child ... and perhaps themselves! The same dynamics apply to branding: the market needs to see the same imagery and the same message again and again and again.

Sales reps can undermine your consistencyEven in large organizations, sales representatives tend

to develop their own way of talking about the company they represent. However, if every rep tells a different story, your customer base will ultimately have many different impressions of what your business does. This may cause customers and prospects to overlook key products and services -- and per-haps, look for them elsewhere.

More than just a logoEvery business should have a logo, but just as important

are a consistent colour scheme for the website and brochures, a strong tagline, and a consistent set of talking points for sales and marketing communication. Branding should dive deeper into the details still, in terms of consistent font styles, product/service descriptions, item numbers, and any other data and imagery customers see.

Far more than window dressingFar from it: Effective branding refl ects and projects the core

values and key differentiators of your business. A strong brand tells customers what you stand for and why they should buy from you. Are you the cheapest? The best quality? The most reliable? The most innovative? Your imagery and messaging must get to the heart of what you do.

Branding must be focusedContinuing on the previous point, you must confi ne your

branding to a few critical concepts. No amount of branding expertise can communicate that you’re the cheapest, best quality, most reliable and the most innovative. The more you dilute your message, the harder it is to remember and the less important it sounds. This is counterintuitive for sales people and small business owners who feel compelled to tell the whole company story every time they have the fl oor.

What small business owners should know about branding

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National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013 A14 30 Business CourageCourage

To say that change is com-ing to the enterprise is like saying the sun will rise in

the east tomorrow. But even while change has been a con-stant factor in data infrastruc-ture since the fi rst mainframe was deployed, it seems that both the pace and the scope of changes taking place today are knocking on the very pillars of IT, threatening to remake the entire industry into something completely unrecognizable in a few short years.

Indeed, the very notion of what is and is not the enterprise seems very much in the air as virtualization and the cloud spread responsibility for data infrastructure across multiple independent organizations that could conceivably reside on op-posite sides of the globe. At the same time, new technologies like SSDs and high-speed, uni-fi ed networking are starting to tear down much of what is con-sidered to be “the data centre” to the point that the very role of IT as an enterprise asset is starting to come into question.

The drivers behind all of this are the increasingly sophisticat-ed demands of the user. Where workers were once content to engage in data environments for simple communications and number crunching, the norm these days is a highly collab-orative, always-on experience in which the entire relationship between individual and work environment is defi ned by the level of access to IT resources. And that means if you don’t have the means to accommo-date user needs, they will sim-ply go out on their own and get them.

“Cloud computing and social networking are two key driv-ers of change in the current IT landscape,” said Michael Keen, vice president of presales at management and automation system developer ASG Software. “These drivers are forcing the hands of many IT executives to come up with a strategy, and a way to execute against that strategy, to drive agility and fl exibility in their infrastructure so they can provide a quick and effi cient way for IT to adapt to these changes. Traditional en-terprise IT models have always emphasized an opposite view - that change is not the norm, but the exception. However, in today’s current IT landscape, rapid change is the norm and IT must evolve their enterprise models, people, processes and technology to acknowledge this shift.”

The changing face of InformationInformation TechnologyBy Arthur Cole

The challenge, however, is to adapt to these changing en-vironments quickly enough to keep pace with user expecta-tions, but not too quickly so that the new systems and archi-tectures are left obsolete before their full value can be realized.

“Being able to adapt to change is critical to any organization’s success, so it is imperative that (IT) develop a standards-based framework that leverages best-of-breed technologies and com-ponents to create a new level of

integration between business processes and IT,” Keen said. “In addition, IT needs to build their new organization with four fundamental ideals in mind; simplifi cation, standardization, modularity and integration. By applying these ideals they can lay the groundwork for an in-frastructure that will meet the demands of their customers, business partners, external customers, etc.

Fortunately, at the same time that demand for increased col-

laboration and data fl exibility is rising, IT has gained access to a highly dynamic and imminently scalable infrastructure that ca-ters to exactly the kind of build-up/tear-down environment that rapid change requires. In the cloud, software, platforms and even infrastructure are de-livered as services that can be deployed, re-arranged and de-commissioned without the cost or commitment of traditional enterprise architecture.

“Cloud infrastructures of-

fer secure extranets that enter-prises can leverage to securely manage collaboration between employees, departments, con-tractors, and customers/ven-dors, without requiring remote access into the corporate fi re-wall,” said Guy Marion, vice president and general manager of CollabNet Cloud Services. “Cloud services typically provide deeper, more specialized ser-vices that collaborative teams can use to work more effi cient-ly. These include fl exibility to

Platform ArchitecturesOne of the most signifi cant trends identifi ed in the report

fi nds that the age of “viewing everything through an application lens is coming to an end.” Instead, platform architectures will be selected primarily to cope with soaring volumes of data and the complexity of data management, not for their ability to sup-port applications.

The tried and true relational database will not go away, but it will soon start to make way for other types of databases – streaming databases, for instance – that mark a signifi cant departure from what IT departments and business users have relied on for decades.

Social platformsThe report also predicts the evolution of social media into

social platforms. This means company websites may no longer be the fi rst port of call for customers. This has the potential to disrupt the way companies conduct business, posing new chal-lenges – and opportunities – for IT.

For example, “social identities” – based on the rich history of information that individuals leave in social networks – will become much more valuable to businesses than the traditional and isolated information they get when an individual registers on their corporate website.

Cloud computingAccenture also sees a new conversation emerging around

cloud computing, which will become so pervasive that the term itself becomes superfl uous. According to the report, hybrid

clouds – software-as-a-service (SaaS) and platform-as-a-service (PaaS) in combination with internal applications – will “cement IT’s role as a driver of business growth.”

The focus will shift from simple infrastructure solutions to de-veloping cloud strategies that deliver increased functionality and fl exibility using a mix of public and private cloud-based applica-tion and platform services. While many challenges remain, cloud is nonetheless poised to change the face of enterprise computing.

Data securityThe fortress mentality, in which all IT has to be architected to

be foolproof, is giving way to a security architecture that responds proportionately to threats when and where they happen.” As a result, the role of people in data security will decline, replaced by automated capabilities that detect, assess, and respond immedi-ately.

Data privacyIndividual privacy will take centre stage as a result of in-

creased government regulation and policy enforcement. The report concludes: “We expect that leading players will develop superior levels of understanding, enterprise-wide, about the distinctions between being a data processor – broadly handling the personal data of others – versus being a data controller, thus lowering the risks of unwitting breaches or privacy regulations and perceptions of privacy breakdowns.”

AnalyticsCompanies that continue to view analytics as a simple exten-

Trends driving the future of IT

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TechnotipsTechnotips

BC

BC

Information TechnologyTechnology

spin up new users and projects on demand, access to seam-lessly integrated services and workfl ows across geographies and departments, a consumer-friendly user experience, and granular visibility and data ac-cess controls.”

All true, but the question is whether the cloud can provide the kind of user experience that knowledge workers demand. Remember: The people who rely on IT to get their jobs done don’t really care how it all happens,

so long as it meets their expec-tations. And as architectures become more distributed, the challenge to maintain response times, service levels and overall performance grows.

That’s part of the reason many enterprises are shoring up their WAN capabilities to such a high degree. With appli-cations sometimes housed miles away from users, the distinction between LAN performance and WAN performance is starting to blur.

sion of business intelligence will be “severely underestimat-ing analytics’ potential to move the needles on the business.” Among other failings, traditional BI does not take advantage of the wealth of unstructured data that is now available. IT leaders will need to work closely with business leaders to identify where analytics can be leveraged effectively, as well as the proper mix of services required to optimize analytics capabilities across the enterprise.

ArchitectureInformation technology is evolving from a world that is serv-

er-centric to one that is service-centric. Companies are quickly moving away from monolithic systems that were wedded to one or more servers toward fi ner-grained, reusable services distrib-uted inside and outside the enterprise. The goal: to decouple infrastructure, systems, applications, and business processes from one another.

User experienceToday, business process design is driven by the need for

optimization and cost reduction. Tomorrow it will be driven by the need to create superior user experiences that help to boost customer satisfaction. Great user experiences will require more layered approaches than what is typical today. As such, applica-tion design will be a multidisciplinary exercise: Typically handled today by IT architects and business owners, tomorrow it will in-volve optimization from the perspective of the process actor, with the emphasis on simplicity and on removing ineffi ciencies.

*Culled from IT Business Edge

“There really are two worlds in the cloud: the internal and external clouds,” said Jean-Paul Bergeaux, CTO of WAN optimi-zation fi rm SwishData. “Mature WAN optimization products are already in a good position to take advantage of these shifts in the IT landscape to an internal cloud. To make sure they are fi rmly in place to take advan-tage of the external clouds, WAN optimization companies need to have a tie-in to the distribution networks that bring cloud prod-ucts to the customers.”

None of the changes that have taken place so far are shaping up to be as radical as that affecting internal storage infrastructure. From consolida-tion to on-line cloud services to the advent of solid-state tech-nology, storage looks set for a major makeover in the coming decade.

The most signifi cant change is likely to take place in stor-age networking, so much so that some are already predict-ing an end to the SAN as we know it. As Flash storage ca-pacity increases, the ability to place large amounts of storage inside or right next to server en-closures promise to both lower costs and complexity of storage infrastructure and vastly im-prove I/O for mission-critical applications.

Companies like Nutanix are already devising integrated server/storage clusters built around PCIe networking that provide low-cost and easily scal-able data infrastructure. The company’s Complete Cluster consists of 2U systems outfi tted with up to 1.2 TB of Flash mem-ory from Fusion-io and up to 20 TB of traditional SATA storage, with no SAN to worry about.

“We have a healthy respect for SANs for what they achieved in the last 15 years,” said Nuta-nix CEO Dheeraj Pandey. “But there are winds of change due to virtualization, Big Data, and NoSQL. SANs were not built for any one of these. They are now past their prime. If any-thing, their presence is ugly when force-fi tted. They are the grand old daddy of storage that deserve respect, as long as they know that they are now ‘a’ piece - not ‘the’ piece - in the bigger storage puzzle of cloud comput-ing and big data.”

Few enterprises are willing to undergo such a radical trans-formation just yet, however. That may change, though, as new organizations rise up with-out all the baggage of traditional enterprise infrastructure and begin weighing the costs and benefi ts of the cloud vs. bricks-and-mortar facilities. When it comes to provisioning new re-source sets for cloud computing and other advanced architec-tures, it’s hard to argue against low cost, easy deployability and virtually no management and maintenance responsibilities.

Omobola Johnson, Minister for Communication Technology

Tips on how to increase Your Smartphones Battery Life

Smartphones are used by pretty much everyone now, though they’ve really taken off in the last few years. They all come with large brilliant displays such as

WiFi, impressive cameras and super quick processors. How-ever, because they have all these brilliant features, they in no time really drain down your battery, especially with any-thing more than moderate usage. Most people who have these smartphones are made to go about with battery char-gers or at times with extra batteries.

To a large extent, it is very obvious that most of you have similar problems with your smartphones/iPhones battery life.

However, to enjoy your smartphones, here are a few quick tips on how to increase it and ensure your battery isn’t fl at when you need it most.

1. Turn down the brightness This one is probably fairly obvi-

ous. Smartphones have very large displays, which are very clear and bright. However if you are brows-ing the web or watching a video on them, it is going to drain the battery in no time. The best thing you can do is to reduce your screen bright-ness in your display settings.

2. Turn off Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPSA lot of the time you are out of range of a wireless hot

spot, but your phone is constantly searching for one to con-nect to. If you turn your Wi-Fi off, your phone will stop look-ing for one that is not there. Bluetooth is also a big drain on your battery, only turn it on when you actually need it, the same goes for GPS which really sucks the life out of your battery.

3. Kill Unneeded Apps Because smartphones are getting

quicker all the time, it means that we can multitask. While this is great and practical, it also draws on your battery constantly having all these programs open and running in the background. A lot of the time you don’t know it, you actually have to exit an app properly for it to stop running, or sometimes you’ll need to download a task killer to kill them. The latest version of Android and

iOS both come with built in task killers to manage this prob-lem, but if you don’t have a task killer download one from your app store.

4. Turn Off SyncOne of the greatest things about smartphones is that

they are constantly feeding you new information. They could be pulling in your latest emails, news or Facebook notifi ca-tions. However this means the phone is constantly working and draining down it’s battery. The best thing you can do is to turn off the automatic sync and then just sync manually when you want to. Failing that you could always see if your phone has settings to set the sync to only occur every few hours.

5. Get A Power Saver App Before I never believed in these pow-

er saver apps, but I’ve recently tried out one called Easy Battery Saver. This great little app has really improved my battery life. It has a few different modes, depending on how badly you need to save your battery life. It works basically by automatically doing all the steps I’ve outlined above and more. However it’s intelligent and does it’s best not to ruin your phones performance. It’s defi nitely worth having a look at if you want to improve your battery life. (This app’s for Android, but there could be similar apps available for iOS)

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NCC lifts ban on promotions on Airtel, Globacom, EtisalatStories by Kunle Azeez

The Nigerian Communica-tions Commission (NCC)

has lifted the ban placed on promotions on Airtel, Globa-com and Etisalat networks, Tony Ojobo, the NCC Director of Public Affairs, has said.

Ojobo stated in Lagos on Friday that the lifting of the ban was because the three service providers met the regulatory body’s December 2012 Key Performance Indi-cators (KPIs).

Ojobo, however, said that the ban placed on promo-tions on MTN network was still in force. ‘’The ban on MTN still remains in force until the KPIs are met. We expect that the networks will all continue to provide good Quality of Service (QoS),’’ he said.

It would be recalled that the NCC, on November 12, 2012, placed the ban on all promotions by telecom opera-tors as well as lotteries on the GSM networks.

Ojobo then said that the ban, which took immediate effect, would remain in force until the commission decided otherwise.

He said the ban was introduced because NCC was inundated with many complaints from consumers and stakeholders against the various promotions offered by the operators.

NGO drives $15m software development initiative in Nigeria

Information Technology Developers Entrepreneur-

ship Accelerator (iDEA) has sped off activities towards the implementation of a $15 million software incubation scheme being supported by the Ministry of Communica-tion Technology.

Speaking at a media roundtable recently, the Programme Manager of iDEA,

Helen Anatogu, said through the programme, iDEA would create and export locally-de-veloped and relevant software applications.

iDEA is a not-for-profi t organisation founded this year, whose primary purpose is to accelerate the development of the software industry in Nige-ria by nurturing and helping Nigerian software technology businesses.

According to Anatogu, who explained the various strate-gies being put in place and the state of activities, said iDEA provides essential support to entrepreneurs to build software skills, solutions and business-es critical to their success.

According to her, entre-preneurs accepted into iDEA Centres have access to physi-cal work space, shared facili-ties, training, business services as well as access to capital, stressing that iDEA is partner-ing with technology companies to offer training and access to software development tools across a number of platforms.

“Entrepreneurs will also have access to guidance from our network of mentors,” she said.

On the support so far re-ceived from the government, Anatogu said, the Federal Gov-ernmnet through the Ministry of Communication Technology, had supported the scheme with N500m seed capital, say-ing that an independent fund manager hired for the scheme had also disclosed a $1.2 mil-lion support fund to run the software project.

“More fund would also be sourced from angel investors and other willing investors, through whom we expect to realise the rest of the $15 mil-lion,’ she added.

Noting that the programme is targeted at students, starts-up and software development companies, Anatogu disclosed that two centres in Lagos and Calabar would soon be com-missioned where facilities had been installed for prospective members of iDEA.

She listed the various ser-vices provided to the benefi cia-ries of the scheme to include provision of subsidized busi-ness and technical training, access to software development tools at no cost and use of fa-cilities and computing resourc-

es for development purposes.Others are mentoring, as-

sistance with markerting and production, access to fi nance and support from incubation till maturity, among others.

“Specifi cally on training, we are in talks with Lagos Busi-ness School to help provide training on business manage-ment for the incubatees.

Speaking in the same vein, Vice President of the governing board of iDEA and Second Vice President, Institute of Software Practitioners of Nigeria, Mr. Pius Okigbo, who listed the names of other board mem-bers, said software remains a faster avenue to economic development.

On the structure of iDEA, another executive of iDEA, Chinedu Okoli, noted that the programme operates an orbital structure with a strong core at the centreand orbits, where individual incubation centre operates under the umbrella of the programme.

Cashless: E-PPAN set for mobilisation in six other states

The Electronic Payment Providers Association of Ni-

geria (E-PPAN) is set to support the Central Bank of Nigeria in mobilising the masses for the second phase of the cashless economy policy which the apex bank plans to extend to six other states come July, this year.

The six states include Ogun, Kano, Abia, Rivers, Anambra as well as the the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.

E-PPAN has always been at the forefront of keying into any e-payment initiatives in the country where it engages in mass literacy and mobiisation for such schemes.

Chief Executive Offi cer of E-PPAN, Onajite Regha, disclosed this during the unveiling of E-Payment Review Magazine, a quarterly publication by E-PPAN.

According to her, “We would be going to six states with the CBN to mobilise people to embrace the ideas of cashless economy which the CBN is propagating.”

In assessing the success of the scheme so far in Lagos, Regha said the scheme had been impressive but noted that the connectivity to Point of Sales terminals so far deployed in the country should be im-proved.

According to her, there was a need for for an industry collaboration that will ensure improved connectivity to Point of Sales terminals deployed to drive the nascent cashless economy in Nigeria.

While enthusing that the number of PoS terminals so far deployed in the cashless

economy has hit 150, 000, a fi gure that has surpassed the projected, 40, 000 before the edn of 2012, Regha said connectivity to the machines remained a challenge.

She said: “The cashless economy initiative is record-ing success and has continued to impact positively on the Nigerians but the issue of con-nectivity to the PoS deployed remained a major challenge.

“By the time we started the Cashless Lagos scheme, the projection of the regulator was that by December, 2012, we would have recorded 40, 000 PoS terminal deployment. But available data showed that we now have about 150, 000 PoS machines in Lagos.

“However, the question is: how many of the PoS are work-ing? So, that is where I believe we need to work on. We need to increase better connectivity to these terminals to encour-age the merchants and the consumers to use the devices for seamless payment transac-tions,” she said.

Speaking on the maiden edition of the E-Payment Review Magazine, Regha said before now, the magazine was published quarterly as an insert in one of the national dailies.

According to her, “From inception, the magazine is designed to be the voice of the e-payment industry and also a platform to showcase the in-novativeness of our members, celebrate their achievements while setting the agenda for a geometric leap and develop-ment in the industry.

“As the e-payment frontier continues to widen and de-mand more roles, we deemed it fi t to expand the size and scope of the publication to capture fully and represent the growth in the industry.”

The stand-alone publication provides readers with informa-tive, educative and exciting news and features, profi ling all developments in the industry backed up with research statis-tics and empirical analysis.

Meanwhile, Regha has restated E-PPAN’s efforts to create a favourable payment landscape in Nigeria, as it strives to meet its overreaching goal of enhancing institutional frameworks and processes for a robust and effective e-pay-ment in the country.

NIGCOMSAT will take Nigerian economy to next level- FG

The Federal Government has said that the Nige-

rian Communications Satel-lite Limited’s facilities would hep in nation building in the country while urging oragin-sations to leverage the satellite facilities’ potential for their operations.

Permanent Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Communi-cations Technology, Dr Henry Akpan, made the observation during a recent visist to the NIGCOMSAT headquartered.

Amazed by what he saw and wondered why this state-of-the-art technology has not been properly harnessed for national development, Akpan said that the NIGCOMSAT has what it takes to take the na-tion to the next level.

The Permanent Secretary stated this while on an offi cial familiarization tour of the NIGCOMSAT Limited facilities and infrastructure recently in Abuja.

In a statement signed by the Head, Corporate Com-munications, NIGCOMSAT, Sonny Aragba-Akpore, the permanent secretary said he was impressed with what he saw at satellite company’s facility site in Abuja. “Beau-tiful things they are doing here. Very impressed, very impressed with what they are doing here. This is not only a process but rather we are see-ing outcomes and hope it will impact on the lives of Nigeri-ans,” he said.

Akpan, in company of directors in the ministry, was elated when they were taken round the facilities in the complex by the Manag-ing Director of the company, Timasaniyu Ahmed-Rufai and members of his management team. “I am very impressed, we are seeing beautiful things here and the outcome of these efforts and hope it will impact on the lives of Nigerians. Gov-ernment should look inward.”

The tour took Akpan and his team around, from the Micro-Electronic Centre (MEC) to the Satellite Control Centre (SCC) where they were shown the dynamics in satel-lite technology operations and the telemetry control and were later taken to the Network Operating Centre (NOC) where billing process was demonstrated.

At the Direct-To-Home (DTH) Centre, the NIGCOM-SAT boss clearly stated that the company has what it takes to digitalise the en-tire Nigerian Broadcasting industry in the shortest time possible in order to actualize the digitilisation deadline of January 1, 2015.

Ojobo

Anatogu

Regha

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Page 33: Monday, April 15, 2013

of the preceding week. Fifty-nine equi-ties depreciated in price higher than 35 equities of the preceding week, while 117 equities remained constant like that of the preceding week.

Full suspensionFull suspension was placed on the

shares of Crusader Plc prior to delist-ing of Crusader Plc and listing of the Scheme merger between Custodian and Allied Insurance Plc and Crusader Plc shares. The Full suspension took effect from Monday, April 8, 2013.

DelistingFollowing the Scheme of merger be-

tween Flour Mills of Nigeria Plc with Ni-gerian Bag Manufacturing

Company Plc, Nigerian Bag Manufac-turing Company Plc was delisted from the Daily Offi cial List of The Exchange on 11th April 2013.

Supplementary ListingA total of 50,893,281 shares were

added to the outstanding shares of Flour Mills of Nigeria Plc being resultant shares from the Flour Mills of Nigeria Plc merger with Nigerian Bag Manufacturing Company Plc on 11th April 2013.

National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net Monday, April 15, 2013 A17 33Business CourageCourage

The Stock Market last week

BC

A turnover of 2.191 billion shares worth of N24.942 billion in 33,100 deals were transacted last week

on the fl oor of The Exchange in contrast to a total of 1.604 billion shares valued at N19.088 billion that exchanged hands the previous week in 26,264 deals.

At the close of trading activities for the week, the Financial Services sector (mea-sured by turnover volume) accounted for 1.599 billion shares valued at N15.013 billion exchanged hands by investors in 20,976 deals. The Information and Com-munication Technology (ICT) sector fol-lowed in the activity chart with 167.324 million shares valued at N357.174 mil-lion traded in 47 deals.

Trading in the top three equities namely Access Bank Plc, Diamond Bank Plc and IHS Plc (measured by turnover

volume) accounted for 584.604 million shares worth N3.635 billion exchanged by investors in 3,165 deals contributing 26.68 per cent to the total equity turn-over volume recorded during the week.

In the course of the week, 510 units of NewGold Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) valued at N1.220 million were executed in seven deals compared with a total of 169 units valued at N404, 900.00 trans-acted the previous week in seven deals.

Also, 3,310 units of FGN bonds val-ued at N4.049 million were traded dur-ing the week in 20 deals in contrast to 1,700 units valued at N2.057 million transacted last week in 17 deals.

Index movementThe NSE All-Share Index declined by

787.23 points or 2.30 per cent to close

on Friday at 33,514.14 while the mar-ket capitalization of the listed equities on the mainboard decreased by 2.41 per cent to close at N10.713 trillion. Also, the NSE 30 Index depreciated by 38.53 points or 2.35 per cent to close at 1,600.12.

Other NSE sectoral indices that de-preciated during the week include; NSE Consumer Goods, NSE Banking, NSE Oil and Gas, NSE-Lotus II and NSE In-dustrial Goods by 0.19 per cent, 5.36 per cent, 1.40 per cent, 0.13 per cent and 1.12 per cent respectively. However, NSE Insurance appreciated by 3.86 per cent.

Summary of price movementTwenty equities appreciated in prices

during the week lower than 45 equities

TOP 10 PRICE GAINERS:Company Open Close Gain (N) % ChangeWAPIC INSURANCE PLC 0.97 1.26 0.29 29.90 IPWA PLC 0.63 0.76 0.13 20.63 MANSARD INSURANCE PLC 2.30 2.58 0.28 12.17 UNIVERSITY PRESS PLC. 4.50 4.95 0.45 10.00 OKOMU OIL PALM PLC. 95.00 104.0 0 9.00 9.47 JOHN HOLT PLC. 1.71 1.86 0.15 8.77 CAP PLC 37.10 40.00 2.90 7.82 ROYAL EXCHANGE PLC. 0.66 0.71 0.05 7.58 JULIUS BERGER NIG. PLC. 51.10 54.49 3.39 6.63 ETI 14.00 14.90 0.90 6.43

TOP 10 PRICE LOSERS:Company Open Close Loss (N) % ChangeA.G. LEVENTIS NIGERIA 1.61 1.07 -0.54 -33.54 NEIMETH INTERNATIONAL 0.98 0.73 -0.25 -25.51 ABC TRANSPORT PLC 0.88 0.71 -0.17 -19.32 ETERNA PLC. 3.51 2.85 -0.66 -18.80 COSTAIN (W A) PLC. 2.66 2.16 -0.50 -18.80 U B A PLC 8.12 6.60 -1.52 -18.72 AFRICA PRUDENTIAL REG. 1.90 1.55 -0.35 -18.42 AIRLINE SERVICES AND LOG. 4.75 3.90 -0.85 -17.89 TRANSCORP 1.43 1.20 -0.23 -16.08 ACCESS BANK PLC. 10.50 8.84 -1.66 -15.81

Two-third of the Nigeria’s foreign exchange demand in the fourth quarter of 2012 was injected

into the importation of visible goods, a clear indication to the level which the nation’s real sector has dwindled.

This revelation was contained in the recent External Sector Development Report of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), which shows that $6.42 billion or 62.8 per cent of foreign exchange demand was utilised on visible goods.

The report, which highlights major external sector developments in the fourth quarter of 2012, compared with the third quarter of 2012 and fourth quarter of 2011, also reveals policy challenges that require the attention of CBN’s management.

Analysis of the utilisation shows that the importation of industrial oil, food and manufactured products was 28.3 per cent, 27.3 per cent, 19.2 per cent and 18.0 per cent, respectively.

Further analysis also reveals that $3.80 billion or 37.2 per cent was expended on services, which

comprised, fi nancial- $2.97 billion or 78.1 per cent; business- $0.23 billion or 6.1 per cent; transportation- $0.29 billion or 7.7 per cent; while “others” accounted for the balance.

The report notes that foreign exchange utilisation of 19.2 per cent for food importation was high and suggests the need for adequate funding of the agricultural sector and vigorous pursuit of the fi nancial inclusion programme.

“The persistent defi cit in the services account calls for proactive policy actions targeted at the development of the services sub-sector and investment in human capital through vocational and technical education. The current attention being given to the agricultural sector should be sustained in order to reduce high import bills on food items. The major threats to external sector stability in the medium term are: the volatile nature of the short-term capital infl ows, slowly rising external debts and non- diversifi cation of the economy,” the report said.

Nigeria’s forex demand compounds, Real sector woes

Dangote Group, Nigeria’s biggest listed company, has begun talks

to raise a debut syndicated loan for $3.5 billion to fund fertiliser and oil refi nery projects, two sources with knowledge of the situation said.

The seven-year loan for Nigeria’s biggest cement producer is split equally between the country and international lenders via lead banks Guaranty Trust Bank, Standard Bank and Standard Chartered, the sources said.

International lenders are weighing up the risk associated with a relatively long-term jumbo loan for Dangote being a fi rst time borrower.

Dangote’s position as a leading

Dangote Group to raise $3.5bn syndicated loan

Dangote Cement Company

company in one of Africa’s more economically stable countries is expected to appeal to deal-hungry emerging market lenders who faced a shortage of such sizeable loans in 2012.

“If any international banks want to make a new play for Africa then this is the deal to join,” one of the sources said.

Dangote forecasts a 38 per cent rise in net profi t to N81.5 billion for the fi rst quarter compared with a year earlier, it said in a fi ling with the Nigerian Stock Exchange in late December.

The company’s full-year results are expected shortly. BC

BC

Page 34: Monday, April 15, 2013

National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013 A18 34 Business CourageCourage

Behind d WheelsThis page is open to sponsorship

An interesting controversy is currently raging be-tween Ford Motor Com-

pany and Toyota over which of the automakers had the best sales across their various brands for 2012.

A research fi rm, R.L. Polk & Co. In its recent report said that Ford Motor Co. sold 1,020,410 Focus models worldwide last year with about a quarter of the sales made in the US, beating Toyota to the second position with its prime brand, Corolla recording sales of 872,774. US Focus sales rose 40 per cent in 2012, Ford said, while in China, Focus registrations -- a proxy for sales that’s often used in in-ternational markets -- rose 51 per cent. China was the best-selling market for the cars, ac-counting for more than a quar-ter of Focus sales globally.

Toyota is however contesting the report, stressing that Co-rolla remains the world’s best-selling car.

Toyota Motor Corp. said last week that its Corolla was the world’s top sell-ing car of 2012, con-tradicting ri-val Ford which claimed top spot for its Focus model.

Toyota’s Tokyo-based spokesman Ryo Sakai said the Japanese carmaker sold 1.16 million Corollas in 2012 and that “Toyota still sees the Corol-la as the world’s most popular car”. “The sales fi gure includes Corolla Sedan, which is over 90 per cent of the total volume, and the Corolla Altis, Corolla Axio, Corolla Wagon, Corolla Fielder and Corolla Rumion,” he said.

It does not include Corolla derivatives like the Auris, Auris Hybrid, Verso, E’z, Matrix, Sci-on xB and Rukus, which do not share the ‘Corolla’ name.

Polk however said that the F-series truck and Fiesta com-pact car, Ford had three of the 10 top-selling vehicles inter-

Top 10Top 10 best selling cars selling cars in 20122012

nationally. “Ford has been among the leaders in Eu-rope for a long time and the F o c u s a n d t h e F i -esta have traditionally done well there,” said Tom Libby, an analyst at Polk, adding that “resurgence in the US with passenger cars has helped Ford too.”

“The global ranking of F-Series really shows our strong position in this segment not just in the U.S., but also how F-Series compares on a global scale, relative to a number of vehicles that sell in every region of the world,” said Erich Merkle, Ford’s sales analyst.

The Zhiguang from Chinese automaker Wuling was the fourth-most-popular auto glob-ally, with sales of 768,870. It

is a van that sells mostly in Chi-

na.

T h e r e p o r t claimed t h a t Toyota Camry,

the best-s e l l i n g

passenger car in America, ranked fi fth

globally, with sales of 729,793. The Fiesta, a small compact was sixth with sales of 723,130, with less than 10 per cent sales in the U.S.

The Volkswagen Golf, ac-cording to Polk, was seventh with sales of 699,148 while Chevrolet’s Cruze was eighth with sales of 661,325.

Honda had the fi nal two cars on the list; both are also big sellers in the U.S. The Civic was ninth at 651,259 and the CR-V was 10th with sales of 624,982.

“Ford and GM, VW and Toy-ota are the global major play-ers,” Libby said. “They each have foundations in the three major regions, Asia, Europe and

the Americas.”

The rankingFord F-SeriesAccording to the report, the

number-one selling vehicle of 2012 is the Ford F-Series pick-up truck, which it claimed was so successful in America that its sales lead is monumental, compared to the Chevrolet Sil-verado.

In 2012, according to Polk’s report, 645,316 of F-Series were sold, a 10.3-per cent increase compared to 2011′s 584,917 fi gure. The F-Series was even a huge success in Canada, allow-ing Ford to become the fi rst au-tomaker to ever sell more than 100,000 trucks in the country.

Chevrolet SilveradoComing in second place

is the Chevrolet Silverado, a pickup that saw a slight 0.4 per cent increase in sales compared to 2011. In 2012, Polk says, 418,312 units of Silverados

were sold.

Toyota Camry The king of the mid-size se-

dans, the Toyota Camry lands in third place for 2012 and is the bestselling car on the list – the top two spots belong to pickup trucks. With 404,886 units sold in 2012, the Camry has quite the lead on its main competitors and looks to remain consistent for many more years to come. It’s hard to believe that any mid-size sedan will come and dethrone the Camry any-time soon, but the competition has defi nitely been stepping up to the plate in recent years.

Honda AccordAnother consistent mod-

el from Honda is the Accord, which was also redesigned for the 2013 model year, though that made its debut late in the year.

Regardless, the Accord’s sales were strong in 2012 with 331,872 units sold, also an im-pressive increase over its 2011

nally. “Ford hasamong the

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Ford-f-150

Chevrolet Silverado

Toyota Camry

Honda Accord

Honda Civic

Nissan Altima

Nissan hires former RAM CEONissan might be taking a serious run at the US light-duty

truck market when it unveils the next generation Titan.Previous reports suggest the truck will get new engines

and model options, but the Japanese brand made a quiet an-nouncement today that could tip plans to take on the Detroit 3 in their strongest segment.

Fred Diaz used to be the boss behind Chrysler’s Ram trucks, but Nissan announced at the weekend that he is fi lling a newly-created divisional vice president of sales and marketing posi-tion.

Nissan introduced the Titan in the 2004 model year and there hasn’t been much else to talk about since then. Sales are slow and the brand hasn’t made much of an effort to pit it against the Ram line, F-Series or other Detroit 3 workhorses.

Diaz worked at Chrysler for 24 years and could bring the right sort of marketing moxie to drive sales when Nissan launches its new truck.

Previous speculation suggests the new truck could come with three engine options instead of the single V8 currently of-fered. Still, Nissan has an uphill battle to fi ght with options like

the EcoBoost F-150 and the Ram 1500 offering up to 25 mpg on the highway with the V6. Next BMW X6 to be bigger, more aggressive

The BMW X6 is going to get bigger and more aggressive looking in its next generation. “We want to give our sporting models

a more individual look, further separating them visually from the more practical models in our line-up,” a source said.

Last week, the German maker unveiled its concept preview of the X4 ahead of its offi cial debut in Shanghai on April 21. In the release, the brand also said the concept is more than a look at what to expect from its heavily styled version of the X3. It’s also a preview of the entire X family.

Given that, it only makes sense for the X6 to have more ex-treme styling cues to separate it from the cheaper X5.

Toyota to pull out Matrix

It appears like the Toyota’s compact hatchback is not going to be around much longer, at least, in the North American market.Past reports suggest the Matrix is headed out to pasture and

an internal source familiar with the matter said that there will be

Page 35: Monday, April 15, 2013

National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net Monday, April 15, 2013 A19 35Business CourageCourage

Behind d Wheels

AutocareThis page is open to sponsorship

BC

What to do if your car has been recalled

BC

fi gure of 235,625. In 2011, it was the ninth-best selling vehicle of the year while in 2012; it skyrocketed up to claim fourth place on the list. It’ll be a surprise if the 2013 Honda Accord doesn’t do better this year.

Honda CivicDespite all the negative

press surrounding the 2012 Honda Civic, the popular mod-el continued to hold steady in sales moving 317,909 units last year. It is really a testament to the Civic nameplate how well it can perform on dealership lots, even though reviews of the vehi-cle was bad enough for the Jap-anese automaker to redesign it for the 2013 model year. In case anyone is curious, the Honda Civic sold a mere 221,235 units in 2011, marking a 43.7 per cent increase over 2011.

Nissan AltimaNissan debuted its new 2013

Altima at

t h e New York Auto Show last year, so its total sales fi gure is a mix of both 2012 and 2013 model years. With 302,934 units sold last year, the Altima actually fell a couple of spots compared to 2011 – though it’s likely to rise again this year giv-en its new model change. The Japanese automaker continues to hope that its improvements made to the 2013 Altima will help it trump the Toyota Cam-ry, though sales fi gures clearly shows it still has quite a bit of work to do.

RAM Trucks

RAM pickup trucks proved to be a viable

competitor in the mar-

ketplace l a s t y e a r , w i t h

293,363 units sold, marking a 19.9-per

cent increase c o m p a r e d to 2011′s 244,762 fi g-ure. The model re-mained con-

sistent howev-er, also coming in the same sev-

enth place spot in 2011. Toyota Corolla/Matrix No top 10 best-selling ve-

hicles list would be complete without the Toyota Corolla/Ma-trix. For years, the entry-level model from Toyota has been successful on the market, and 2012 was no exception with 290,947 units sold. It’s believed that the next-generation Corol-la will be making its debut soon and dramatic changes are ex-pected for Toyota’s best-selling model of all time.

Honda CR-V The Honda CR-V was also

refreshed for 2012 with updat-ed styling and technology. Es-sentially, it was everything good about the old CR-V, but in a better package. Unfortunately, it was more of an evolution than a revolution – but sometimes that’s better when it’s a popu-lar model like the CR-V. Last year, the Japanese automaker managed to sell 281,652 units – a huge increase compared to 2011′s 218,373 fi gure.

Ford EscapeComing in 10th place with

261,008 units sold is the Ford Escape which was updated for the 2013 model year. However, the 2013 Ford Escape will likely raise the bar because of its sleek new look and engine selection.

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If you fi nd out about a vehicle recall by reading a report in a newspaper or magazine, or on an automotive web site, don’t dash right down to the nearest dealership to demand immediate

satisfaction. Unless you are currently experiencing a serious safety problem, wait a while before proceeding. An offi cial notice should be coming by fi rst-class mail, directly from the manufacturer, who is allowed a “reasonable time” to make arrangements for any necessary repairs. If your vehicle is in fact actively showing signs related to a serious safety recall, defi nitely contact a dealer immediately.

The ProcessAs a result of several unpleasant incidents when information was

held back, automakers know the importance of admitting respon-sibility if a safety problem is discovered—and taking action swiftly. That doesn’t mean a dealership’s technicians are ready and waiting instantly, wrenches in hand.

Not only do engineers have to isolate the cause of the safety problem, they must determine how the repair can be made at deal-ership service departments. Essential parts have to be obtained and made available to the company’s dealers. Technicians might need specifi c instructions for remedying the safety defect.

Automakers know the importance of admitting responsibility if a safety problem is discovered—and taking action swiftly. When the manufacturer’s notice fi nally arrives by mail, it should specify exactly what you need to do to get your vehicle repaired. It should indicate how long the repair takes, evaluate the safety risk caused by the defect, and explain any potential hazards. Finally, the notice should include a number to call if any problems develop when trying to get the work done.

Manufacturers use state motor-vehicle records to determine reg-istered owners of the affected vehicles. Inevitably, some owners fail to receive their notices. If nothing arrives in a reasonable time, but you know a recall is taking place, you may have to take individual action.

First, take a look at the National Highway Traffi c Safety Ad-ministration’s web site. (This is the agency that administers safety recalls.) Look up the recall, searching by the make, model and year of your vehicle. Once you fi nd the report, it should state when the notifi cations are (or were) supposed to be mailed. Recall reports can also be obtained over the phone by calling NHTSA.

Remember, not every recall affects every version of a given model. The NHTSA report often includes one or more limiting factors, indi-cating that the recall applies only to certain examples of a particular make and model. It might affect only cars with an automatic trans-mission, or with a specifi c accessory installed.

Take note of the NHTSA Campaign Identifi cation Number. If a question ever comes up, or a dealer’s service department has trouble fi nding information about a recall, it pays to be able to point to its offi cial number.

Then, if a fair amount of time has passed and you still have not received any notifi cation, contact the manufacturer at the phone number given in the NHTSA report. Have details about your car at hand, including the 17-character Vehicle Identifi cation Number (VIN) and the date you purchased the vehicle.

When it’s time to get your vehicle fi xed, any dealer selling that brand of car or truck is required to do to the repair if asked. Fur-thermore, federal law mandates that the repair be free of charge. Call the service department to schedule a repair visit, stating clearly that this involves a recall.

Don’t be surprised if the folks in a strange dealership’s service department fail to jump for joy upon learning of your arrival. Just because a dealership is required to do recall (and warranty) work on any vehicle that shows up, the people in charge don’t have to like it. If you have regular maintenance work done at the dealership where you bought the car, they just might be happier to see you if a recall develop later.

Occasionally, a recall has no repair specifi ed. This doesn’t mean the matter is forgotten—just delayed. The manufacturer’s engineers have isolated the problem, but haven’t come up with a suitable remedy yet. You’ll need to check back later to see what progress has been made.

ExceptionsDo the manufacturer and its dealers have to fi x every single

recall that’s issued? There is one important exception: When the ve-hicle is more than eight years old when the defect is determined, the recall rules don’t apply and repairs are not free. In addition, if you had the car fi xed yourself before a recall was issued; the manufac-turer is not obligated to provide reimbursement.

an offi cial announcement coming in fi ve weeks about the car’s future in North America.

This is a natural time for the Matrix to make its exit. It’s based on the Corolla, which is due for a complete redesign previewed by the Furia concept during this year’s Detroit Auto Show. Given the poor overall demand for the hatchback, it would seem unlikely for Toyota to create a new version.

Plans still aren’t offi cial, but that announcement will probably include the Matrix exiting the US market. The same source sug-gested that demand in Canada could be strong enough to keep it in Canadian dealer showrooms.

Sales have been limping along in the US. In fact, Toyota doesn’t even include it as a separate vehicle in charts detailing individual vehicle unit sales.

Toyota fi rst sold the Matrix during the 2003 model year and at the time it was also offered through GM as the Pontiac Vibe, al-though that car died along with General Motors’ subsidiary.

Last year, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration’s American Automobile Labeling Act report showed that the Matrix had the highest percentage of American parts: 95 per cent. That fi gure dropped to 65 per cent this year. BC

Page 36: Monday, April 15, 2013

National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013 A20 36 Business CourageCourage

Still on the public pension debacle

BCBC

The market indices of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) on Friday increased marginally after three

consecutive days of decline.The two indicators increased by 0.14

per cent as a result of marginal gains posted by some blue chips.

Consequently, the All-Share Index rose by 47.38 points to close at 33,514.14 against the 33,466.76 posted on Thursday.

Also, the market capitalisation appre-ciated by N15 billion to close at N10.71 trillion from the N10.69 trillion recorded on Thursday.

Unilever recorded the highest price gain of 75k to close at N52.79 per share.

GTBank came second on the gain-ers’ table, appreciating by 70k to close at N22.49, while NAHCO rose by 55k to close at N6.13 per share.

Forte Oil rose by 49k to close at N14.14, while FBN Holding grew by 31k to close at N18.83 per share.

NSE market indices record marginal growthConversely, Nigerian Breweries topped

the losers’ chart, losing N2.05 to close at N162 per share.

It was followed by Okomu Oil Palm with a loss of N2 to close at N104, while Mobil Oil lost N1.50 to close at N121.50 per share.

Guinness dipped by N1 to close at N261, while Lafarge Wapco lost 90k to close at N83 per share.

ETI drove the volume of shares trad-ed, accounting for 53.31 million shares worth N820.11 million.

Zenith Bank followed on the activity chart with 38.29 million shares valued at N832.82 million, while Access Bank ac-counted for 32.45 million shares worth N285.29 million.

In all, investors staked N4.52 billion on 340.24 million shares in 5,924 deals against the 375.91million shares valued at N4.79 billion exchanged in 6,673 deals on Thursday, a decrease of 9.49 per cent

FSDH projects 8.9 per cent inflation for March

Ahead of the April 17 release of Nigeria’s infl ation fi gure for March 2013 by the National Bureau of

Statistics (NBS), researchers at FSDH Merchant Bank have forecasted an infl ation rate (year-on-year) of 8.9 per cent, representing 60 basis points drop from February 2013 infl ation rate at 9.5 per cent and 9.0 per cent in January.

“FSDH Research is of the opinion that the price movements in the consumer goods in March will increase the Consumer Price Index (CPI) to 144.46 points, an increase of 1.03 per cent month-on month. The March CPI will have to increase by at least 1.6 per cent from February to produce an infl ation rate that is higher than 9.5 per cent reported in the month of February 2013. In our opinion, this is unlikely. Looking into April 2013, our estimate points to an increase in infl ation rate in excess of 9.5 per cent,” the researchers said.

To arrive at the projection, FSDH Research considered that the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Food Price Index (FPI) for the month of March 2013 showed that the Index averaged 212 points in March, up 1 per cent from February. The FAO Food Price Index measures the monthly changes in international prices of a basket of food commodities.

According to the FAO, the rise in the Index was driven mainly by 11 per cent increase in dairy, which accounts for 17 per cent of the various commodity prices included in the calculation of the FPI.

The rise in dairy prices is the largest recorded and was as a result of unfavourable weather conditions in Oceania which disrupted milk production and resulted in a reduction in the processing of dairy products in the region. However, cereal prices and global rice prices remained unchanged from February while maize prices increased on account of a fall in exportable supplies from the United States. Wheat prices fell on the prospects of good world harvest which offset the increase in maize prices. Meat prices fell 2 per cent while sugar rose one per cent from February. Oils/fats increased by 2.5 per cent, mostly due to a drop in soy oil prices.

“Our analysis of the foreign exchange rate shows that the value of the Naira remained stable against the US Dollar in the month of March 2013 compared with the depreciation of 0.01 per cent recorded in the month of February. The stability in the value of the Naira in March 2013 reduced the impact of the rise in the prices of some imported consumer goods in Nigeria between the two months under review,” the researchers said.

In another development, an analysis of the prices of a basket of consumer goods that FSDH Research monitored across the country in March shows that prices of some major components of the basket increased. The average prices of rice increased by about 25.98 per cent on account of increase in import duties.

The price of yam increased by 26.67 per cent, price of potato (Irish) increased by 24.76 per cent, the prices of meat and vegetable oil increased by 3.33 per cent and 0.56 per cent respectively, while the prices of onions and tomatoes dropped by about 12.59 per cent and 3.33 per cent respectively. The price of palm oil also decreased marginally by about 3.33 per cent. However, the price of garri and that of beans remained stable during the period.

The observed increases in the prices of food items in March and the increase in the demand for non-alcoholic beverages during the Easter celebration should result to about 1.30 per cent increase in the Food and Non-Alcoholic Index. BC

Rilwan Bello-Osagie, GMD FSDH

I must admit that I was bit surprised at the speed with which President Goodluck Jonathan moved to

avert potentially damaging protests planned by organised labour and civil society groups for last Thursday over the non-payment of arrears of pension for retired public servants in the past year or so.

In ordering the immediate payment of the outstanding check off dues estimated at a mere N1bn, the president had just shown that the money is there to pay only it is not on top of the priority list.

In calling the protests, the Nigeria Labour Congress said it had been pushed to the wall haven written at least two letters to the Presidency calling for its intervention in the pension crisis without getting any response.

Yet, pensions are the legitimate right and or expectation of persons who have served the government or companies in their productive yearsto enable them to at least put food in their stomachs in their twilight years. The way pensioners have been treated in the past decades in this country, including those in critical services such as the police and the military is quite telling of the level of moral decadence into which our society has descended.

But as we all know, it is also indicative of the massive corruption and criminality that has characterised the administration of pension funds in Nigeria.

Certainly, a system that allows serving civil servants to steal pensions due to old, mostly impoverished retirees in such a brazen manner, will and cannot address the sense of insecurity that had enveloped the public service since the great purge during the short-lived military administration late Gen Murtala Mohammed.

While it is true that the pension reforms has tried to address this problem with the introduction of the contributory pension scheme, those that had retired before 2005 have been caught in a web spun by vicious predators in the shape of senior government offi cials.

The outdated record keeping machinery of the civil servicethat had resultedin the falsifi cation of pension records that allowed those in vantage positions to deliberately infl ate the number of pensioners that should be entitled to payments, is also used as an excuse to humiliate pensioners through the odious verifi cation system to “weed

out ghost pensioners”. Hundreds have died right there on the queue.

I encountered some military pensioners sometime in 2001 that were living rough on a major road in Ikoyi Lagos close to the former Military Pensions offi ce. Some of them had been in Lagos for over two weeks and did not have a dime, even to go back home if they so wished. They survived by begging and going menial chores for roadside food vendors. Some had already taken ill. These were men that once stood proud in their uniforms, now reduced to haggard shells at a time they should be content with living a quiet life in their respective villages.

The problem, based on what they told me, was simply that most could not afford to give gratifi cation to those in charge of processing their papers to make things happen.

The situation today is even worse with pension fi nd being stolen. The trial of some civil servants in the Police Pension Offi ce, one of which was indicted for signing off N1.1bn in cheques, is just a pointer to the extent of rot in that system and the utter disdain in which we hold our senior citizens.

As the President General of the TUC, Mr. Peter Esele, the destinies of our fathers and mothers who served the country with their blood are being toyed with and if the congress fails to fi ght for change now, today’s workers may be treated the same way when they retire.

“How do we explain it that every now and then they invite these old people for verifi cation and in the end nothing comes of it after all? Some die on the verifi cation ground without receiving their money, subjecting their wards to avoidable pains,” he said.

Esele reiterated that this injustice must stop if the country must move forward; pointing out that in the African tradition the younger ones have so much respect for elders, but that it is unfortunate the reverse is now the case to the extent that money meant for elders is now being stolen by the youths.

It is however interesting that while the government fi nds it diffi cult to pay pensions of career civil servants, political offi ce holders especially state governors have been packaging generous severance packages and pensions which include houses in Abuja, cars and paid aides for themselves to ensure that they continue to live like kings even after living offi ce.

Page 37: Monday, April 15, 2013

National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net Monday, April 15, 2013 A21 37Business CourageCourage

Stock Updates

GAINERS

COMPANY OPENING PRICE CLOSING PRICE CHANGE

NAHCO 5.58 6.13 0.55

MANSSARD 2.35 2.58 0.23

AIICO 0.75 0.82 O.07

UBCAP 1.10 1.20 0.10

JOHN HOLT 1.71 1.86 0.15

LOSERS

COMPANY OPENING PRICE CLOSING PRICE CHANGE

LEARNARCA 1.90 1.71 0.19

NEIMETH 0.81 0.73 0.08

ETERNAL 3.16 2.85 0.31

WAPIC 1.39 1.26 0.13

AGLEVENT 1.18 1.07 0.11

Inter-Bank Rates

TENOR RATE%(PREV) 05-April-2013 RATE%(CURR) 12-April-2013

CALL 10.0500 – 13.5000 10.5000 – 11.00000

OBB 10.1500 – 12.7000 9.5000 – 11.5000

Primary Market Auction

TENOR AMOUNT (N’mn) RATE (%) DATE

91-Days 31838.51 11.00 27-Mar-13

182-Days 59081.14 11.15 27-Mar-13

91-Days 20,278.04 10.45 21-Mar-13

Open Market Operation

TENOR AMOUNT (N’mn) RATE (%) DATE

91-Days 20159.21 10.49 10-April-13

182-Days 43490.87 10.68 10-April-13

364-Days 12000 10.71 10-April-13

Wholesale Dutch Auction System AMOUNT OFFERED MARKET DEMAND AMOUNT SOLD DATE

$300m $237m $237m 03-April-13

$300m $300m $300m 27-March-13

Market Indicators for Week Ended 12-04-13All-Share Index 33514.14 pointsMarket Capitalisation N10,713,237,306,220.47

BC

GTBank and Zenith Bank were rated fi rst and second respectively

in the three categories of the KPMG’s 2012 Banking Industry Customer Satisfaction Survey. The survey focuses on the perceived quality of customer service delivery by the banks from the customer’s perspective across the Retail, Corporate/Commercial and Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) segments.

FirstBank was rated third in Corporate/Commercial, Stanbic IBTC rated third in Retail and Standard Chartered rated third in SME.

Other banks in the top 10 in Retail are Diamond Bank 4th, Fidelity 5th, Standard Chartered 6th, FCMB 7th, FirstBank 8th, Sterling Bank 9th and Access Bank 10th.

Stanbic IBTC, Access, FirstBank, FCMB, Diamond, Sterling and Ecobank were rated fourth to ten respectively in the top 10 SME categorisation while Sterling, Diamond, UBA, Skye Bank, Stanbic IBTC, Access and Standard Chartered ranked fourth to ten positions respectively in Corporate/Commercial banking.

KPMG said that the customer satisfaction index (CSI) used to rate the banks composed of fi ve key factors- convenience, product/service offering, transaction method and system, pricing and customer care.

According to KPMG, the survey results revealed increase satisfaction in the Retail and SME segments, driven largely by satisfaction with service delivery through channels and customer care.

“On the other hand, overall CSI fell in the corporate segment; a signifi cant number of corporate customers expressed displeasure with the ability of banks to meet their needs,” KPMG said.

On relationship maintenance across all segments, it said fi nancial stability remained the most important factors customers considered in choosing to maintain a banking relationship, noting that in the

GTBank, Zenith, FirstBank lead others in KPMG 2012 customers’ survey

retail segment; customers were more likely to switch banks because of service quality not fi nancial stability.

By further breaking down the consumer satisfaction index into the fi ve key factors, the top three banks in convenience (retail) are Zenith, GTBank, Diamond; convenience (SME) Standard Chartered, Zenith, GTBank; convenience (Commercial/Corporate) GTBank, Zenith and FirstBank.

The top three banks in channels (Retail-Branch) are Zenith, Diamond, Stanbic IBTC; channels (Retail-ATM) Zenith, GTBank, FirstBank; channels (Retail-Internet) Standard Chartered, GTBank, Sterling Bank; channels (Retail-Contact Centre) ETB, Standard Chartered, Diamond; channels (Retail-Mobile Banking) Stanbic IBTC, Zenith and GTBank.

The top three banks by CSI rating in transactions methods and system (Retail) include Zenith, GTBank, Stanbic IBTC; GTBank, Zenith and Stanbic IBTC led in transactions methods and system (SME); while GTBank, Zenith and FirstBank topped the league in transactions methods and system (Commercial/Corporate).

The top three banks in CSI rating in customer care (Retail) are GTBank, Standard Chartered and Zenith; with GTBank, Stanbic IBTC and Zenith leading in transactions methods and system (SME) and Zenith,

GTBank and FirstBank leading in transactions methods and system (Commercial/Corporate).

KPMG says the top three banks by CSI rating in product and services (Retail) are GTBank, Zenith and Fidelity, in product and services (SME), GTBank, Stanbic IBTC and Zenith topped the list while GTBank, FirstBank and Zenith also led in product and services (Commercial/Corporate).

Top three banks by CSI rating in pricing (Retail) are GTBank, Stanbic IBTC and FCMB; pricing (SME) GTBank, Stanbic IBTC and FCMB; pricing (Commercial/Corporate) Keystone Bank, Union and Zenith.

According to KPMG, “Over the past fi ve years, we have witnessed many initiatives by banks to engage better with customers and our fi ndings suggest that customers are responding to some of these initiatives evidenced by the 3 per cent point increase in the banking industry’s overall customers satisfaction recorded this year (2012) in the retail segment.”

KPMG said strong knowledge of the customer’s business ranked as the highest service expectation of corporate respondents in the survey.

“Indeed, 66 per cent of those organisations who said they would not increase transactions with their banks were not satisfi ed with the ability of their relationship managers to present them with useful advice,” it said.

Etisalat Nigeria has disclosed its plans to raise $500 million in debt from local banks to

expand its network this year.The company’s commercial offi cer, Wael Ammar, said that the investments will enable the mobile phone carrier grow the market share of Etisalat Nigeria, which is 40 percent owned by its parent company, to 17 per cent this year, adding that it aimed to add four million subscribers to its existing 15 million this year.

Ammar said that the company currently has a mobile market share of 15 per cent, behind MTN’s 43 per cent and Globacom’s 22 per cent and Airtel’s 20 per cent share.

Ammar also said he expected average revenues for voice traffi c

Etisalat to raise $500 million debtacross the industry to continue to decline to around $5 per user over the next 3-5 years, from around $6-7 per user currently. ARPU was $10 per user in 2008, he said. “We are investing $500 million this year to expand our network and services to Nigerian consumers,”

He said that Etisalat aims to increase its existing 3,000 cell sites by an undisclosed number.

Ammar noted that Etisalat entered Nigeria’s fast growing market as a start-up operation with a $2 billion investment seven years ago, facing more established rivals like South Africa’s MTN and Globacom, owned by billionaire tycoon, Mike Adenuga.

He further added that Etisalat

would be able to grow its subscriber base without having to poach large numbers of customers from rivals because some 40 per cent of Nigerians -- tens of millions of people -- still did not own a phone.

“We see the second wave of growth coming from the youth segment. It is a huge segment that will turn into future consumers and the growth will happen across multiple years,” he said.

It will be recalled that the International Telecommunications Union forecasts Nigeria to have 120 million mobile subscribers by end 2013, out of a population of 170 million.

The number of mobile users in Africa’s most populous nation crossed the 100 million subscriber base in the fi rst half of last year, adding six million new callers from 2011.

Bisi Onasanya, First Bank Godwin Emefi ele, Zenith Bank

BC

Page 38: Monday, April 15, 2013

National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013 A22 38 Business CourageCourage

Julius Berger Plc; Financial Data 2012=N=(‘Nm) 2011=N=(‘Nm)Turnover 137,479,534 130,170,984

Cost of sales 106,029,239 98,932,143

Gross Profi t 31,450,295 31,238,841

Profi t Before Taxation 7,496,986 6,768,892

Profi t After Taxation 3,785,038 2,737,482

Total Assets 186,542,906 177,297,390

Shareholders fund 10,997,179 7,954,491

Working Capital 3,483,014 25,111,802

Current Asset 84,065,943 91,939,609

Current Liabilities 80,582,929 66,827,807

Fixed Assets 58,328,177 55,245,358

Current Assets-stocks 67,252,379 77,328,280

Trade Debtors 62,733,103 58,259,212

Trade Creditors 49,650,410 46,966,433

Sales Growth(%) 5.61 -22.24

PAT Growth (%) 38.27 -43.84

Cost of sales (growth) 7.17 -26.24

Profi tability Ratios

Return on Equity(%) 34.42 34.41

Gross profi t Margin (%) 22.88 24

Profi t Margin(%) 2.75 2.1

Pretax Margin (%) 5.45 5.2

Liquidity Ratios

Current Ratio 1.04 1.38

Quick Ratio 0.83 1.16

Debtors(No of days) 166.55 163.36

Creditors(No of days) 170.92 173.28

Financial analysis carried out on Julius Berger Nigeria Plc has revealed

an average performance in its fi nance for the last nine months of 2012. The company recorded a marginal growth in majority of its measuring indices with revenue of N137.5 billion in 2012 as against the N130.2 billion recorded in 2011.

What’s New?Julius Berger Nigeria Plc

has been trying to diversify its business. It has established PrimeTech Design and Engineering Nigeria Limited for the provisions of design and engineering support services to the company. It has also incorporated another subsidiary, Julius Berger Medical Services Limited (JBMSL), as a health care provider for the operation of medical service centres, hospitals and all forms of medical and health care services.

The German construction company, Bilfi nger Berger, has outlined plans to sell 90 per cent of its investment in its Nigerian business, Julius Berger International (JBI) to Julius Berger Nigeria (JBN). JBI consists of the engineering and services activities of Bilfi nger Berger Nigeria. The strategy will initially see 60 per cent of JBI acquired by JBN, with a further 30 per cent bought by the end of the year. JBN itself is 39.9 per cent owned by Bilfi nger Berger and the deal to consolidate JBI within the company is part of Bilfi nger’s wider strategy of edging out of Nigeria by ultimately selling its stake in JBN.

Julius Berger: Boosting future earnings through diversificationBy Tayo Adeleke

Financial PerformanceThe construction fi rm

recorded an impressive earning growth in its third quarter results. The unaudited third quarter 2012 result shows that the company posted N137.5 billion turnover, an increase of N7.3 billion compared with N130.17 billion in the corresponding period of 2011. Gross profi t moved from N31.24 billion in 2011 to N31.45 billion in the review period. The company was able to manage its cost effectively during the period as operating expenses declined from the third quarter 2011 fi gure by 2.29 per cent to N22.88 billion from N23.37 billion in 2011.

Consequently, this translates into an improved bottom line indices during the period. JBN Profi t before Tax (PBT) increased signifi cantly by 10.76 per cent between 2011 and 2012 to N7.5 billion from N6.77 billion. The tax provision which decreased by 7.9 per cent in the review period to N3.71 billion from N4.03 billion resulted in the Profi t after Tax of N3.79 billion, up from N2.74 billion in 2011, a growth of 38.27 per cent. JBN plc is targeting N175 billion incomes by December 2012. The company’s latest forecast shows that cost of sales will increase to N138.6 billion against N134 billion in 2011 while Profi t after tax projection is N5.250 billion compared with N4.9 billion in fi nancial year ended December 2011. Julius Berger’s earning per share forecast is 438 kobo. Financial analysts believe that the projection is achievable based on current run rate.

Profi tability RatioJBN recorded a mixed

performance in its profi tability ratios indices. Return on Equity closed at 34.42 per cent, represent marginal increase of 0.01 basis points from 34.10 per cent. The Profi t before Tax (PBT) margin in the third quarter of 2012 increased over the third quarter of 2011. The PBT margin increased to 5.45 per cent in third quarter, 2012 from 5.20 percent as at third quarter of 2011. Profi t margin currently stands at 2.75 per cent up from 2.10 per cent in the corresponding third quarter period of 2011. The result also revealed that the percentage of turnover, PBT, and PAT in the third quarter of 2011 to the full year audited turnover, pre-tax profi t and profi t after tax for the period ended December, 2011 are: 82.14 per cent, 72.53 per cent and 77.82 per cent respectively.

Liquidity Ratio

JBN’s liquidity ratios show weak performance between 2011 and 2012. This implies that the company could not meet up with its fi nancial obligation as at when due during the period under review. As at nine months period ended September 2012, the monetary value of the company’s readily available assets (current assets)

are almost equal its short term debt obligations as the current ratio dropped from 1.38:1 to 1.04:1 in 2012. The illiquidity position is also refl ected in its quick ratio which declined sharply from 1.16:1 in 2011 to 0.83 in 2012. Trade debtors closed at N62.73 billion from N58.26 billion in 2011 while trade creditor stood at N49.65 billion. Thus, the company’s debtors made payment within 167 days (trade debtors) while it took the company 170 days to pays its creditors. The short term borrowing grew by 58 per cent to N26.38 billion from N16.72 billion in 2011. Working capital dropped signifi cantly to N3.48 billion from N26.92 billion. This is understandable as bulk of its capital might have been channelled to various ongoing construction projects.

Assets Quality

Julius Berger’s balance sheet shows a strong assets base in the review period. Fixed assets had 5.6 per cent increase to close at N58.33 billion from N55.25 billion in 2011 and up from N55.49 billion recorded as at fi nancial year ended December 2011. The company made a strategic investment within the third quarter of ongoing fi nancial year as investment accounted for N7.32

billion compared with N213.99 million in 2011 represents 3322 per cent growth. Receivable and fi nancial assets was N32.91 billion, up by 41 per cent from N23.27 billion posted in 2011 while deferred tax assets closed at N3.37 billion. These entire fi gures helped the company to boost its total assets for the period. Total asset climb to N186.54 billion in within nine month in 2012 from N177.3 billion achieved in 2011.

Investment Ratios

In light of the company’s increased earnings in 2011, shareholders of Julius Berger Nigeria Plc got increased dividend of 240 Kobo (N2.40), resulting in a total gross dividend payment of N2.88 billion. It will be recalled that the dividend for the 2010 was 200 Kobo per each ordinary share.

The Nigerian Stock Exchange share valuation of the company as at beginning of July 2012 was N27.63 per share, which is higher than the quotation price of N27.5 per share at the end of September 2012. This implies that the share price of JBN dropped by 0.36 per cent in the third quarter 2012 compare to 20 per cent growth attained by NSE in the same quarter. This reduction in the company’s stock value did not refl ect the overall trend across all sectors, especially in the third quarter of 2012.

ProspectsThe management of JBN has

assured its stakeholders of better return on their investments in years ahead. According to Mohammed Nuruddeen Imam, Chairman Julius Berger Nigeria plc “I can assure you that the Board, Management and staff are working in your best interest at each and every turn. Together we will continue on our journey into the future of our great company and in order to provide you exceptional returns, we will continuously analyze our strategies and where necessary, adjust our objectives based on the business environment”.

The company recently clinched the contract to rehabilitate the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Parliament Building in Abuja. This is expected to boost fi nancials by the end of the year. Meanwhile, analysts remain positive on the company in view of the ongoing restructuring programme, which could result in even more signifi cant cost savings. Specifi cally, the company is expected to witness consolidation of earnings, following the gradual divestment of Bilfi nger Berger, and the streamlining of the company’s businesses. BC

Muhammed Nurudeen Imam, JBN Plc Chairman

Page 39: Monday, April 15, 2013

National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net Monday, April 15, 2013 A23 39

STOCKWATCH

AGRICULTURE/AGRO-ALLIED Crop Production FTN COCOA PROCESSORS PLC 0.50 71 400 0.64 0.50 2 200 000 000 0.10 N/A 0.50OKOMU OIL PALM PLC. 104.00 959 066 34.01 14.53 476 955 000 6.73 9.47 95.00PRESCO PLC 23.45 242 718 16.15 6.40 1 000 000 000 2.75 -6.57 25.10Fishing/Hunting/Trapping ELLAH LAKES PLC. NT NT 4.26 4.26 60 000 000 0.00 N/A NTLivestock/Animal Specialties LIVESTOCK FEEDS PLC. 2.82 2 513 951 1.70 0.48 1 199 549 736 0.11 -7.54 3.05CONGLOMERATES Diversifi ed Industries A.G. LEVENTIS NIGERIA PLC. 1.07 214 923 2.54 0.74 2 191 895 983 0.08 -33.54 1.61CHELLARAMS PLC. NT NT 7.60 5.81 963 900 300 0.24 N/A NTJOHN HOLT PLC. 1.86 561 060 8.82 5.32 389 151 408 0.00 N/A 1.71S C O A NIG. PLC. NT NT 8.28 5.52 821 666 666 0.35 N/A NTU A C N PLC. 55.00 300 157 42.50 28.70 1 600 720 323 6.89 N/A 59.06CONSTRUCTION/REAL ESTATE Building Construction ARBICO PLC. NT NT 26.00 14.09 148 500 000 0.00 N/A NTCAPPA & D’ALBERTO PLC. 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NT NT 0.97 0.57 843 284 027 0.00 N/A NTFINANCIAL SERVICES Banking ACCESS BANK PLC. 8.84 32 445 354 11.70 4.76 17 888 251 479 1.42 -15.81 10.50DIAMOND BANK PLC 6.34 10 781 958 9.27 2.01 14 475 243 105 0.90 -12.55 7.25ECOBANK TRANSNATIONAL INC. 14.90 1 403 969 17.05 9.97 9 873 614 567 2.81 6.43 14.00FIDELITY BANK PLC 2.96 8 892 733 3.20 1.14 28 974 797 023 0.43 -3.58 3.07FIRST CITY MONUMENT BANK PLC. 4.99 41 805 600 8.30 3.04 16 271 192 202 0.60 -0.20 5.00GUARANTY TRUST BANK PLC. 24.49 25 117 640 20.30 11.64 29 146 482 209 2.10 -5.59 25.94SKYE BANK PLC 5.87 3 106 060 10.17 2.73 13 219 334 676 0.71 -12.65 6.72STERLING BANK PLC. 2.95 22 302 608 2.91 0.97 12 563 091 545 0.54 -3.28 3.05U B A PLC 6.60 12 004 999 5.21 1.64 32 334 693 693 0.67 -18.72 8.12UNION BANK NIG.PLC. 10.00 1 034 588 10.07 1.96 13 509 726 273 0.00 -0.99 10.10UNITY BANK PLC 0.70 10 973 398 1.92 0.50 33 675 576 085 0.00 0.00 0.75WEMA BANK PLC. 1.39 9 830 394 1.75 0.50 12 821 249 880 0.00 -11.46 1.57ZENITH BANK PLC 21.66 20 238 041 21.10 11.70 31 396 493 790 2.09 0.70 21.51Insurance Carriers, Brokers & Services AFRICAN ALLIANCE INS. COY. PLC NT NT 0.50 0.50 20 585 000 000 0.00 N/A NTAIICO INSURANCE PLC. 0.82 5 382 535 1.01 0.50 7 809 391 256 0.05 0.00 0.91CONFIDENCE INSURANCE PLC NT NT 0.64 0.61 211 626 000 0.00 N/A NTCONSOLIDATED HALLMARK INS. PLC NT NT 0.50 0.50 6 000 000 000 0.05 N/A NTCONTINENTAL REINSURANCE PLC 1.02 15 000 1.20 0.61 10 372 624 157 0.14 0.00 1.03CORNERSTONE INS. COY. PLC. 0.50 674 422 0.50 0.50 8 820 010 363 0.02 0.00 0.50CUSTODIAN AND ALLIED INS. PLC 1.82 115 000 3.51 1.31 5 100 846 808 0.28 0.00 1.84EQUITY ASSURANCE PLC. NT NT 0.50 0.50 8 847 298 420 0.00 N/A NTGOLDLINK INSURANCE PLC NT NT 0.69 0.50 4 549 947 000 0.00 N/A NTGREAT NIGERIAN INSURANCE PLC 0.50 10 000 0.50 0.50 3 827 485 380 0.00 N/A 0.50GUINEA INSURANCE PLC. NT NT 0.50 0.50 720 000 000 0.00 N/A NTINTERCONTINENTAL WAPIC INS. PLC 1.26 611 850 0.80 0.50 5 061 804 000 0.00 N/A 0.97INTERNATIONAL ENERGY INS. PLC 0.50 127 000 0.50 0.50 6 420 427 449 0.00 0.00 0.50INVESTMENT AND ALLIED ARN. NT NT 0.50 0.50 28 000 000 000 0.02 N/A NTLASACO ASSURANCE PLC. NT NT 0.50 0.50 7 323 313 227 0.00 N/A NTLAW UNION AND ROCK INS. PLC. 0.50 123 965 0.61 0.50 3 437 330 500 0.00 N/A 0.50LINKAGE ASSURANCE PLC 0.50 123 965 0.50 0.50 4 083 713 569 0.03 0.00 0.50MANSARD INSURANCE PLC 2.58 305 800 1.93 0.95 10 000 000 000 0.16 12.17 2.30MUTUAL BENEFITS ASSURANCE PLC. NT NT 0.50 0.50 7 998 705 336 0.01 N/A NTN.E.M INSURANCE CO (NIG) PLC. 0.75 13 410 084 0.66 0.50 5 332 830 881 0.37 -5.06 0.79NIGER INSURANCE CO. PLC. NT NT 1.11 0.50 5 649 693 923 0.02 N/A NTOASIS INSURANCE PLC NT NT 0.50 0.50 5 003 506 791 0.04 N/A NTPRESTIGE ASSURANCE CO. PLC. 0.60 9 776 000 2.35 0.50 2 508 315 436 0.06 -6.25 0.64REGENCY ALLIANCE INS. COY PLC NT NT 0.50 0.50 6 668 750 000 0.04 N/A NTSOVEREIGN TRUST INSURANCE PLC 0.50 25 000 0.52 0.50 5 203 757 266 0.09 0.00 0.50STACO INSURANCE PLC NT NT 0.50 0.50 6 141 087 609 0.00 N/A NTSTANDARD ALLIANCE INS. PLC. 0.50 60 000 0.50 0.50 8 493 173 450 0.00 N/A 0.50UNIC INSURANCE PLC. 0.50 708 026 0.50 0.50 2 581 733 505 0.00 N/A 0.50UNITY KAPITAL ASSURANCE PLC NT NT 0.50 0.50 13 000 000 000 0.02 N/A NTUNIVERSAL INS. COMPANY PLC 0.50 3 627 0.50 0.50 16 000 000 000 0.00 N/A 0.50Micro Finance Banks FORTIS MICROFINANCE BANK PLC NT NT 6.00 0.00 0.01 NTNPF MICROFINANCE BANK PLC 0.90 500 000 1.15 1.00 0.07 0.90Mortgage Carriers, Brokers &Services ABBEY BUILDING SOCIETY PLC NT NT 1.51 1.33 4 200 000 000 0.03 N/A NTASO SAVINGS AND LOANS PLC 0.50 1 030 000 0.50 0.50 8 679 148 676 0.02 N/A 0.50RESORT SAVINGS & LOANS PLC 0.50 2 000 0.50 0.50 13 175 732 404 0.00 N/A 0.50UNION HOMES SAVINGS&LOANS PLC NT 1 0.99 0.50 7 812 500 000 0.00 N/A NTOther Financial Institutions CRUSADER ( NIG) PLC. NT NT 0.61 0.50 3 778 005 975 0.00 N/A NTDEAP CAPITAL MGT & TRUST PLC 2.02 900 2.02 2.02 1 333 333 333 0.00 N/A 2.02FBN HOLDINGS PLC 18.83 11 161 407 17.01 8.50 32 632 084 358 3.03 -10.76 21.10NIG SEW. MACH. MAN. CO. PLC. NT NT 0.15 0.15 5 880 000 0.00 N/A NTNIGERIA ENERYGY SECTOR FUND NT NT 552.20 555.20 2 500 000 12.65 N/A NTROYAL EXCHANGE PLC. 0.66 114 237 0.66 0.50 3 608 657 661 0.00 N/A 0.66STANBIC IBTC HOLDINGS PLC 13.10 80 285 11.38 6.40 18 750 000 000 0.87 -1.65 13.32HEALTHCARE Healthcare Providers EKOCORP PLC. 4.80 1 366 5.31 5.05 498 600 908 0.12 N/A 4.80Medical Equipment UNION DIAGNOSTIC &CLINICAL PLC 0.50 3 500 0.50 0.50 3 553 138 528 0.00 N/A 0.50Medical Supplies MORISON INDUSTRIES PLC. 2.23 3 057 10.54 7.39 152 178 750 0.06 N/A 2.23Pharmaceuticals EVANS MEDICAL PLC. 1.70 15 862 1.45 0.50 486 473 856 0.00 0.00 1.70FIDSON HEALTHCARE PLC 1.80 618 749 3.20 0.76 1 500 000 000 0.44 0.00 1.80GLAXO SMITHKLINE CONSUMER PLC 48.00 21 676 39.00 19.30 956 701 192 2.62 0.00 48.00MAY & BAKER NIGERIA PLC. 2.21 398 859 5.61 1.62 980 000 000 0.20 -4.33 2.31

NOTE NT=Not Traded on 12-04-13 N/A=Not Avialable

NEIMETH INT PHARM PLC 0.73 2 500 1.96 0.76 1 925 717 268 0.09 -16.09 0.87NIGERIA-GERMAN CHEMICALS PLC. NT NT 12.91 8.59 153 786 012 0.00 N/A NTPHARMA-DEKO PLC. NT NT 4.28 3.50 100 000 000 0.00 N/A NTICT Computer Based Systems COURTEVILLE BUSINESS SLN PLC 0.50 212 000 0.52 0.50 2 960 000 000 0.10 0.00 0.50Computers and Peripherals OMATEK VENTURES PLC 0.50 1 000 0.50 0.50 2 941 789 472 0.00 N/A 0.50Electronic Communications Services MTECH COMMUNICATIONS PLC NT NT 0.91 0.91 4 966 666 668 0.00 N/A NTIT Services NCR (NIGERIA) PLC. 18.00 2 300 18.28 13.12 108 000 000 0.00 N/A 18.00TRIPPLE GEE AND COMPANY PLC. 2.29 1 146 3.59 2.41 492 825 600 0.01 N/A 2.29Processing Systems CHAMS PLC 0.50 13 873 0.50 0.50 4 620 600 000 0.00 N/A 0.50E-TRANZACT INTERNATIONAL PLC NT NT 4.97 4.04 4 200 000 000 0.04 N/A NTTelecommunications Carriers STARCOMMS PLC NT NT 1.47 0.50 6 878 478 096 0.00 N/A NTTelecommunications Services IHS NIGERIA PLC PREF SHARES NT NT 2.25 0.00 0.00 N/A NTIHS PLC 2.35 17 050 000 3.50 2.46 4 400 000 000 0.00 N/A 2.35MTI PLC NT NT 0.50 0.50 4 893 594 400 0.00 N/A NTINDUSTRIAL GOODS Building Materials AFRICAN PAINTS (NIGERIA) PLC. NT NT 3.32 2.86 260 000 000 0.00 N/A NTASHAKA CEM PLC 25.97 511 460 30.00 9.10 2 239 453 125 2.14 5.48 24.62BERGER PAINTS PLC 10.00 52 611 12.57 7.27 217 367 585 1.09 -5.84 10.62CAP PLC 40.00 19 754 43.98 14.50 560 000 000 2.28 7.82 37.10CEMENT CO. OF NORTH.NIG. PLC 9.34 665 620 15.49 4.20 1 241 548 285 1.47 -11.47 10.55DANGOTE CEMENT PLC 156.00 121 595 132.51 95.00 15 494 019 668 8.33 0.00 156.00DN MEYER PLC. NT NT 3.51 0.93 242 908 200 0.00 N/A NTFIRST ALUMINIUM NIGERIA PLC NT NT 0.75 0.50 2 109 928 275 0.00 N/A NTIPWA PLC 0.76 1 112 980 0.99 0.91 513 696 000 0.00 N/A 0.63LAFARGE WAPCO PLC. 83.00 535 711 56.50 37.00 3 001 600 004 4.10 -4.15 86.59PAINTS & COATINGS MANFACT.PLC NT NT 3.36 0.52 792 914 256 0.26 N/A NTPORTLAND PAINTS & PRDT NIG. PLC 5.70 300 5.28 2.27 400 000 000 0.23 N/A 5.39PREMIER PAINTS PLC. NT NT 13.40 10.93 75 000 000 0.00 N/A NTElectronic and Electrical Products AUSTIN LAZ & COMPANY PLC NT NT 2.00 2.00 0.03 N/A NTCUTIX PLC. 1.70 6 600 2.50 1.33 510 396 608 0.11 -5.56 1.80NIGERIAN WIRE AND CABLE PLC. NT NT 0.73 0.50 2 220 000 000 0.00 N/A NTNIGERIAN WIRE IND. PLC NT NT 2.58 2.58 15 000 000 0.00 N/A NTPackaging/Containers ABPLAST PRODUCTS PLC. NT NT 3.98 3.98 25 000 000 0.00 N/A NTAVON CROWNCAPS & CONTAINERS 1.90 1 711 6.91 2.19 683 974 528 0.05 N/A 1.90BETA GLASS CO PLC. 10.43 42 000 12.71 9.53 0.05 10.43GREIF NIGERIA PLC 12.68 50 15.03 13.28 42 640 000 0.90 N/A 12.68NIG. BAGS MANFACT. COY PLC 2.70 2 717 101 3.60 1.60 6 215 000 000 0.24 0.00 2.70POLY PRODUCTS (NIG) PLC. NT NT 1.86 1.05 240 000 000 0.22 N/A NTW A GLASS IND. PLC. NT NT 0.63 0.63 199 066 550 0.00 N/A NTTools and Machinery NIGERIAN ROPES PLC NT NT 8.69 8.26 265 409 280 0.00 N/A NTSTOKVIS NIG PLC. NT NT 0.14 0.14 2 918 000 0.00 N/A NTNATURAL RESOURCES Chemicals B.O.C. GASES PLC. 8.00 67 936 9.20 5.70 393 120 000 0.76 0.76 7.94Metals ALUMACO PLC NT NT 7.75 7.75 75 600 000 0.00 N/A NTALUMINIUM EXTRUSION IND. PLC. NT NT 12.39 10.55 100 000 000 0.43 N/A NTNon-Metallic Mineral Mining MULTIVERSE PLC NT NT 0.50 0.50 4 058 989 226 0.00 N/A NTPaper/Forest Products HALLMARK PAPER PRODUCTS PLC. NT NT 3.22 3.22 50 000 000 0.04 N/A NTTHOMAS WYATT NIG. PLC. NT NT 1.38 1.38 220 000 000 0.00 N/A NTOIL AND GAS Energy Equipment and Services JAPAUL OIL & MARITIME SER. PLC 0.70 7 958 889 1.02 0.54 6 262 701 716 0.13 -1.41 0.71Integrated Oil and Gas Services OANDO PLC 16.00 1 600 419 24.80 10.94 2 262 711 568 1.73 -5.66 16.96Petroleum &Petroleum Products Distributors AFROIL PLC NT NT 20.71 20.71 125 487 475 0.00 N/A NTBECO PETROLEUM PRODUCT PLC 0.50 10 000 0.70 0.50 3 716 976 579 0.00 N/A 0.50CONOIL PLC 26.33 13 661 41.89 19.61 693 952 117 0.47 0.00 26.33ETERNA PLC. 2.85 252 903 5.59 2.12 1 249 162 828 0.61 -18.80 3.51FORTE OIL PLC. 14.14 262 867 28.69 9.12 1 080 280 628 0.00 3.59 13.65MOBIL OIL NIG PLC. 121.50 23 661 163.50 111.51 300 496 051 6.11 -2.02 124.00MRS OIL NIGERIA PLC. 22.40 18 112 72.00 32.29 253 988 672 3.62 N/A 22.40TOTAL NIGERIA PLC. 180.00 104 364 240.00 125.00 339 521 837 14.63 0.00 180.00SERVICES Advertising AFROMEDIA PLC NT NT 0.72 0.50 4 035 497 307 0.00 N/A NTApparel Retailers LENNARDS (NIG) PLC. NT NT 3.48 3.48 0.19 N/A NTAutomobile/Auto Part Retailers R T BRISCOE PLC. 1.87 660 061 3.65 1.12 980 294 400 0.21 -4.59 1.96Courier/Freight/Delivery RED STAR EXPRESS PLC 3.95 155 890 3.67 2.11 589 496 310 0.58 1.54 3.89TRANS-NATIONWIDE EXPRESS PLC. NT NT 6.40 3.28 198 819 763 0.25 N/A NTEmployment Solutions C & I LEASING PLC. 0.53 622 638 1.64 0.85 865 808 912 0.08 N/A 0.61Hospitality TANTALIZERS PLC 0.50 400 0.75 0.50 3 211 627 907 0.01 N/A 0.50Hotels/Lodging CAPITAL HOTEL PLC 6.27 10 000 8.00 3.00 1 548 780 000 0.18 N/A 6.27IKEJA HOTEL PLC 0.75 97 000 2.59 1.16 2 078 796 396 0.92 -11.76 0.85TOURIST COMPANY OF NIGERIA PLC. NT NT 4.76 4.31 1 772 884 297 0.00 N/A NTTRANSNATIONAL CORP. OF NIG.PLC 1.50 27 080 317 1.95 0.50 25 813 998 283 0.22 0.00 1.50Media/Entertainment DAAR COMMUNICATIONS PLC 0.50 10 000 0.50 0.50 8 000 000 000 0.00 N/A 0.50Printing/Publishing ACADEMY PRESS PLC. 1.85 52 200 3.68 1.64 403 200 000 0.14 N/A 2.05LEARN AFRICA PLC 1.71 202 132 8.00 1.94 771 450 000 0.29 N/A 1.74STUDIO PRESS (NIG) PLC. NT NT 2.92 2.78 0.01 N/A NTUNIVERSITY PRESS PLC. 4.95 31 511 6.82 3.09 425 641 111 0.50 10.00 4.50Road Transportation ABC TRANSPORT PLCPLC 0.71 250 815 0.80 0.50 1 507 000 000 0.00 N/A 0.88Specialty INTERLINKED TECHNOLOGIES PLC NT NT 5.15 4.90 236 699 511 0.00 N/A NTSECURE ELECTRONIC TECH.PLC NT NT 1.88 0.80 5 631 539 736 0.03 N/A NTTransport-Related Services AIRLINE SERVICES AND LOGISTICS PLC 3.90 168 990 2.78 1.54 634 000 000 0.38 N/A 4.75NIG. AVIATION HANDLING COY PLC 6.13 1 197 527 11.75 5.15 1 230 468 750 0.81 0.36 6.11ASeM CONSTRUCTION/REAL ESTATE Property Management SMART PRODUCTS NIGERIA PLC NT NT 1.43 1.04 45 000 000 0.12 N/A NTCONSUMER GOODS Food Products MCNICHOLS PLC 0.97 11 000 1.02 1.02 201 885 335 0.00 N/A 0.97Personal/Household Products ROKANA INDUSTRIES PLC. 0.60 500 0.60 0.60 30 000 000 0.00 N/A 0.60HEALTHCARE Pharmaceuticals AFRIK PHARMACEUTICALS PLC. NT NT 0.50 0.50 24 898 850 0.00 N/A NTINDUSTRIAL GOODS Electronic and Electrical Products NT NT NTADSWITCH PLC. 1.63 500 1.88 1.63 125 005 250 0.00 N/A 1.63NATURAL RESOURCES Metals W.A. ALUM. PRODUCTS PLC. NT NT 0.50 0.50 6 650 000 0.00 N/A NTOIL AND GAS Petroleum & Petroleum Products Distributors ANINO INTERNATIONAL PLC. NT NT 0.21 0.21 24 200 000 0.00 N/A NTCAPITAL OIL PLC 0.50 20 000 0.50 0.50 5 857 500 000 0.00 N/A 0.50RAK UNITY PET. COMP. PLC. NT NT 0.31 0.31 15 000 000 0.00 N/A NTUNION VENTURES & PET. PLC NT NT 0.63 0.63 98 600 000 0.00 N/A NTSERVICES Apparel Retailers UDEOFSON GARMENT FACT. NIG PLC NT NT 0.50 0.50 20 000 000 0.00 N/A NTFood/Drug Retailers and Wholesalers NT NT NTJULI PLC. 2.76 16 000 3.05 2.76 194 700 000 0.00 N/A 2.76ETF’s Sector ETF NEWGOLD EXCHANGE TRADED FUND 2 638.00 100 2 706 2 422 0.00 2 638.00

PRICE 52 WK 52 WK SHARES MOV.SECURITY (=N=) QUANTITY HIGH LOW OUTSTANDING EPS (%) Previous

PRICE 52 WK 52 WK SHARES MOV.SECURITY (=N=) QUANTITY HIGH LOW OUTSTANDING EPS (%) Previous

Stock Exchange weekly equities summary as at Friday, April 12, 2013

Business CourageCourage

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Monday, April 15, 2013 National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net40

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Page 41: Monday, April 15, 2013

be heard and he would also secure a date for judgement.

However, his hopes were dashed as the court, presided over by Justice Ibrahim Sau-lawa, informed Ladoja’s counsel, Dr. Dapo Olanipekun that if the appeal was heard on the day, it would place more pressure on the appellate court, expected to deliver its judge-ment within 90 days.

Section 294 of the constitution states that ‘’every court established under this Consti-tution shall deliver its decision in writing not later than 90 days after the conclusion of evidence and final addresses.’’

In adjourning the case, the appellate court acknowledged that the court was confronted with too much workload and could not take arguments on the appeal.

Justice Saulawa explained the rationale behind the prolonged adjournment of the matter, pointing out that the Appellate court needed sufficient time to write and deliver its judgements.

Ladoja’s is just one out of many other litigants whose appeal could not be heard speedily because of the volume of cases streaming into the Lagos Division of the ap-pellate court on a daily basis.

The need to increase the number of jus-tices of the Court of Appeal, Lagos is more urgent in order to deal with the exigency of clearing the high volume cases. With two panels of justices, the Appeal Court is expected to adjudicate over about 60 appeal

The Court of Appeal is the second high-est court in the hierarchy of courts’ system in Nigeria. By section 237 of

the 1999 Constitution, ‘’ the Court of Appeal shall consist of a President of the Court of Appeal: and such number of Justices, not less than forty- nine (49).’’

The constitution further provides that not less than three justices shall be learned in Islamic personal law, and not less than three shall be learned in Customary law, as may be prescribed by the National Assembly.

By section 240 of the constitution, the ap-pellate court shall have jurisdiction to the exclusion of any other court of law in the country, to hear and determine appeals from the Federal High Court, the various High Courts of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja and states of the federation, amongst others.

It is against this background that the for-

mer Governor of Oyo State, Rasheed Ladoja lodged an appeal to quash his prosecution by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) over corruption and fraud charges.

Like other appellants, Ladoja showed up at the Court of Appeal, Lagos Division on April 8, 2013, accompanied by his spouse, Oluyinka, with the hope that his appeal against the decision of Justice Ramat Mo-hammed of the Federal High Court would

•Judges, lawyers complain as cases are delayed

Law & Justice“The law is in the breast of the judge and he can

make use of it at any time.”

National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 41Monday, April 15, 2013

[email protected]

RETIRED JUSTICE OF SUPREME COURT, JUSTICE NIKI TOBI

CONTINUED ON PAGE 42

Lawmakers don’t deserve legislative immunity –Adekoya

47

Rockefeller impostor convicted, faces 27 years jail term

Ex-convict saga: How S’Court absolved Ibori

46

42

Appeal Court groans under heavy workload

Court of Appeal building, Lagos.

The Lagos Division of the Court of Appeal is groaning under the workload of high volume of appellate cases in its docket. This has heightened to a level that calls are mounting for the appointment of more justices in the division, writes WALE IGBINTADE.

JUSTICE SAULAWA EXPLAINED THAT THE

APPELLATE COURT NEEDED SUFFICIENT TIME TO

WRITE AND DELIVER ITS JUDGEMENTS

Page 42: Monday, April 15, 2013

cases on a daily basis. Specifically, the Court of Appeal, Lagos division hears

and determines appeals emanating from the decisions of the Federal High Courts in Lagos, State High Courts in the Ikeja, Lagos, Ikorodu and Badagry Divisions, the National Industrial Courts, Court-martial , Election Tribunals, Investment and Securities’ Tribunals and Disciplinary Tribunals of Regulatory Bodies for various professionals.

Recently, the Chairman of the House Committee on Judiciary, Hon. Aminu Shehu Shagari (PDP, Sokoto), said the country was in dire need of more judges be-cause the advent of democracy in 1999 has opened the judicial space for more people to ventilate their claims in the courts.

According to him, out of the 10,899 cases filed in the High Court in 2010 alone, 6,119 were carried forward into 2011. He said at present, there are 17 divisions of the Court of Appeal and five justices in each court. He sug-gested that the number of justices should be increased to 95, not even 90 as proposed in the amendment.

The National Mirror spoke to some notable lawyers who were unanimous that the failure to increase the number of Justices in the Lagos division of the appel-late court might pose a threat to the health of the judges due to the heavy workload.

They argued that if more justices are appointed to the Lagos division, the issue of not forming a quorum for sittings would be drastically reduced and the dispensa-tion of justice would be hastened.

According to Prof. Fidelis Oditah (SAN) , “there is need to appoint more justices to the Lagos division, even though a lot of improvements has taken place. He said more justices are required to enable the Court of Appeal cope with the challenge of increasing workload.

In his view, Dr Abiodun Layonu (SAN) said the easiest way to speed up hearing of cases at the Lagos division of the Appellate Court was to increase the number of the courts.

He said ‘’if you increased the number of courts you must also increase the number of justices for you to achieve the desired result. The President of the Court of Appeal could, as a temporary measure, draft some jus-tices to Lagos to help with the backlog of cases pending before the court

. The truth of the matter is that Lagos is the busiest state in Nigeria and it needs more than two panels of the

court to handle cases that are brought before the appel-late court. But it would require a lot of recourses to fix the problem permanently.

In his view, a life Bencher, Usman Ibrahim said, “what President of the Court should do is to send more justices to Lagos division of the court, thereby creating more panels.”

Presently, only two panels can sit a time, but if more justices are sent to Lagos, they could have about four jus-tices and this will decongest the court.

‘’ For instance, I have about three appeals pending be-fore the court. These appeals were filed over three years ago. Appointing more justices to Lagos will lessen the workload of the justices. Presently, you may have one justice writing more than five judgements at a time. For-tunately, the current Presiding Justice of the court, Jus-tice Amina Adamu- Augie, is very hardworking and also very intelligent. This is what Lagos division of the court needs.

Chairman of Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Lagos Branch, Mr. Taiwo Obayemi Taiwo said ‘’what could be done is that more justices should be sent to Lagos because there are too many appeal cases emanating from all the courts in Lagos. It would not be too much to ask for an-other division of the Court of Appeal in Lagos State.

‘’There wouldn’t be any need to amende the Constitu-tion because the Constitution only set up the Court of Ap-peal, it did not create all the divisions. The divisions were created under the Court of Appeal Rules. Under the Rules of the Court, there are provisions for the President of the Court to make some adjustments by way of Practice Di-rection. So, to create another division would not require amendment of the constitution to create more divisions.

According to him, ‘’Lagos deserves to have about four panels of the court, judging by the number of cases at the Court of Appeal and ones being filed daily. The justices

in Lagos are trying their best, but they are overworked and overwhelmed. Something should be done to alleviate the ‘’suffering’’ of these justices. Appointment of more jus-tices will not affect the quality of judgement because all of them are cerebral and are knowledgeable in law, but it will affect their productivity.

Another Lagos Lawyer, Mr. Wale Adesokan shared this view and reasoned that the appellate court in Lagos re-quired more justices.

He said, ‘’considering the number of High Courts in the Ikeja, Lagos, Ikorodu and Badagry Divisions of Lagos State, adding the Federal High Courts in Ikeja and Ikoyi, as well as the Industrial Court in Ikoyi and the number of commercial and other cases being filed in those courts, it is very clear that we need more than two Court of Appeal panels in Lagos State.

“My recommendation is that the Ikeja division of the Court of Appeal should be created in addition to the ex-isting one in Lagos in which two panels sit simultane-ously’’.

National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net42 Monday, April 15, 2013Law & Justice

AugieLayonu Oditah

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 41

Oditah, Layonu, others task federal judiciary to clear backlog of cases

STEPS TOWARDS FORMATION OF A COMPANY

LEGAL TIPS

THE PRESIDENT OF THE COURT OF APPEAL COULD AS

A TEMPORARY MEASURE DRAFT SOME JUSTICES TO LAGOS

DIVISION TO HELP WITH THE BACKLOG OF CASES PENDING

BEFORE THE COURT

• The law regulating the formation of a company is the Companies and Allied Matters Act otherwise known as CAMA.

• Any two or more persons may form and incorporate a company upon fulfilling the statutory requirements for the particular type of company.

• Responsibility for the formation of companies is vested exclusively in legal practitioners as contained in CAMA.

• Formation of a company will involve the following:

.Taking instructions from the promoters.

.Preparing the incorporation documents; and

.Filling the incorporation documents with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), payment of the appropriate registration fees and obtaining the Certificate of Incorporation. • From the date of incorporation, the subscribers and anyone who later on becomes a member shall be a body corporate capable of exercising the powers of an incorporated company, shall have perpetual succession and also a common seal.

• Prospective promoters and businessman should consult lawyers when desirous of forming a company.

We welcome feedback and reactions from readers via our e-mail: [email protected]

Page 43: Monday, April 15, 2013

Monday, April 15, 2013National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 43

Page 44: Monday, April 15, 2013

Recently, President Jonathan Goodluck granted some people pardon regarding the crimes they allegedly committed in the past and a lot of reactions have greeted this develop-ment. What is your view on the issue?

I have nothing against state pardon, but they need to be merited. A situation where people have been given state par-don for participating in a coup is not the same as a situation where people have been convicted for criminal offences like misappropriation of public funds. So, I am not happy that the government put the two as if they belong together.

I can understand if the government in its wisdom through the Council of State decides to look upon those people who were said to have participated in coup with mercy since the alleged offence, treason, is an offence against the state.

My worry is when you pardon someone whose offence is misappropriation of public funds. When you say you are fighting the war against corruption and then you pardon someone who has this antecedent, it sends a wrong signal both at home and to the international community that cor-ruption is legitimate.

The development shows that we are not serious about what we are saying in respect of corruption and two; you send a signal locally that corruption is legal and that even if you are caught after a period of time you would be rehabili-tated. I don’t think that is appropriate.

What then do you think the framers of the constitution had in mind when they bestowed this prerogative to grant pardon on the president?

Firstly, the conception of granting pardon has no limita-tions and I know that in other countries, pardons have been granted by Presidents and head of states for political rea-son. I also think that the framers of the constitution granted the power to the president on the expectations that pardons would be granted for good reason and for the best interest of the country.

The issue of legislative immunity comes to the front burner when a bill to that effect passed the second reading at the House of Representatives, would you say the bill is in the best interest of the country?

I don’t think it is a good idea; even the extant executive im-munity is not a good idea. If you say that we are operating the rule of law and that nobody is above the law, then, everybody must be subjected to the law. Consequently, there should not be immunity.

The argument has been that there would be distraction if people are just allowed to file actions against the sitting gov-ernor or president as this may detract from their concentra-tion on the preponderant issue of governance. There may be some merit in this but I think the middle ground should be that immunity could exist only in relation to the actions these executives committed on behalf of government and not in personal capacity.

As for the legislators, I don’t see what they need immunity for. As a legislator, If I have a car accident and kill someone would that mean I should not be charged to court? If some-body gives you an envelope, to say please help me pass this bill and the thing is now discovered that the bill has been pushed through bribery, should legislative immunity mean that you

should not be prosecuted as a legislator? Should it mean I should not be liable for bribery and corruption because I am a legislator? It does not make sense. The way we are going in this country, there will no longer be law and order in the land, because if all the leaders like the legislators, the executives and even the judges have immunity, it is only the poor people who would be left without immunity.

There is an ongoing process for the amendment of the 1999 Constitution. Which specific areas would you identify for amendment?

The number one area that is burning in my mind now is the National Industrial Court. There is a part in it which says that in a civil matter there is no right of appeal. This provi-sion is inconsistent with the constitution that says that every-body has the right of appeal either as of right or by leave of

court. Unfortunately, the part of the constitution that brings in the NIC says in civil matters there is no appeal, so the first and the last court on this issue is NIC. This inconsistency is unnecessary and has to be redressed.

The second issue I want to address is this; we should take out of the constitution the schedule that lists local govern-ment areas. This is because we are operating the federal sys-tem of government comprising the Federal Government and states. We talk of three tiers of government in recognition of the local government but the local government is under the state. Now once you have listed the local government inside the constitution like we have done, it makes it impossible for states to create more local government areas, if they need it, but that should not be the case under a federal system. So we need to amend the constitution by taking off the local govern-ment schedule.

The judiciary workers a couple of months ago embarked on strike and grounded the court system before they called off the industrial action. . What does this portend to the country’s administration of justice?

It is very unfortunate. If it true that the government reached agreement with the judiciary workers which it has not kept. Then, there is an incumbent obligation on the gov-ernment to abide by the term of the agreement. Having said that, I will also add that this is a kind of situation when our Industrial Court should prove very useful. May be the work-ers should have taken the government to the industrial court and ask the court to declare that the agreement is binding and that the government should be asked to respect it.

Whenever there is a strike, a lot of people have their mat-

National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net44 Monday, April 15, 2013Law & Justice

SOME LAWYERS WOULD TAKE MONEY FROM THEIR CLIENTS

ON THE AGREEMENT THAT THEY WOULD DELIVER SUCH MONEY TO

JUDGES

Adekoya (SAN)

Mrs. Funke Adekoya is the fifth woman to be elevated to the rank of Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN). A leading partner in AELEX Legal Practitioners and Arbitrators, she has carved a niche for herself over the years both in active legal practice and Bar activism. In this interview with the Assistant Head, Judiciary desk, KAYODE KETEFE, she speaks on the ideal role of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) and the plight of young lawyers among other diverse issues. Excerpts.

Lawmakers don’t deserve legislative

Page 45: Monday, April 15, 2013

ters delayed. But I don’t put the blames on the feet of the ju-diciary workers. If they have a prior agreement, government should not shirk away from its responsibilities.

The NBA increased the practising fees for lawyers this year and expectedly a lot of lawyers are not happy about this development. Is this increment justified?

Personally, I agreed with the increment. I think the cost of living has gone up. Children’s school fees have gone up, the food stuffs in the market have followed suit; the cost of every-thing has gone up. If we want to deliver good services the cost of practising fees should also go up. It is as simple as that.

When you compare what you pay in Nigeria as practising fees with what some countries comparable to us like Kenya, not just UK and USA are paying; you would see that our fees, even with this increment, are by no means too much. What I think our people should ask is “What are the services the NBA is providing for the practising fees that we are paying for?” On this point I think the NBA too needs to step up its efforts to provide services that lawyers can see.

We need to be able to go to NBA if we have an issue and get protection; we need to be able to go there when we need guides and want information. Even when a member needs to locate another lawyer, the person should be able to do that from the NBA office.

Again, a lot of lawyers are not computer literates, the as-sociation should be able to assist them so that they would be able to acquire this vital skill and be beneficiaries of all the advantages the information and communication technology has to offer. NBA needs to do more for our members. When

these services are being rendered, I think our colleagues would no longer be asking the question “What are they doing with our money?”

There is a perennial complaint by young lawyers that they are not being adequately remunerated by the senior lawyers. How do you think this problem should be addressed?

I think the problem with the senior lawyers lies in the way they run their chambers; they don’t record the money they are getting. They feel they cannot offer to pay a lot of money to the junior lawyers. If you don’t have proper accounting sys-tem in place and you are just collecting money from clients, and as far there is money, you are paying salaries; you might not know how much you are making.

If you have a proper accounting system and you are moni-toring the cash flow, you would be able to make critical evalu-ation of your incomes and how to properly place the lawyers working under you. If you don’t do this, you might just con-tinue thinking you are not making enough money to offer your lawyers very good salaries.

This is another area the NBA can help in terms of set-ting up structures in advising the senior lawyers on just how to do their accounts. This is not to look at how much money they have made, it is to give them basic guidelines on how to make projections and business plan for the year.

Having said that, I think many senior lawyers, not even only the SANs, can do more in terms of what they are pay-ing their juniors. I don’t even agree to a proposal that a se-nior lawyer should pay a minimum of N50, 000 a month to a junior. Because in Ibadan, may be N50, 000 may be manage-able, but in Lagos N50, 000 for a lawyer is nothing.

By the time he spends at least N1, 000 for transport every day and N10, 000 a month for accommodation in a one room somewhere in Agege area; he feeds himself and he also buys cloths, you would realise that he cannot survive on N50, 000.

Specifically, how can senior lawyers help the junior ones?In England, there is a saying that when you have a ju-

nior, you take the pounds and he takes the shillings. Se-nior lawyers can work with junior lawyers under some pre-arranged formula that will benefit them both. For example, it might be agreed that for every brief that the lawyer has which the junior works on, the junior is to get 10 to 20 percent. The junior lawyer will even be encouraged by this kind of arrangement, because he would know that he is getting money from the work he is doing. There are so many ways other ways the senior lawyers can assist ju-niors.

An average man today has the impression that the judiciary is corrupt. How true is this impression?

Unfortunately, I think the allegation is substantially true, or let me put it this way substantially when it touches election petitions and political matters. Whenever any judgment is delivered on political or election matter, it is insinuated that somebody has gone to see the judge. Unfortunately, some of these stories we heard are sometimes true. Some unscrupu-lous lawyers however also contributed in creating the im-pression that the common man gets about the judiciary these times. Some lawyers would take money from their clients on the agreement that they would deliver such money to judges! Many times, they would not deliver anything; they are just using the ploy to get money from their clients.

There is need to organise more judiciary training for judg-es. There are instances when you read some judgments and you keep wondering how the judge reached the decision. It could be that the judge does not have the necessary exposures and doesn’t know the law. But from the perspective of a liti-

gant, who had already been told by his lawyer that he needs to bring money for onward delivery to the judge, he would think that the judge gave that judgment because he had not seen him. “If I had seen him through my emissary, I could have won” he might reason.

These are the kind of things that fuel the impression of corruption in the judiciary. Nonetheless, there are bad eggs but unfortunately everybody is being painted with the same colour of corruption. I thank God for the Chief Justice of Ni-geria we have who is taking step to improving the reputation of the judges by insisting that allegations against judges are getting deserved attention and making people to know that any judge found guilty of corruption would be booted out of the system.

Regarding those judges who are corrupt on the Bench, how do you think they manage to go about their corruption prac-tice, do they demand bribe directly or otherwise?

They are so many ways they might do it. Your matter may not be heard on time as it keeps suffering adjournment upon adjournments. If you as a lawyer then say “My lord please, can we have an early date?” Then the judge might say, “They are paying you, whether you get early date or not, they are paying you for the work you are doing for them.”

If a lawyer says “My Lord each time this matters come up , your court is not sitting, the case is not progressing .” The judge may make certain statement like “You guys are mak-ing big money and you want to kill us with work; the money you are making, are we sharing with you?” Sometimes it is the lawyers who makes the move and go and corrupt the judges. They would go there and start telling the judges that they want their matters speedily heard, and end up with a statement like “If it is good for me it will be good for you too!” Some judges would fall and some would not fall.

Law is an instrument of social engineering, How can law be employed as instrument to curb corruption in the country?

One, we have to institute a policy on public interest litiga-tion, so that when we have a situation when something is go-ing wrong, the public either through the Bar association or through civil society can actually institute action to procure redress or to forestall an unwanted but imminent state of af-fairs.

Once you get the problem of locus standi solved, which is one the things that disturbs public interest litigation, you can challenge action of omission or corruption that borders on corruption.

The Freedom of Information Act has helped in this direc-tion, but we need to do more. Now we heard all sorts of sto-ries circulating about who owns oil blocs. With FOI Act, what we need to do is just to write to Department of Petroleum Resources and say give me the lists of the owners of oil-blocs; I want to know who are the owners of so and so companies and then go to the Corporate Affairs Commission to conduct your own search.

The strengthening of our public institutions, encourage-ment of public interest litigation by removing legal obstacles on its way and ensuring stricter enforcement of our laws are some ways the law can assist in fighting corruption.

National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 45Monday, April 15, 2013 Law & Justice

immunity –AdekoyaIF ALL THE LEADERS, LIKE THE LEGISLATORS, THE EXECUTIVES

AND EVEN THE JUDGES HAVE IMMUNITY, IT IS ONLY THE POOR

PEOPLE WHO WOULD BE LEFT WITHOUT IMMUNITY

Page 46: Monday, April 15, 2013

Monday, April 15, 2013Law & Justice46 National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net

FAMOUS CASES

Ex-convict saga: How S’Court absolved Ibori

James Ibori was the Delta State governor from 1999 to 2007. He had been accused by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) of stealing

and misappropriating of state funds and also putting such funds in foreign accounts.

He escaped being tried in Nigeria, but the law caught up with him in the UK. Ibori was convicted and sen-tenced to 13 years jail -term at about 3.20p.m on April 17, 2012 by Judge Anthony Pitts of the Southwark Crown Court in the UK. His conviction was sequel to a ‘guilty plea’ he made to a number of corruption and money laundering charges preferred against him. These charges were put at about $250million and included the V-Mobile and Bombardaire scams which amounted to $50million.

Prior to his conviction in the UK, he had been indict-ed for corrupt practices after his two-term tenure as the Delta State Governor. Besides, he had also faced accusa-tion of being an ex-convict to which his legal team and himself variously denied.

It was therefore not surprising that two Delta State indigenes, Engineer Goodnews Agbi and Anthony Alabi headed for an Abuja High Court in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and sought a declaration to stop Ibori from seeking re-election as the state governor in 2003.

The plaintiffs had told the court that by virtue of Ibo-ri’s previous conviction at the Bwari Upper Area Court, he was not qualified to contest election as the People’s Democratic Party‘s (PDP’s ) gubernatorial candidate for the 2003 Delta State governorship election.

They also claimed injunctive reliefs aimed at re-straining the then PDP National Chairman, Chief Audu Ogbeh, another PDP Chieftain, Chief Vincent Ogbula-for, and the Independent National Electoral Commis-sion (INEC) from presenting Ibori to the INEC as the party’s candidate for the said elections.

After the addresses of the lawyers, the trial judge, Justice Mukhtar, in his ruling delivered on March 24, 2003, ruled that there was “no conviction against the accused in that case”, and dismissed the claims of the plaintiffs.

Agbi and Alabi appealed against the ruling. The Court of Appeal, after criticising the procedure adopted by the trial judge, held that on the face of Exhibit A, there was a conviction of the person therein named as the accused.

The court, however, held that in order to determine the identity of the person convicted, it was imperative to remit the case to the High Court for trial de novo. This would enable the court to establish the identity of the convicted person.

Indeed, the facts of the case are that on September 28, 1995, the Upper Area Court, Bwari in FCT in a criminal case No CR-81-95 convicted one James Onanefe Ibori for the offences of negligent conduct and criminal breach of trust under Summary Trial Procedure under the pro-visions of Section 157 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the former Northern Region of Nigeria, applicable to the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The said convict was sentenced to a fine of N1, 000 or one year imprison-ment on the information.

As far as Agbi and Alabi were concerned, the identity of the convict remained the same Ibori.

Ibori, however, felt dissatisfied with the decision of

the Court of Appeal and appealed to the Supreme Court. The appellants were also aggrieved with the verdict and they also cross-appealed.

In its judgement, the Supreme Court, on February 6, 2004, dismissed both the appeal and the cross-appeal and affirmed the decision of the Court of Appeal. The court equally sent the case to the High Court for trial de novo.

The Supreme Court had also unequivocally held that the issue of the conviction of one James Onanefe Ibori was settled beyond any dispute, and ‘’ what remains in dispute was whether the 4th respondent was, in fact, the person convicted in Exhibit A in CR/81/95, C.O.P. vs. James Ibori.’’

The trial de novo came before Justice Hussein Mukhtar, who ordered pleadings as directed by the Su-preme Court.

At the end of the testimonies and after the written

addresses, the judge, on November 8, 2004 delivered his judgement dismissing the plaintiffs’ claims and granted partially Ibori’s claims in his counter-claim.

Insisting that they were sure of their facts, the men accordingly appealed to the Court of Appeal, but the ap-pellate court on May 21, 2005 dismissed the plaintiffs’ claims.

Dissatisfied with the decision again, Agbi and Alabi pursued the case at the Court of Appeal. The Notice of appeal contains 10 grounds of appeal against the judge-ment of the Court of Appeal.

Lagos lawyer, Chief Gani Fawehinmi (SAN) argued the appeal on behalf of Agbi and Alabi while Dr. Alex Izinyon (SAN) represented Ibori. The panel of the Su-preme Court justices that heard the appeal were, Salihu Modibbo Alfa Belgore, Idris Legbo Kutigi, Umaru Atu Kalgo, Dahiru Musdapher, Sunday Akinola Akintan, Walter Samuel Nkanu Onnoghen, and Ikechi Francis Ogbuagu.

In its lead judgement delivered on Friday, May 19, 2006, the Supreme Court unanimously declared that the ap-peal brought by the men was unmeritorious.

Justice Musdapher who read the lead verdict ac-cordingly dismissed this appeal and affirmed the de-cisions of the lower courts.

According to him, ‘’ In attempting to prove their case, the appellants called P.W.1, Alhaji. Awwal Yu-suf the presiding judge of the Upper Area Court. He gave his evidence which was not believed by the trial court and the Court of Appeal.

He said ‘’ The appellants unfortunately led no evi-dence in proof of these averments. The appellants also failed to call any other witness beside P.W. 1 to establish the identity of the convict. Under the circumstances, it is obvious that issues 1, 3 and 4 are not made out. I re-solve them against the appellants. Both the lower courts considered the pleadings and the evidence led by the plaintiffs and rightly came to the conclusion that they failed to prove, the identity of the convict aforesaid.’’

Six other justices concurred with the lead judgement that the judge found contradictions and inconsistencies in the evidence of trial Upper Area Court judge, Awwal Yusuf (PW1) whereby he disbelieved the latter that it was Ibori that he tried.

By the apex court’s decision, Ibori escaped being stopped from seeking re-election into the Delta State Government House.

Four years ago, the EFCC instituted 170-count corrup-tion charges against the ex-governor at the Federal High Court, Asaba, Delta State.

Surprisingly however, the trial judge, Justice Marcel Awokunlehin, ruled that Ibori had no case to answer and accordingly quashed the charges.

Almost a year ago, former Governor of Delta State, James Onanefe Ibori was sentenced to 13 years imprisonment by a Southwark Crown Court in the United Kingdom (UK). FRANCIS FAMOROTI, Head, Judiciary reflects on how the Nige-rian Supreme Court in 2006 absolved the former governor of the ex-convict contro-versy arising from the Bwari Upper Area Court about 18 years ago.

ON SEPTEMBER 28, 1995, THE UPPER AREA COURT,

BWARI IN FCT IN A CRIMINAL CASE NO CR-81-95 CONVICTED ONE JAMES ONANEFE IBORI FOR THE OFFENCES OF NEGLIGENT CONDUCT AND CRIMINAL

BREACH OF TRUST

Justice AwokunlehinIbori

Page 47: Monday, April 15, 2013

Law & JusticeNational Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 47Monday, April 15, 2013

Foreign

United States

Rockefeller impostor convicted, faces 27 years jail-term

Ondo Judiciary has witnessed transformation–CJ

A German-born conman who posed for years as a member of America’s

wealthy Rockefeller family has been convicted of the 1985 mur-der of his California landlady’s son, whose dismembered body was found a decade later buried in the backyard of a Los Ange-les-area home.

A Los Angeles Superior Court jury deliberated for less than a day before returning a guilty verdict against 52-year-old Chris-tian Karl Gerhartsreiter, follow-ing a month-long trial in the sen-sational case.

Gerhartsreiter, who for years lived under various aliases, including Clark Rockefeller, showed little reaction as clerk read the verdict in court. He

faces a maximum penalty of 27 years to life in prison when he is sentenced in June.

The remains of John Sohus, 27, were discovered in 1994 bur-ied in the backyard of the home he shared with his wife, Linda, in the Los Angeles suburb of San Marino.

Both John and Linda Sohus were both reported missing in 1984, while Gerhartsreiter was renting a guest house on the property from Sohus’ mother and living under the guise of a British aristocrat named Chris-topher Chichester.

By the time John Sohus’ re-

mains were unearthed by a work crew preparing to build a swim-ming pool on the property for a new owner, Gerhartsreiter had

resurfaced on the East Coast un-der other assumed names.

Linda Sohus remains missing and is presumed dead.

Gerhartsreiter’s double life unraveled after he was arrested in 2008 for abducting his young daughter in Boston following a bitter divorce and was revealed to have passed himself off for 16 years as a member of the Rock-efeller clan, gaining entry into high society.

He was convicted in 2009 of kid-napping, assault and battery and was serving a four-year prison sentence in Massachusetts when he was charged by authorities in Los Angeles with the Sohus slay-ing.

The case against Gerhartsreit-

er, who came to the United States from Germany as a student in the 1970s, has drawn so much atten-tion that his story became the sub-ject of a 2010 made-for-TV movie titled “Who is Clark Rockefeller?”

Speaking outside of court fol-lowing the verdict, jurors said they were convinced of Gerharts-reiter’s guilt by evidence that in-cluded the bags that held Sohus’s dismembered remains. The bags bore logos from two school Ger-hartsreiter had attended - the University of Southern Califor-nia and University of Wisconsin Milwaukee.

Jurors said they were also swayed by his behavior after the crime, moving across the country and changing his identity.

Gerhartsreiter

OJO OYEWAMIDE AKURE

The Judiciary in Nigeria is being confronted with a myriad of chal-lenges. It has been neglected over

the years, especially during the military era, a development which caused a lot of damage to the psyche of the judicial work-ers. Although the country’s constitution recognizes the judiciary as the third arm of government, this status has not trans-lated into adequate funding, infrastruc-ture and personnel.

But in the past two years, efforts have been made in Ondo state to scale down these challenges. The present courts in the state were said to have been built about 30 years ago and there had not been any improvement in terms of aesthetics. But now, the courts have been renovated, each of which has become conducive to workers. The state of the courts is now a clear depar-ture from what it was.

Speaking with National Mirror, the Chief Judge of Ondo State,. Justice Olas-ehinde Kumuyi, said the judiciary in the state had witnessed tremendous growth since he came on board. “I think the work environment is now better. In the last two years, we have achieved tremendous growth in Ondo state. If you talk of physi-cal development, we have renovated all the courts. What you see in my chambers now is what you see everywhere in Ondo state. Go to Owo, Ikare, Ondo, Okitipupa, Oka and the other places, all the court halls and chambers have been renovated. We are also doing a lot of infrastructural development.

One of the reasons cases are not being dispensed on time is because there are no enough judges to handle them. For a period of seven years preceding 2010, the state reportedly lost nine judges to retirement, death and elevation. The development caused a situation where the remaining judges were burdened down with cases. It was not possible for the judges to expedi-

tiously dispose most of the cases in their courts’ dockets. But in the last two years, more judges have been appointed.

Kumuyi said: “In the area of man-power, we have had more judges. We were 15 when I came on board. We are now 21. We have also extended training to all the judges in the state and other staff in the ju-diciary. We try to make provision for their training. In fact to be a Registrar in this dispensation, you must have a university degree. The judiciary has been profession-alised now. We could not have achieved all these but for the state government that pro-vided the funds.”

It was learnt that up till 2010, the state had only 21 Magistrates to manage the 18 Local Government Areas and about three million people despite the rise in crimes and other social activities which involve the intervention of the courts. This was considered grossly insufficient. Most of the Magistrates were helpless and over-worked as it was not possible for them to handle the volumes of cases in their courts with dispatch. But within the last two years, the Chief Judge has appointed, through the ap-proval of the governor, about 40 additional Magistrates.

In the past when a judge retired, mi-nor sicknesses would begin to set in soon after his retirement, because the judge had been overused. At night, he would be busy reading and writing because he wanted to deliver judgments and when he retired, he actually was tired. Most retired judges managed terrible diseases which was a re-sult of overwork while in active service on the Bench. To prevent this, it was gathered, the Chief Judge appointed for every judge a Staff Attorney who assists to carry out le-gal research in order to reduce the burden on the judge. The Staff Attorney is a lawyer who is competent to appear in court.

Another remarkable initiative of the state judiciary is the Rapid Justice System. This is meant to achieve speedy justice de-livery. Explaining the initiative, Kumuyi

said: “In the last two years, we discovered that the percentage of the people who are awaiting trial and those that are serving prison terms in the Olokuta Maximum Prison, Akure, is a ratio of 80 to 20. Yet, we say we are running a system that pre-sumes that they are innocent. What is the problem? A think tank was set up and we discovered a lot of problems associated with bringing prison inmates to court. We confronted the problems headlong and es-tablished two High Courts in the precincts of the prison, the first in Nigeria and in-deed, in Africa. Two judges now attend to only cases of people awaiting trial and I am glad that the number is decreasing. They are less prone to violence now be-cause they know their cases will surely come up.”

The adjudicative system being oper-ated in the country is such that people (litigants) don’t come back from court and

still relate as friends. This is because the system is too foreign, hostile and does not seem to repair society. So, the Chief Judge has commenced the process of establish-ing what is called a Multi-door System. The system is another window of resolu-tion where alternative dispute resolution mechanism operates.

“The new rules make provision for arbitration. But the bottom line is the fact that in our area here, we have little com-mercial cases. Most of the cases deal with land. I must confess the Multi-door system is an idea we are still toying with.

We want to make sure that it is not ev-ery case that we take to litigation. The in-tention is to ensure that people have a way of ventilating away their grievances not necessarily going through litigation but resolving disputes between them. It is an-other alternative to litigation,” the Chief Judge said.

Other remarkable achievements of the state judiciary in the last two years include the establishment of a Family Court- an innovation of the Chief Judge, and the cre-ation of the Customary Court of Appeal with the approval of the state government.

Also, there is the new High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules which came to force on the 31st of December, 2012. Toward the better understanding and appreciation of the High Court Rules, there was a three-day workshop last week (9th-11th of April) where Judges, Magistrates, Lawyers, Reg-istrars and other stakeholders from within and outside the state deliberated on the op-eration of the new rules.

The next project that the Judiciary in Ondo state is said to be working on is to ensure that judges are no longer record-ing in longhand. Stenographers, comput-er recording, video and audio recording are going to take over. It is expected that by the time this is achieved, the turnover of cases will increase. It is hoped that more developments will still come the way of Judiciary in years to come.

Justice Kumuyi

Page 48: Monday, April 15, 2013

Community Mirror48 National Mirror

www.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013

“I am delighted to be part of your shooting competition. I never bargained to win but it indicates that even within fi ve minutes, a

good student would always be a good student. ”AKWA IBOM STATE GOVERNOR, GODSWILL AKPABIO

DANJUMA WILLIAMSGOMBE

Following the communal clash between Waja and Dafiya community’s inBal-

anga LGA of Gombe State, that claimed the lives of four persons, the Tangale/Waja Women Develop-ment Association, TAWADA, has appealed for peace in the area.

Making the appeal in Kaltungo,at the annual general meeting and cultural exhibition, National President of the associa-tion, Mrs. Finney David said the need for peace is very important if Gombe South Area, to which Bal-anga belongs, must experience the desired development.

She said, “it is with mixed feel-ings to some of us who have been affected by the recent civil distur-

bances in Bambam. Our hearts go out to those who lost their lives, families, houses and means of live-lihood”.

She said there can be no develop-ment without peace, stressing that the warring groups should forgive each other and live in peace.

Mrs. David condemned the clashes, saying women and chil-dren are always at the become end of every crisis as they are left wid-owed and children are left to roam the streets once the bread winners are dead.

She said “I beg our women to support the peace process and plead with their husbands to live with one another, as we are one big family. We should join hands to fight poverty, corruption and injus-tice rather than fighting and killing each other”.

Association pleads for peace in Gombe

FRANCIS SUBERU

A Bureau de Change opera-tor, Alhaji Usman Sani, has dragged a former Inspector

General of Police, IGP, Mr. Tafa Ba-logun to an Ikeja High Court for un-lawful arrest and detention of his friend, Alhaji Ahmed Kamba.

Alhaji Sani, who is promoter of ‘Great Endurance BDC Limited, Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos, in the suit No. ID/241m/13 of April 5, 2013, is pray-

ing for an enforcement of his fun-damental rights to personal liberty pursuant to Order 11 rules 1, 2 & 3 of the fundamental rights (Enforce-ment procedure) rules, 2009, section 35 of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999, articles 5, 6 & 14 of the African Charter on hu-man and Peoples’ right.

According to him, in January 2011 he received a sum of N10 million from ex-IGP Tafa Balogun for trans-action on condition to pay N150, 000 on a weekly basis to the latter.

The applicant claimed he duti-

fully paid the sum of N150, 000 in cash on a weekly basis to Balogun at his Ikoyi residence, Lagos till June 22, 2012 and, a cumulative sum of N11, 550, 000 was also re-ceived by him.

Also, Sani said he received ad-ditional N10 million from the re-spondent on June 26, 2012 and he obtained an undertaking to pay N325, 000 on a weekly basis.

At the end of March 2013, the applicant claimed he had paid N12, 675,000 to the respondent, only for the latter to demand for the initial

N20 million. He said in his affidavit, that he

could not have owed the respon-dent (Tafa Balogun), N20 million having paid N24, 225,000 per weekly installment for a period of time.

His disagreement with the re-spondent led to the arrest of his bo-som friend, Alhaji Ahmed Kamba in order to get at him.

He is now praying the court to order the release of his friend and to declare the respondents’ action illegal and violation of his friend’s fundamental rights.

Bureau de Change operator sues ex- IGP EMMA GBEMUDUYENAGOA

The Joint Task Force, JTF, has donated relief materi-als to victims of land slide

in Okoloba, Kolokuma /Opokuma Local Government Area of Bayelsa State.

Items donated included bags of rice, mosquito nets, clothing and toiletries.

The landslide which recently oc-curred in the community destroyed eight buildings, while displacing many families.

Presenting the materials, JTF Commander, Major Gen. Bata Debi-ro, said they were meant as pallia-tive to victims of the landslide.

Debiro, who was represented by the coordinator, Civil-Military Af-fairs of JTF, Col. Augustine Odoba, stated that the donation was part of the Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR, of the agency to host commu-nities.

He said it the agency was ready to partner with communities in the Niger Delta to encourage excellent civil-military relations.

Earlier, the traditional ruler of Okoloba, King MacCarthy Macpherson, lauded the JTF for the donation, stressing that it will help victims of the disaster that ravaged the community.

He said:”The gesture will remain indelible in the minds of members of the community for a very long time. I am assuring you of the will-ingness of the community to coop-erate with the JTF in executing its mandate in the Niger Delta”.

It would be recalled that the par-amount ruler of the community, Chief Orumobiri Woyergikuro, had blamed the landslide on the alleged refusal of the Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, to complete the Shore Protection project.

Woyegikuro alleged that failure of NDDC and the Dredging Atlan-tic to execute the work was costing the community losses of millions of naira.

He said:”For five years, the com-pany has refused to commence work on the shore protection work that would have helped the commu-nity”.

But, an official of Dredging At-lantic, Port Harcourt, Alex Ogieva, said the law suit against the firm by some members of the community over N50million compensation was responsible for stoppage of work on the project.

MURITALA AYINLA

The Lagos State Government has said it has plans to gen-erate 10,000 jobs in agro-

business, just as it revealed that 40 percent of farm produce, especially vegetable are lost through post-har-vest activities.

Speaking at the launch of the Eko Farmers’ mart at Ajah and Surulere, the Commissioner for Agriculture and Cooperatives, Mr. Gbolahan Lawal, said the loss had contributed to the huge gap between the farm gate and market price without guarantee for quality

product in the state.The commissioner added that

during the supply period, a lot of post-harvest losses occurred that could be as high as 60 percent for vegetable.

He said: “A lot of people are involved in bringing the produce from local producers to markets in the urban centres with each adding their profit margin.Transportation difficulty has also contributed neg-atively to the landing price of agri-cultural products as many farmers leave their farms a day before mar-ket day and this affects the quality of their produce.”

JTF donates items to landslide victims

Lagos to create agricultural jobs

Crowd waiting to purchase kerosene at NNNPC mega station on Moshood Abiola Way in Abeokuta. PHOTO: NAN

The president said the associa-tion is executing a programme for 100 girls who will be taught voca-tional skills and given seed money

to help them become self reliant, as she promised that the number of the beneficiaries would be in-creased in future.

Page 49: Monday, April 15, 2013

PAUL ARHEWEWITH AGENCY REPORTS

Nine al-Shabaab Islamic extremists, most wearing suicide vests, stormed So-

malia’s main court complex yes-terday while the Supreme Court was in session, firing a barrage of bullets during a running gun battle with security forces that lasted two hours, officials said.

Sixteen people, including the nine attackers, are believed to have died after gunmen stormed the city’s main court buildings.

Later a car bomb was detonat-ed on the road to the airport, kill-ing three; including two Turkish aid workers and the attacker.

The Islamist militant group al-Shabaab says it carried out the attacks.

The assault was the most serious in Mogadishu since al-Shabaab militants were forced out of the capital in August 2011. Al-Shabaab controls far less ter-

ritory today than in years past, and its influence appears to be on the decline, but Sunday’s at-tack proved the extremists are still capable of pulling off well-planned and audacious assaults.

The attack on the Supreme Court complex began at around 12:30 p.m., sparking running battles with police and army forces. Two bomb blasts were heard and gunmen were seen on the roof of a court build-ing firing shots, an Associated Press reporter at the scene said. Police officer Hassan Abdulahi said he saw five dead bodies ly-ing at the entrance to the court.

The militants took an un-known number of hostages dur-ing the siege. Many other govern-ment workers and civilians in the court complex — a confusing labyrinth of buildings and rooms — hid while fearing for their lives.

Western officials knew mili-tants had been planning some-thing major. The British For-

eign Office on Friday released a travel warning for Somalia that warned of a high threat of ter-rorism. “We continue to believe that terrorists are in the final stages of planning attacks in Mogadishu,” it said.

The complex and sustained nature of the assault on the court system suggested mili-

tants hoped to inflict severe casualties. Later, a suicide car bomber rammed a vehicle carry-ing Turkish citizens.

On a Twitter feed believed to be-long to the militants, al-Shabaab appeared to take credit for the at-tack. A posting said five militants from the “Martyrdom Brigade” took part in the “daring” attack.

John Kerry, the US secretary of state, has said Washington

will “do what is neces-sary” to protect its Asian allies against any provoca-tive acts by North Korea.

Kerry made the com-ments on Sunday after meeting his Japanese counterpart, Fumio Kishi-da, in Tokyo on the last leg of his Asia tour.

But he stressed that Washington wanted a peaceful solution to rising tensions in the region.

“I think it is really unfor-tunate that there has been so much focus and attention in the media and elsewhere on the subject of war, when what we really ought to be talking about is the possi-bility of peace,” Kerry said.

He said “denuclearisa-tion” was a reality and that peaceful resolution to the issues of North Korea re-

mained a “big priority”.The visit came just a day

before North’s biggest holi-day of the year, the Day of the Sun, the birth date of state founder Kim Il-sung.

The day is an occasion for pomp and perhaps a military display.

The North’s state me-dia, one of the few ways of glimpsing what is hap-pening in the reclusive country, has so far ignored Kerry’s talks in Beijing and Seoul, his first stops on

the three-nation visit.Kerry met China’s se-

nior leaders in Beijing on Saturday in a bid to per-suade them to push reclu-sive North Korea, whose sole main ally is China, to scale back its belligerence and return to nuclear talks.

North Korea has for weeks escalated threats of nuclear attacks on the US and South Korea, raising tensions on the Korean peninsula.

L-R: U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry meets with Chinese State Councillor, Yang Jiechi at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing. PHOTO: AP

49National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013

World News

Venezuelans lined up yesterday to vote whether to honour Hugo Chavez’s dying wish for a long time loyalist to continue his hardline socialism or hand power to a young chal-lenger vowing business-friendly changes.

Acting President Nicolas Maduro had a double-digit lead in most polls heading into election day, buoyed by Chavez’s public blessing before he died from cancer last month. But the gap had narrowed in the final days, with one survey putting it at 7 percentage points.

Maduro supporters mobilized voters in the rough barrios of Caracas, where the late Chavez is revered as a hero of the poor, sounding a pre-dawn bugle call urging citizens to get out and vote. Lines formed under a blistering sun outside voting centers all around the capital.

“Nicolas is going to win, but we can’t afford to be triumpha-list. We need to work hard to get people out to vote,” said Chavista activist Mario Izarra, 33, who was up all night helping the So-cialist Party mobilize voters and cast his own ballot at 6 a.m.

Maduro, a 50-year-old former bus driver who trumpets his working-class roots, is promis-ing to deepen Chavez’s “21st cen-tury socialism” if he triumphs. Capriles, an athletic 40-year-old who has generated widespread enthusiasm among the opposi-tion, wants to take Venezuela down a more centrist path.

Venezuelans vote for successor to Chavez

Seven killed in gun battle in CAR capital

At least seven people were killed in the capital of Central African Republic yesterday during heavy fighting between forces who seized power last month and armed youths loyal to the president they ousted, a doctor and a resident said.

A Reuters correspondent said heavy and small arms fire rang out in Bangui’s Boy-Rabe neighborhood on Sunday morning before easing off just after 0900 EST. Three of the dead were killed when a shell landed on a church.

Michel Djotodia seized power last month when he swept through the mineral-rich but isolated country with thou-sands of rebels, forcing Presi-dent Francois Bozize to flee.

General Moussa Dhaffane, who said he was acting as a government spokesman, said Sunday’s fighting erupted after the forces patrolled through the neighborhood, which is a stronghold for pro-Bozize youths who were armed during the rebel advance.

WORLD BULLETIN

Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad whose country is facing sanctions over nucle-ar programme has begun three-nation visit to

West Africa.Ahmadinejad visit to West Africa will take him to

Benin, Ghana and Niger, the world’s fourth-largest uranium producer, Iranian media have reported.

The Fars news agency said Ahmadinejad’s trip began yesterday and that he would meet the presi-dents of the three countries and sign agreements to develop economic and political relations.

Ahmadinejad was expected to arrive in Benin yesterday afternoon on an official visit in his capac-ity as chairman of the Non-Aligned Movement of countries, the country’s foreign minister, Nassirou Arifari Bako, told the AFP news agency.

“Education, agriculture and, above all, energy” will be on the agenda, the minister said.

Ahmadinejad then heads to Niger on Monday for a two-day visit, the government in Niamey said.

“He will lead a large delegation and both our nations will discuss cooperation and means of strengthening it,” Iran’s ambassador told reporters after a meeting with Niger’s President Mahamadou Issoufou.

Mohammad Nikkhah said the visit would be a turning point in bilateral ties and would yield “ex-cellent opportunities that will benefit both peoples”.

He did not elaborate, but Niger is one of the world’s top producers of uranium, which Iran has long been seeking to acquire for its controversial nuclear programme.

Ahmadinejad begins trip to West AfricaNorth Korea: US will protect

its Asian allies –Kerry

“Pakistan’s government signed off on (US drones) strikes “only on a few occasions, when a target was absolutely

isolated and no chance of collateral damage”– FORMER PAKISTANI PRESIDENT, PERVEZ MUSHARRAF

19 killed in attack on Somali Supreme Court

Somali soldiers carrying a wounded civilian from the entrance of Mogadi-shu’s court complex after being injured during a siege by militants in Moga-dishu, Somalia, yesterday. PHOTO: AP

Page 50: Monday, April 15, 2013

Saudi prince backs women driversSaudi billionaire

Prince Alwaleed bin Talal has indi-

cated support of allow-ing women there to drive.

He says that would help the kingdom’s campaign to cut down on the num-ber of foreign workers.

Saudi Arabia follows an ultraconservative in-

terpretation of Islam and bans women from driv-ing.

“The question of al-lowing women to drive in Saudi Arabia will save more than 500,000 jobs in addition to the social and economic benefits,” the prince wrote Sunday on his Twitter account.

50 National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013World News

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National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 51NorthMonday, April 15, 2013

Executive members of the Catholic Women Organisation of St. James Catholic Church, Gombe, cutting a cake to mark the Mothers’ Day in Gombe, yesterday. PHOTO: NAN

AZA MSUE KADUNA

Gunmen yesterday morning killed Yohana Yakubu,

a younger brother to the Nigerian National Petro-leum Corporation (NNPC) Group Managing Director, Mr. Andrew Yakubu, on Kachia Road in the South-ern part of Kaduna State.

An eye witness said that Yohana (47) and his wife were on their way to at-tend a funeral in Zangon Kataf Local Government Area when the incident oc-curred.

The witness said: “They have driven to somewhere near Idon village in Ka-chia Local Government Area before they were am-bushed by the gunmen and

killed. But Yohana’s wife was not hurt. The incident occurred at about 7:0am.

“Yohana was a Kaduna Refinery and Petrochemi-cal Company worker.”

His body has, however, been deposited at a mortu-ary in Kaduna.

National Mirror learnt that suspected armed rob-bers operated in the area unchallenged on Saturday,

in spite of the check-point manned by soldiers.

The Kaduna State Com-missioner of Police, Mr Adefemi Adenaike, con-firmed the incident, but said that the killing was perpetrated by armed rob-bers.

Adenaike said: “Armed robbers shot him on the neck, he was taken to a hospital and later die.”

Gunmen kill NNPC GMD’s brother, Yohana Yakubu

The House of Rep-resentatives Com-mittee on Diaspora

Affairs has called on the Federal Government to rescue the 26 Nigerians currently stranded in the Republic of Tunisia.

The committee, which reacted to the develop-ment yesterday through its chairman, Hon. Abike Dabiri-Erewa, disclosed that the 26 Nigerians, in-cluding a child at the Unit-ed Nations Refugee Agency camp in Choucha, Tunisia, sent a letter to the commit-tee, pleading to be evacu-ated from the country.

In a statement she signed in Abuja, Hon.

Dabiri-Erewa decried the dehumanising condition of the 26 Nigerians at the refugee camp.

She reminded the Fed-eral Government on its citizen diplomacy policy, asking it to expedite action in rescuing of the stranded Nigerians.

The lawmaker also urged the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to as-sist the stranded Nigerians with support for feeding and other essential neces-sities of life.

Dabiri-Erewa said the committee would forward the letter to both the UN-HCR and Ministry of For-

eign Affairs for interven-tion.

In the protest letter, the stranded Nigerians de-manded that they should be granted international protection in a safe third country with effective system of protection as well as a resettlement pro-gramme.

The refugees claimed that ``during the evacu-ation of people in Libya, hundreds of Nigerians came to the camp with the hope that arrangement would be made for them to return to their home coun-tries with the assistance of the Tunisian govern-ment and International Or-

ganisation for Migration (IOM).”

According to the state-ment, the Nigerians “came to Tunisia legally during the Libyan 2011 crisis, un-der the evacuation of the UNHCR, Red Cross and the International Com-mittee, but at first the UN-HCR emergency protection team refused to register us’’.

The letter signed by Mr. Obinna Obielu on behalf of the affected Nigerians, stated that “for more than two years, we have been living in a remote desert make shift camp under extreme weather condi-tions.’’

Reps urge FG to rescue 26 Nigerians stranded in Tunisia

AUGUSTINE MADU-WEST KANO

The National Agency for Food, Drugs and Administration Con-

trol (NAFDAC) has won its appeal against the March 4, 2011 ruling by a Federal High Court sitting Kano which discharged an Indian businessman, Dijay Lawani, of criminal charges brought against him by the agency.

NAFDAC had earlier filed an appeal, challenging the ruling of the Kano which dismissed the criminal charge of faking Rambo in-secticide, product of a Kano-based companied, Gongoni Nigeria Limited.

Lawani was arrested by the police in November 2010 for the importation of 1,l500 cartons of fake Rambo in-secticide valued at about N8 million.

The fake products were said to have been manufac-tured in China and brought to Nigeria via Dubai.

The accused was conse-quently charged to the Fed-eral High Court on Novem-ber 2010.

After several months of legal fireworks, the In-dian was discharged of the criminal charge on techni-cal grounds as the presiding judge, Justice Shehu Yaha-ya, stated that he would not proceed with the criminal charge for some technical reasons.

The judge’s decision fol-lowed an argument by the defence counsel, Mr. Max-well Duru, that the case against his client was not properly brought before the court.

Duru asked the court to discharge the accused on the ground that his client was facing both criminal and civil charges in the same court at the same time over the same case.

But NAFDAC counsel insisted that all legal proce-dures were duly followed in arraigning the accused.

The Kano State Gov-ernment plans to immunise about 6

million children against polio in the current round of the exercise.

The Public Relations Of-ficer in the state Ministry of Health, Alhaji Isma’il Gwammaja, disclosed this to News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) yesterday in Kano.

He said that the exercise had so far been successful, as it did not record any form of resistance by the people.

Gwammaja also said that a team, headed by the Commissioner for Health, Dr Abubakar Labaran, had

visited Ungogo and Minjibir local government areas to monitor the exercise.

Besides, the Fagge Local Government Area Informa-tion Officer, Malam Salisu Kassim, commended the manner in which the exer-cise was handled place in the area.

He told NAN that about 200, 890 children were expect-ed to be immunised between April 13 and April 16.

NAN reports that the ex-ercise, which commenced in all the 44 local government areas of the state on Satur-day, is expected to end on April 16.

The Bauchi State Government has pleaded with resi-

dents of Bauchi to exer-cise more patience as it makes efforts to improve water supply in the town.

Addressing journalists at the weekend in Bauchi, the Commissioner for Water Resources, Alhaji Sani Bara, said the government was aware of the problem faced by the people because of in-adequate supply.

Bara said that unstable power supply affected wa-ter supply, but that the gov-ernment had contacted the

management of Power Hold-ing Company of Nigeria (PHCN) to improve the situ-ation.

He said another factor was that the plant was origi-nally meant to supply water for less number of people, but because of the influx of persons from neighbouring states, demand had greatly increased.

Bara said: “Because of the need for the pipes to be reticulated, the capacity of the supply has dropped and that is why the government is doing everything possible to fix the problem.”

Adulteration: Court upholds NAFDAC’s appeal against Indian businessman

Kano targets 6 million children for polio immunisation

Govt pleads with Bauchi residents over inadequate water supply

The Kogi State Gov-ernment has said that 27, 373 people

had benefited from its free rural medical initiative launched on March 13, 2013.

The Special Adviser to the Governor on Free Medical and Charity, Capt.

Yakubu Okatahi, said yes-terday in Lokoja, the state capital, that women and children constituted the major beneficiaries.

He also said that peasant farmers, traders and arti-sans were among the ben-eficiaries of the free medi-cal care programme.

Okatahi said high blood pressure, goitre, malaria, hernia and cataract were among the prevalent cases handled by the four medi-cal groups sent to rural ar-eas in the three senatorial districts of the state.

According to him, com-plicated and long-term

cases were referred to the state Specialist Hospital in Lokoja, with clear instruc-tions that such patients should be treated free of charge.

The governor aide add-ed that all the beneficiaries were also given drugs free of charge.

‘27,373 people benefi tted from Kogi free health programme’

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National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net52 North Monday, April 15, 2013

Peoples Democratic Party delegates queuing for the party’s primaries in Nasarawo/Binyeri state constituency bye election in Mayo-Belwa Local Government Area of Adamawa State, at the weekend.

A group, the Net-work of Kogi As-sociation, has

blamed the Federal Gov-ernment over the linger-ing crisis over oil well that is tearing the people of border communities in Kogi and Anambra States apart.

President of the as-sociation, Comrade Goodman Umar Aku, who disclosed this while speaking with journal-ists in Idah, at the week-

end, said the matter was before the Federal Government that had al-ready declared Anambra State an oil producing state.

Aku said when the President was inaugu-rating Orient Oil Refin-ery Company; he made a political statement that was responsible for the tension while the ten-sion was responsible for the killings.

“How can you have well

on your land and some-body says the well belongs to somebody outside the land? Nobody is claim-ing the right of Orient Oil which is their busi-ness right, but our own right which is political right and right of owner-ship cannot be taken away from us,” he stressed.

The group therefore urged the state govern-ment to take a drastic measure to address the injustice being perpe-

trated by the people of Aguleri-Otu in Anambra State by taking a legal action, adding that it is only through such legal action that the crisis could be resolved.

The group also noted that the tension and ha-rassment may continue unabated if the Federal Government continues to keep mute over the boundary dispute and the ownership of the oil well in Igalaland.

FG blamed for Kogi-Anambra oil well dispute

A socio-cultural or-ganisation, the Third Estate Fo-

rum, has called on the Chairman of the Federal Character Commission, FCC, Prof. Shuaib Oba Abdulraheem, to com-mence the planned mon-itoring and enforcement of equitable distribution of infrastructural facili-ties across states of the federation in line with the 1999 Constitution.

Chairman of the fo-rum, Dr. Yusuf Lawal, while congratulating

Prof. Abdulraheem on his reappointment as FCC chairman, said the enforcement of equi-table distribution of in-frastructural facilities would add value to every section of the country and extend development to all the nooks and cran-nies of the country.

The forum described the reappointment of Abdulraheem as a mani-festation of the great confidence reposed in him by President Good-luck Jonathan, based on

the excellent work he is doing at the FCC.

Lawal said the devel-opment further showed that it is still a worth-while venture for a pub-lic officer to approach his assignment consci-entiously no matter the efforts of detractors.

“We note that within the period he has been in office, lopsidedness in employment and ap-pointments into govern-ment offices are being corrected and balanced with chief executive offi-

cers of certain agencies under the searchlight and others charged be-fore the Code of Con-duct Tribunal,CCT, for violating the principle of federal character as enshrined in the consti-tution.

“We therefore urge the erudite scholar to continue in the noble ways that he started in his first tenure, and to contribute his quota to ensure the success of the administration’s trans-formation agenda.”

Group tasks character commission on equity

HENRY IYORKASEMAKURDI

The paramount ruler of the Tiv nation, Orchivirigh, Dr. Al-

fred Torkula, has canvassed that traditional institutions be given recognition and responsibilities in the Nige-rian constitution.

He said this will accord them some privileges as it was done to some other insti-tutions in the country.

The Tor Tiv canvassed this in Anyiin in Logo Lo-cal Government Area of the state, the country home of Governor Gabriel Suswam, during the burial ceremony of the uncle of the governor, Pa Udzuur Tingir.

Torkula observed that though the Federal Govern-ment had accorded tradition-al institutions the honour and respect befitting the role they play in the society, say-ing that often times we are called upon to assist in tack-ling some challenges and as soon as that is over, we are relegated to the background to be sought after again when trouble arises.

He implored the Federal Government to amend the constitution with the aim of giving specific roles to tra-ditional institutions, which

would from time to time dis-charge certain responsibili-ties and duties that will be assigned to them in the con-stitution.

The Tor Tiv further seized the opportunity to announce that in no distant time, the Benue Traditional Coun-cil will create six first class chieftaincy stools in the state, saying that it has never happened before in the his-tory of the state.

“Let me reiterate here for the sake of emphasis that this stool since the creation of the state way back in 1976, it is first of its kind. I want to do it with a view to add value and dignity to the traditional institution and also to make it open so that even younger people, who are interested could also contest to become one if they are so qualified.”

He said; “The Fulani-Tiv constant human carnage, particularly in Guma and Gwer-West is a thorn in the flesh as no one sleeps with his two eyes closed any-more.” He called on Tiv sons and daughters to remain resolute and steadfast with one voice so that a solution could be found to the con-flict, lamenting that many lives and property had been lost, thereby suing for peace among the people.

WOLE ADEDEJI ILORIN

A professor of Hydro-biology has predict-ed that fishes and

other marine animals may face extinction by 2048 if the current trend overfishing in both fresh and ocean waters are not checked.

Quoting research reports on fisheries in 2006, Prof. Chioma Nzeh, who is the first professor in the Depart-ment of Zoology, University of Ilorin, drooped this hint while presenting the 128th Inaugural Lecture of the University of Ilorin titled: “Dwindling Fish Stocks: Aquaculture And Sustain-able Food Security,” at the weekend.

Narrating the effect of this on West Africa in gener-al and Nigeria in particular, the fishery research expert said environmental pollu-tion had even made the case in Nigeria worse than it can be imagined.

The case of Nigeria’s

unprotected aquatic and ecosystem in particular, had heighten negative impacts on food security in the coun-try and has become a seri-ous setback on the economy.

For instance, Nzeh said Nigeria had lost $60 million to illegal fishing on its terri-torial waters while import-ing $200 million worth of fish yearly as at 2011.

The West African has also lost $1billion worth of fish to vessels fishing with-out proper equipment or licence.

She called on the Federal Government to reduce the size of foreign fleet on Nige-rian waters to check loss of the nation’s fish stock that has worsen the country’s food security.

Nzeh enjoined the gov-ernment to increase sur-veillance in the nation’s exclusive economic zone, EEZ, to reduce illegal fish-ing and provide security in the country’s waterways to prevent pirates’ attacks on trawlers.

Tor Tiv calls for roles for traditional institutions

Fishes may face extinction by 2048, expert warns

IGBAWASE UKUMBA LAFIA

Former Defence Minister, General Theophilus Yaku-

bu Danjuma (Rtrd), was over the weekend at the palace of the Esu Karu in Nasarawa State, con-ferred with the tradition-al chieftaincy title of Jiji of Karu by the Esu Karu,

Luka Panya Baba. The traditional title of

Jiji of Karu as conferred on the retired army gen-eral made him the pro-tector and defender of the Gbagyi nation.

The former minister during the event chal-lenged Nigerian leaders on genuine service to the society in order to en-sure collective prosper-

ity and bridge the ever widening gap between the rich and the poor.

According to Dan-juma, “Doing so would not only be service unto humanity, but a divine ordinance that comes with corresponding call to leadership positions. I also challenge Nigerians on the need to be produc-tive by emulating that

which is noble and sub-lime in our leaders.

Former Nasarawa State Governor and Chairman of the orga-nising committee, Sena-tor Abdullahi Adamu, said the title conferred on the retired general is timely, considering the enormous contribution he had made to the state and country in general.

Danjuma gets chieftaincy title in Nasarawa

Page 53: Monday, April 15, 2013

53National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013

The form I am enjoying at the moment is due to hard work. I look forward to

greater days ahead- AMERICAN TENNIS STAR, SERENA WILLIAMS

SportGolden League: Gyang, Pam shine in Sagamu

54

Man City’s Nasri (8) shooting the ball inside Chelsea’s net yesterday, for his team’s first goal.

RICHARD NDOMACALABAR

As part of activities marking 20 years re-membrance of her

late husband, Brig. General U.J. Esuene, who was the first military administrator of defunct South-Eastern State from 1967-1975, Senator Helen Esuene has donated gym facil-ities worth millions of naira for use at the Calabar stadium

While making the dona-tion, Esuene said her husband saw the state through the civil

war and went ahead to put down major infrastructure like the stadium which the Cross River State Government deemed it fit to name after the late army officer.

The Senator thanked the state for naming the stadium after her husband and prom-ised to do more to encourage sporting activities at the sta-dium.

She said the government on its part had tried in devel-oping sports, but that time had come for the private sec-tor to come in effectively and take sports to its highest level as it is done in other parts of the world.

The Senator who had insti-tuted the Under-15 U.J. Esuene National Football Champion-ship in memory of her late husband, regretted that after seven years of sponsoring the competition that attracted teams from all over the coun-try, no corporate body could come in to assist.

As a result of this, she said the championship was rested, but promised to resuscitate it

While receiving the gym facilities, Governor Liyel Imoke thanked Senator Es-uene and her family for the donation as “it will not only be useful to sportsmen and women in the state but all Cross Riverians.”

Governor Imoke, who was represented by the Commis-sioner for Youth and Sports, Mr. Patrick Ugbe, promised to make good use of the facili-ties, noting that as the state is going to host the 2014 Nation-al Sports Festival, the equip-ment will be of much assis-tance to the state and sports development.

Goals from Samir Nasri and Sergio Aguero sent Manchester City into an FA Cup final against Wigan Athletic

after they beat holders, Chelsea 2-1 at Wemb-ley yesterday.

The 2011 winners will return on May 11 af-ter they held off a strong fightback from a Chel-sea side playing their sixth game in 16 days.

Frenchman Nasri gave City, who also beat Chelsea to win the season-opening Commu-nity Shield, a lead they more than deserved when he fired home after 35 minutes and Ar-gentine Aguero headed a second two minutes into the second half.

Demba Ba’s acrobatic volley on 65th min-ute inspired a Chelsea revival but City held their nerve.

Earlier on Saturday, Premier League strug-glers, Wigan, overcame Championship (sec-ond division) Millwall 2-0 at the same Wemb-ley, in a match marred by fighting among the London club’s supporters.

Wigan reached the FA Cup final for the first time in their 81-year history with the deserved victory over Championship side, Millwall, in a match marred by serious crowd violence.

Shaun Maloney’s first-half goal put Ro-berto Martinez’s Premier League side on their way and Callum McManaman secured a meeting with Manchester City next month when he finished off a flowing move 12 min-utes from time.

But yesterday, City set the tone for a domi-nant opening half when Petr Cech clawed away Aguero’s early effort from close range and Chelsea, with only two days full rest after their Europa League trip to Moscow, soaked up almost continual pressure.

Vincent Kompany’s goal-line header to stop Eden Hazard from scoring did get City off the hook and they made the most of the let-off and went ahead when Chelsea, not for the first time, allowed Yaya Toure to run at

them.The Ivorian, the dominant figure in mid-

field for City, played a precise pass to Aguero’s feet and his layoff bobbled off Cesar Azpilicu-eta and fell for Nasri to lash home.

Kompany should have added a second from a lightning attack but City rammed home their supremacy two minutes after the break when Aguero met Gareth Barry’s cross with a looping header that went in off the post.

Chelsea, FA Cup winners in four of the last six seasons, got a lifeline when Ba turned to fire home after substitute Fernando Torres, seconds after coming on, had unsettled City’s backline enough to force a messy clearance.

It was the first goal City has conceded in the competition and only smart block from keeper Costel Pantilimon denied Senegal for-ward Ba an equaliser.

Chelsea pressed strongly in the closing stages but now only have the Europa League for a chance of silverware this season.

Millwall’s fans who shamed Wem-bley by fighting a bloody battle among themselves while their

team slumped to an FA Cup semifinal defeat will face life bans, the London club warned on Saturday.

Ten people were arrested after violent scuffles broke out towards the end of their 2-0 defeat to Wigan.

Only a baton-wielding charge by police brought the chaos under control in an eerie echo of British football’s hooligan-plagued past.

“Our position is clear. Anyone associ-ated with our club found guilty of violent behaviour will be banned indefinitely from Millwall matches in addition to any punish-ment they receive from the authorities,” said Millwall chief executive, Andy Ambler.

Esuene Stadium gets gym boost

...Millwall fans face life bans

FA Cup: City dethrones Chelsea, faces Wigan in fi nal

Page 54: Monday, April 15, 2013

54 National Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.netMonday, April 15, 2013 Sport

W/Cup 2014: Seriki wants Eagles’ action

Aiyefele ready for Oyo schools

Golf: Pwajok harps on Ladies Open

Fergie hails RVP, Pulis rues fate

LG coach banks on 2014

Golden League: Gyang, Golden League: Gyang, Pam shine in SagamuPam shine in Sagamu

Long jumper, Stanley Gbagbeke, shone at the Sagamu meetLong jumper, Stanley Gbagbeke, shone at the Sagamu meet

Oyo State governor, Ajimobi

YEMI OLUS

Winner of the 2013 I C P C / S p l a s h FM marathon,

Deborah Pam, scooped the 5,000m title during the first leg of the Athletics Federa-tion of Nigeria (AFN) Gold-en League held in Sagamu, Ogun State on Saturday.

The 19-year-old Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps staff overcame a fierce opposition from Obu-du Mountain Race four-time winner, Janet Dung, and National Sports Festi-val (NSF) triple gold med-alist, Aminat Olowora, to lead the pack with 17:26:62. Dung and Olowora came second and third in 17:41:17 and 17: 41: 71 respectively.

Meanwhile, national long jump champion, Stan-ley Gbagbeke, started his outdoor season with a leap of 7.64m to win the long jump. Toyin Oladimeji (7.62m) and Babajide Oku-laja (7.37m) won silver and bronze medals respectively.

Emmanuel Gyang who won the 10,000m at the 2009 edition of the NSF, beat Kefas Williams (30:56: 83) to second place in 30:54:45. Friday Osayande won the javelin (men) with a

distance of 65.72m while Kenechukwu Ezeofor and Eze Johnmike came second and third respectively with 65.24m and 63.48m.

Queen Obisesan (61.03m), Daramola Feyi-sayo (57.66m) and Elizabeth Bello (38.11m) emerged the top three in the women’s hammer throw while a leap of 1.65m earned Patience Okoro the women’s high jump title.

Olajide Abiola of the NSCDC won the men’s triple jump with 15.19m, trailed by George James of the Nigeria Prisons (14.62m) and Sodipo Bu-sayo (14.44). The women’s category was won by Bless-ing Ibrahim (13.16m) while Mary Otugruah (12.85) and Veronica Ugeh (12.63) took second and third positions. The women’s 400m hurdles was won by Oluwakemi Adekoya Oluwakemi (57:37) while Okorie Henry (52:41) emerged winner of the men’s category.

The 100m event did not hold as scheduled, even as it was also revealed that the Golden League series, whose next edition will hold in Benin, Edo State has been abridged to five legs as against the six ear-lier planned by the AFN.

JAMES ABRAHAMJOS

Representative of Plateau North in the National As-

sembly, Senator Gyang Pwajok, yesterday said the annual Ladies Open Golf tournament has reinforced the peace process in Jos while providing avenue for cross fertilization of ideas among members of the di-verse ethnic groups in Pla-teau State.

The Senator, who is the lead sponsor of the compe-tition, said the tournament testified the return of tran-

quility to the state capital “People can congregate

in the capital for sporting activities,” Pwajok said yesterday after tyeeing off the final round of the event that started on Friday.

“Competition like this is good for the country as it will change the perception and stereotype of people about Jos.”

According to him, plans are underway to expand the Rayfield Golf Club, Jos to international standard while the ladies open would to serve as build up to the forthcoming centenary an-niversary of the club.

Surulere Local Gov-ernment Coach, Goodluck Obilor, has

warned their rivals in the Lagos Junior League Pre-mier League Champion-ship come next season to be ready for stiff competi-tion.

The former Ikorodu West LCDA football coach, who gave the warning after the last match of the 2012–2013 Lagos Junior League Premier League Champi-onship last week, said the new era at the club suggest-ed the fresh ambition.

Manchester United Man-ager, Sir Alex Fergu-son, was yesterday de-

lighted to see his major summer signing, Robin van Persie, back on the score sheet in a 2-0 win over Stoke City at the Britannia Stadium after drawing blanks for eight weeks.

“Today was an impor-tant goal. Robin did re-ally good work from Wayne’s pass to get brought down for the penalty,” an elated Fergu-son said.

Meanwhile, Stoke boss Tony Pulis felt his players shot themselves in the foot again as the side looks to avoid relegation.

“You build up to a big game and you want to play high tempo and everything else and you know you give away a bad goal from a set-play, and that settled United and took the steam out of us.

“Our last two home games against Aston Villa and now United, we gave away silly goals.”

United needs only seven

points from its remaining six games to ensure it cannot be caught by Manchester City, and could win the title as early as next Monday night against Aston Villa.

Stoke finds itself in real danger of slipping into the relegation zone, having won just once in 13 league games in 2013. The club currently

sits three points above the trapdoor, but has played

two games more than third-bottom Wigan

A t h - letic.

AFOLABI GAMBARI

Team Manager of Managers Foot-ball Club of Isolo, Barrister Tunde Seriki, has urged the Super Eagles

to execute their remaining World Cup 2014 qualifiers as African champions with a view to win back skeptics who have written them off.

Seriki, who manages the team that comprised ex-International and national footballers, also called on Nigerians to support the Eagles in their bid to qualify for the World Cup.

“The Eagles 1-1 draw with Harambee Stars of Kenya in the qualifying round last month will serve as a tonic for the AFCON Champions to go all out and eliminate the Kenyans in the second leg in Nairobi in June,” he said yesterday in Lagos.

“I am supremely confident that Nige-ria will qualify for Brazil,” he added.

Nigeria leads Group F with five points tying with Malawi who is second on goals difference while Namibia and Kenya trail respectively.

AFOLABI GAMBARI

Ibadan-based gospel musician, Yinka Aiyefele, MON, has finalised plan to stage a football competition for primary

school pupils in Oyo State with the aim of fishing talent that will enjoy educational scholarship through his foundation.

Aiyefele, who spoke in Ibadan at the week-end, said the competition would be a catalyst for future development in view of the need to encourage generational growth in Nigerian football.

“I have opted for the primary schools be-cause there are lots of competitions already instituted for the secondary schools,” the popular musician explained.

“I am also convinced that the primary schools have been long neglected and they de-serve priority. Most of the big names in world football today, like Lionel Messi and Cristia-no Ronaldo started from the cradle and their kind in Nigeria should be encouraged.”

Organisers of the competition said en-tries for the tournament would close on May 1 while the competition would commence same week.

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Page 55: Monday, April 15, 2013

IKENWA NNABUOGOR

One-cap Eagles’ striker Shola Ameobi made a rare appearance for the belea-

guered Newcastle United as they continued their downward plunge with a disappointing 3-0 loss to Sunderland yesterday. Ameobi came off the bench at the start of second half and failed to deliver the goodies as the misfiring Mag-pies handed Sunderland manager Paolo Di Canio his first victory in the saddle. Ameobi, who has gone further down the strikers’ pecking order in the North East, has only managed four appearances as a starter in his 20th outing for New-castle so far and disappointingly returned a goal. He has also been cautioned five times.

Still in England, forgotten Ea-gles striker Victor Anichebe was in a superb goal scoring form for Champions League spot chasing Everton as they claimed a 2-0 vic-tory against sinking Queens Park Rangers on Saturday. Anichebe found himself in the right place at the right time to direct the ball in-side the QPR’s net for the second of the afternoon for the impres-sive Toffees. Anichebe, described by the Toffees’ coach David Moyes as the ‘New Drogba’ was on from start but was pulled out in the added time as the Merseyside club ran down the clock for the impor-tant victory that catapulted them to fifth place. The strike however, fired Anichebe’s goal account this season to six. That was An-ichebe’s 13rd start of the season in his 189th appearance for Everton and he’s only been yellow-carded once thus far.

Across the border in France, surprisingly and for the very first time in as many games, John Uta-ka was not listed for Montpellier’s trip to Bordeaux who inflicted a 4-2 beating on the defending cham-pions.

In Spain, Nosa Igiebor sealed a point for Real Betis, scoring in the dying minute to secure 3-3 draw for his side against visiting Seville on Friday. Igiebor had just been on the pitch for seven minutes hav-ing replaced Brazilian defender Paulao before he brought Betis from the dead with just seconds left on the clock. That was Igie-bor’s fourth appearance since he returned late to base after the AFCON in South Africa, follow-ing a visa hitch and his 13th all over game for Betis. He was also scoring his first goal. He has so far been booked twice.

In Belgium, young Nigerian striker Imo Ezekiel continued to hit the target in the Jupiler League as he netted the winner in Stan-dard Liege’s 4-3 road win at Zulte-Waregem in the championship play-off’s third game. Brazilian striker Kanu had evened scores for Standard in the 64th minute af-ter the hosts had taken the lead 10 minutes earlier before Ezekiel put

the

icing on the cake with 11 minutes left on the clock to seal the victory. That was Ezekiel’s first goal in the play-offs and his 15th of the season. He was nominated for the Ebony Shoe Award last week and will fight Anderlecht’s Congo star Duiemerci Mbokani for the award last won by a Nigerian – Ce-lestine Babayaro in 1996. However, the wonder kid was introduced in the 62nd minute as he made his 25th league appearance this sea-son. He has been red-carded once and cautioned three times.

Still in Belgium, Nigerian striker Derek Ogbu could not save his side OH Leuven as they were bashed 3-0 at home by Mechelen, losing their second mid-table play-offs game. Ogbu, who had started and finished in the two previous games, started from the bench in the 73rd minute but failed to hit the target in the second consecu-tive game. That was Ogbu’s 33rd league game. He has so far scored eight goals and seen yellow only four times.

It appeared a glimmer of hope was in the horizon for big Nige-rian striker Michael Uchebo and

his sinking Cercel Brugge as they recorded another heart-warming away 2-1 victory over fellow rel-egation candidates Germinal Beerschot in the third game of the two-game relegation play-offs. With the victory, troubled Cercle

Brugge, with Uchebo in 90-minute action, appear to escape relega-tion with just a game left to decide their fate. Beerschot were howev-er without their on-loan Nigerian striker Kennedy Nwanganga who spent the duration of the game on the bench.

In Russia, Ahmed Musa re-turned to action after a trip to Ni-geria for the burial of his young-er sister that passed away early in the month, to fire blanks in the goalless draw at Dinamo Moscow in the famous Moscow derby on Friday. Musa was on for 90 min-utes but still in search of his 10th goal having netted his ninth goal early last month. Musa was play-ing his 22nd league game of the season.

Still in Russia, Victor Obinna Nsofor dropped to the bench again after his rare 90-minute appearance penultimate week-end as Lokomotiv Moscow were beaten by an odd goal at home by defending champions Zenit St.Petersburg. Nsofor was intro-duced in the 62nd minute as he failed to make hay. Nsofor has now gone six games without scor-ing with his last coming on No-

vember 24, 2012, in their 3-2 home win against Krasnodar. The for-mer West Ham striker for has so far scored two goals in 21 league outings for his side. He has seen yellow only once.

In the Netherlands, former schoolboy international Uche Nwofor returned to action for VVV Venlo after coming back from injury, but failed to save his sinking side from a 2-0 home loss to Zwolle on Friday. Nwofor, playing his first game since 23 February, was on for 90 minutes. He has so far netted six goals in 21 appearances for his side. He has also seen red once and cautioned twice.

Also in the Netherlands, for-mer Eagles midfielder Femi Ajilore once again returned from injury to grab a substitute shirt for Groningen as they pulled an impressive 2-0 away victory at Heracles on Saturday. Ajilore was thrown into the fray in the 77th minute. That was Ajilore’s second game since he came back from injury. He had been unavail-able since 23 February. He was making his 16th league game of the season. He has so far been on the referees’ books just twice.

Super Eagles revelation Ken-neth Omeruo was as usual in ac-tion for ADO Den Haag but could not prevent fifth-placed Twente from inflicting a 3-1 home defeat. Omeruo was on for 90 minutes. He has so played all the games for his side since he returned from African Cup of Nations in South Africa in February. He has so far made 24 league appearances.

Turkish Super League scoring machine Kalu Uche fired blanks for Kasimpasa, losing surprising-ly 1-0 to strugglers Akhisar Beledi-yespor on Sunday. Uche, who celebrated his Eagles’ return in grand style, hitting his 17th goal last weekend, has now failed to score in his last 11 eleven games.. Uche’s last effort still places him in second place in the top scorer’s chart, one goal short of top scorer Burak Yilmaz, Galatarsaray hit man. He was as usual, on for 90 minutes and has also maintained a stainless record with no red and yellow cards.

In Ukraine, Super Eagles striker Brown Ideye finally broke his 2013 duck, scoring the lone goal in Dynamo Kiev’s 1-0 away victory at Karpaty on Sun-day. Ideye made the difference when he collected a pass from Portuguese midfielder Miguel Veloso and blasted past Karpaty keeper for the only goal of the encounter. He was on from start but was pulled out in the added time as he banged his 14th goal of the season, to still maintain his second spot on the scorers’ chart behind Shakhtar’s Ar-menia striker Henrikh Mkhi-taryan on 22 goals. Ideye has so far made 23 league appearances and has been in the referees’ books just twice.

Ideye celebrating

Igiebor jumping above his opponents to head in the goal.

Anichebe

National Mirrorwww.nationalmirroronline.net 55Monday, April 15, 2013 Sport

Ideye returns with goal, Ezekiel, Anichebe, Igiebor also on target

Euro Leagues – Results

England

Southampton 1– 1 West Ham

Arsenal 3 – 1 Norwich City

Norwich City 2 – 2 Stoke City

Reading 0 – 0 Liverpool

Everton 2 – 0 QPR

Stoke City 0 – 2 Manchester United

Aston Villa 1 – 1 Fulham

Newcastle 0 – 3 Sunderland

Spain

Espanyol 3 – 3 Valencia

Levante 0 – 4 Deportiva La Coruna

Real Betis 3 – 3 Seville

Malaga 1 – 0 Osasuna

Rayo Vallecano 0 – 2 Real Sociedad

Real Valladolid 2 – 1 Getafe

France

Valenciennes 0 – 0 St.Etienne

Troyes 0 – 1 PSG

Ajaccio 1 – 1 Nancy

Evian 4 – 2 Rennes

Lorient 4 – 1 Bastia

Bordeaux 4 – 2 Montpellier

Page 56: Monday, April 15, 2013

Vol. 03 No. 599 Monday, April 15, 2013 N150

[email protected]

NOTES FROM CAMBRIDGEAnthony A. Kila

WORLD RECORD

Most consecutive knee spins

Printed and Published by Global Media Mirror Ltd: Head Offi ce: Mirror House, 155/161 Broad Street, Lagos Tel: 07027107407, Abuja Offi ce: NICON Insurance House, Second Floor, Central Business District Area, Abuja Tel: 08070428249, Advert hotline: 01-8446073, Email: [email protected]. Editor: SEYI FASUGBA. All correspondence to PMB 10001, Marina, Lagos.

Printed simultaneously in Lagos, Abuja and Ondo State. ISSN 0794-232X.

NFF President, Aminu Maigari

World number one, Novak Djokovic, yesterday said

he is yet to confirm if he will compete in this week’s Monte Carlo Masters.

Djokovic injured his right ankle during a re-cent Davis Cup tie against

American Sam Querrey.Although the news is

good regarding the injury - an MRI scan revealed no structural damage to the joint capsule and ligaments, although the strain still re-

quires considerable rest.The Serb suffered the in-

jury early in the match but carried on to win in four sets.

“Obviously, it’s very strong emotion when you play for your country,”

Djokovic admitted.“Injuries are a part of

sport and you try to avoid as much as you can as an ath-lete.”

The six-time Grand Slam winner is already

in Monaco and could be allowed to start his cam-paign as late as Wednes-day against either Russian Mikhail Youzhny or Daniel Gimeno-Traver of Spain.

Sport ExtraTennis: Djokovic sweats over Monte Carlom

Printed and Published by Global Media Mirror Ltd: Head Offi ce: Mirror House, 155/161 Broad Street, Lagos Tel: 07027107407, Abuja Offi ce: NICON Insurance House, Second Floor, Central Business District Area, Abuja Tel: 08070428249, Advert hotline: 01-8446073, Email: [email protected]. Editor: SEYI FASUGBA. All correspondence to PMB 10001, Marina, Lagos.

Printed simultaneously in Lagos, Abuja and Ondo State. ISSN 0794-232X.

The favour Akpabio did us allThe most consecutive knee spins is 30 and was achieved by Takashi Taniai (Japan) at

Komaba High School, Nippon Institute of Technology, Tokyo, Japan, on 20 August 2010.

If we want to be honest then we can-not but admit that Akwa Ibom State governor, Godswill Akpabio, is not the

only leading political figure in Nigeria indictable of manipulating electoral pro-cess in his party and in the country. All our major political parties from ACN to APGA and from CPC to PDP with their leaders have had to deal with the suspi-cions and even outright accusations of conducting irregular primaries and rig-ging of elections. When it comes to elec-toral process, the cleanest of our ruling parties is a leper.

Given such reality, a question arises: Should we just accept things the way they are and try to adapt? Some people say yes because they truly feel over-

whelmed by a sense of helplessness and all they can do is hope for a miracle to change the system. Some other people say yes because they are cunningly and ferociously waiting for their own turn to do the same (like what senior boys do to junior ones in school), or to have some-one from or friendly to his/her ethnic or political tribe in power to manoeuvre things in his/her favour. I say no. That will turn us into an S.T.A.D nation (So They All Do); we must resist such trajec-tory.

When confronted with the mess in this country, many of those in a position of authority seem not to know where to start. With his now notorious exuberant mode of operating and lately speaking, Governor Godswill Akpabio has done us all a favour by giving a possibility and a challenge to those who really un-derstand what democracy and common-wealth mean and care about these ideals to stand up and act in their defence.

With his own self-incriminating dec-laration and consequent clumsy attempt to deny that he personally overturned the results of party primaries for sena-torial elections in his state, many now have the opportunity to explore the es-sence of our democracy, and fix some essential far from perfect components within the system.

For anyone that missed it, and just to be clear for all, we now have Governor Akpabio on record (audio and video), saying:

“I used my own hand to strike out the name of the person who has won before,

and I said it is important for me to give that [Ikono and Ini Local Government Areas] region a senator in 2007, and I produced Senator Aloysius Etuk for you; that’s where he comes from.”

Thanks to Governor Akpabio, activ-ists, analysts, public commentators and teachers now have the opportunity and duty to explain to Nigerians the impor-tance of primary elections and how they should be conducted in the coun-try. Contrary to the nonsense some are saying either out of sheer ignorance or with a conscious effort to deceive many into believing that primaries are just mere internal party rituals, the whole process of representative democracy ac-tually starts from and depends a lot on primary elections and caucuses. These processes are in fact the essential condi-tion without which we cannot have the emergence of a capable and committed political class that is not involved in or compromised by corruption disguised as generosity or servilism misconstrued as loyalty.

It is not by accident that under the Electoral Act that governs political par-ties and with which INEC functions, the

regulator’s monitoring powers over po-litical parties allow it to observe prima-ries, and as it deems fit, either accept or reject the outcomes.

The deafening silence of INEC on this issue is to say the least, unbearable.

In a normal country, the agency offi-cially charged with regulating electoral matters should by now be investigating the election about which someone in the position of the Akwa Ibom Governor has made such statement. Akpabio has done us all a favour by giving a possibil-ity and a challenge to examine the role and functions of INEC in our democ-racy, and see how fit it is for the purpose.

Where do the judiciary and our secu-rity forces stand on this matter? Don’t they read the papers? Where is the press? After Governor Akpabio report-ed himself, we should by now be having feature stories on whose name he struck off that list, how did such candidate re-act, and what is he doing now or intends to do?

It must be said that in making this incriminating declaration, Akpabio’s intent was to demonstrate his fairness and generosity to the people of Ikono and Ini LGAs by righting a wrong and putting one of their own into power. Now let us for a moment blindly and dangerously assume that Akpabio is a completely righteous and exceptionally competent politician whose actions are solely dictated by the good of his state and that he genuinely means well, even in such scenario, what he should have done is to openly canvass for and make a case for the candidate he deems best for the post.

Elected officials ought to remember that their tenure in office is only for a limited period of time. They ought to bear in mind that after them, a self-serv-ing scoundrel or a lucky imbecile might just come into power and consequently makes it his/her duty to create prec-edents and discontinue patterns that, for any reason in the world, might allow others to abuse power.

Governor Akpabio has done us all the favour of reminding us of this duty.

WHEN IT COMES TO ELECTORAL PROCESS,

THE CLEANEST OF OUR RULING PARTIES

IS A LEPER

African U-17 resultsCongo 1-1 CIV

Nigeria 5-1 Ghana Novak Djokovic

MAYBE THAT IS THEIR OWN DIVIDENDS OF DEMOCRACY!


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