The Economy Under Buhari Has Remained On Rapid Fall – PDP

Press Statement

‘Pay Attention To The Economy,’ PDP Tells Buhari, APC…Urges Sustenance Of Existing Economic Projects...

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), for the umpteenth time, urges the President Mohammadu Buhari-led APC administration, to pay urgent attention to the management of the nation’s economy.

*President Buhari

The party said its worry stems from the fact that the economy has remained on rapid fall since the last four months apparently due to the absence of clear-cut fiscal policy direction and an economic team to deal with the domestic and global challenges associated with a developing economy.

PDP National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh, in a statement on Monday said “whereas the PDP is in full support of the President’s efforts in tackling corruption and insurgency, the party is however concerned about the grave economic situation we now face, as well as indices from global economic watchers, which this administration has failed to give deserving attention, despite its predictable negative impact.

The PDP said as a responsible party, it is duty-bound, beyond politics, to draw the President’s attention to the fact that under the prevailing circumstances, the nation is evidently heading to economic doldrums.

“Mr. President, this is no longer about politics and partisanship. It is about the economy of our dear nation and the wellbeing of the Nigerian citizens.

“Recall that we have severally in the past, drawn attention to official reports showing that the unemployment situation in the country as well as inflation rate are growing at frightening dimensions, not to talk of the continued decline in domestic and direct foreign investments, all due to uncertainty created by the lack of economic direction of APC-led administration.

Is Autumn Finally Here For Robert Mugabe?

Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

Robert Mugabe, the 91-year old president of Zimbabwe – that beautiful but horribly impoverished country tucked away in the Southern part of Africa – has always managed to emerge colourful in his endless battle of wits with the West. He has over the years been able to retain the admiration and support of a sizable percentage of his people (despite the biting economic hardship in his country) and remained the toast of quite a number of African intellectuals.

**President Mugabe and wife, Grace 

Even his worst enemies would admit that he is very intelligent, well-informed and articulate. At 91, he is yet to show any convincing signs that age is eating into his well-cultivated intellect and psychological bearing. Always impeccably turned out in well-tailored suits, Mugabe remains many people’s pleasant idea of ageing gracefully and a delight to watch at press conferences or interviews.

Although, the recent decision of the European Union (EU) to relax sanctions on Mugabe’s country might represent a grudging admission by the West that, perhaps, it is gradually losing the argument over Zimbabwe , it remains a glaring fact that Mugabe presides over a very sick country. The United Nation’s World Food Programme (WFP) said two weeks ago that 16% of Zimbabwe ’s population “are projected to be food insecure at the peak of the 2015-16 lean season, the period following harvest when food is especially scarce.” According to the WFP, this situation “represents a 164% increase in food insecurity compared to the previous season.”

The Zimbabwean dollar is long dead and dressed for burial – brutally murdered by hyperinflation that hit an unprecedented 500 billion per cent in 2008 according to several reports (mostly in the Western media) and 231,000,000% according to the official account. A couple of years ago, a Zambian friend showed me a 40 billion Zimbabwean dollar bill which he said could not buy a loaf of bread. Looking back now, one can even refer to that period as the finest hour for the Zimbabwean currency. In January 2009, Zimbabwe introduced a One Trillion Dollar (Z$1000 tr) note whose worth was placed at about US$30 (£20). Since then, the currency has received even more devastating battering and living in Zimbabwe , according to reports, has been one bit of a hell, with the hapless citizens being regularly referred to as poor, starving billionaires.

In June this year (2015), the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (the country’s Central Bank) intent on formally removing the worthless Zimbabwean dollars from the banking system asked the citizens to start exchanging the billions, trillions and quadrillions of the local currency in their bank accounts or hoarded at home for just a few US dollars or cents, as the case may be. In a statement in Harare , the Reserve Bank governor, John Mangudya, advised the “banking public [to] visit their banks to establish the balances which were in their accounts.” He explained that officials of the apex bank “have interacted with the banks and they still have all the information, which we as the Reserve Bank also authenticated," so, they were not envisaging any difficulties in the exchange process.   

Why Nigeria Does Not Need Renewable Energy For Main Power Generation

By Idowu Oyebanjo

Recently, there has been an increase in the agitation for the deployment of alternative sources of energy for the generation of electricity in Nigeria especially when the problem of providing stable electricity seems to be intractable. But to be frank, this is not how to solve the problem. The inclusion of alternative energy sources as part of the total mix of generation portfolio is recommended but this must remain as "back up" to electricity generation from conventional sources of energy.

*President Buhari

There is a general tendency to follow the crowd by copying the trend in developed economies and most times this yields positive results. However, this will only be the case after a careful consideration of local circumstances. The Western world is persuading Nigeria to embrace their much needed market for Renewable Energy System not because they want to help, but because of the trade and economic benefits it will bring them in terms of the gains from the delivery of goods and services that this will bring, huge financial gains from the cost of expatriates they will export to us just like in the oil industry now taken over by their own mostly less educated professionals compared to locals, economy of raw materials in the industry they really need in their own environment, making Nigeria a dumping ground for their products among other reasons. If any country is serious about assisting Nigeria, they should provide funds and expertise to build, operate, maintain and transfer ownership of thermal plants (OCGT and CCGTs) in Nigeria within the shortest time frame possible.

There is no doubt that the capacity credit (I use a technical term here) of most of the renewable electricity systems is low compared to that of conventional generation which in simple terms means they cannot be relied upon for grid operations exactly as electricity generated from conventional energy sources such as oil, gas, coal etc. Power System is difficult to explain to non-power engineers especially those who hear about what takes place in other countries and believe Nigeria should copy them hook line and sinker without looking at local circumstances. 

LOGISS Celebrated At National Assembly’s Outstanding Schools Awards

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye 

At the recent Strategic School Management and Outstanding Private Schools Merit Awards organised by the House of Representatives Committee on Education in conjunction with Family Affairs Consultancy Limited, Logos International Secondary School (LOGISS), a mission school located in Awo-Omamma, Imo State, whose motto is “Academic Excellence and Godliness of the Youth” stood out among the other honorees selected from among the countless private schools scattered across Nigeria. 

*The Director of Logos International Schools, Pastor  Bede Ogu (left), and the Principal, Pastor Precious Ahiaogu, displaying the award to LOGISS at the International Conference Centre, Garki, Abuja

The event which took place at the International Conference Centre, Garki, Abuja, saw the Director of Logos International Secondary Schools, Pastor Bede Ogu, singled out and invited to the podium to tell the various representatives of other private secondary schools selected for the award the story of LOGISS – how it has grown from a dream to its present enviable state.

  

Addressing the audience, Pastor Ogu traced how the journey to what is today known as LOGISS started in 1994 “with a mandate that was truly divine” which was given to the General Superintendent of the Watchman Catholic Charismatic Renewal Movement (WCCRM), Pastor A.C. Ohanebo, “to start a secondary school to help to restore the quality of education in Nigeria and to bring the youths to discipline once again in the school system.”

  

 He announced that the WCCRM plans to set up at least one secondary school in every state of the federation.

*Pastor Bede Ogu addressing the audience at the International Conference Centre, Garki, Abuja

 “It took off in October 1994 … [and we] have been able by the grace of God to train and send out students that have represented this nation in various nations of the world. Our students are noted for academic excellence and godly character. Indeed they have excelled and have been able to distinguish themselves in various fields in various nations. I have had the opportunity to visit them in the various nations where they have been and their testimonies have always been the same,” Pastor Oguh told the gathering which reacted with an applause.

  

Speaking on the impact made across the world by former students of LOGISS, Pastor Ogu said: “we have students in almost all the continents of the world that have graduated from our school and have had very good and wonderful recommendations from the various places. One of those institutions wrote to our school and called our students ‘legendary Nigerians’. We sent some students to India and the number one private university there turned them down saying that they had closed admissions to Nigerians (that they have blacklisted Nigerians) because of what some students from Nigeria did in that school. I was sent to go to the head of the school and insist that we are bringing a different brand of students. Eventually, they gave admissions to those students. Today the Nigerian students from us are the people they are using to advertise the school in Western nations. In fact, last year that university (SRM University) came to Nigeria for a drive for students because of what the students we sent there have represented Nigeria for.”

A New Sheriff Is In Town

By Femi Adesina 

Some call it the Buhari bounce. Others describe it as the Buhari effect. Yet some others say it is the Buhari aura. One thing is however crystal clear. Things have not been the same in the past 100 days in Nigeria, since Muhammadu Buhari assumed the presidency. A new sheriff has truly come to town.

Exactly 100 days ago, he climbed the podium at Eagle Square in Abuja and got inaugurated as president, 30 years after he had been toppled from power as military head of state. He promised to belong to nobody, and to belong to everybody. It is a pledge that still resonates loudly today, and will surely echo for a long time to come.

*Buhari and his wife, Aisha

On a day like this, you would expect a presidential spokesman to chronicle the achievements of his principal in office. He has turned stone to bread, slain the dragon, and climbed Mount Olympus in ten seconds. But that is not what I want to do. There are some intangible, almost imperceptible achievements, but which run very deep, and are quite fundamental. Those are the ones I’ll rather talk of, while we leave the tangibles till some other day.

Oh, he’s escaping. There are no concrete achievements, some wailing wailers would cry. True? Not true. I could have decided to focus on the bloody nose being given to Boko Haram in the North-east, which would see the country rid of insurgency soon, the rallying of leaders of other neighboring countries to deploy a Joint Multinational Task Force, the openness displayed about government finances and the welfare package instituted for states that couldn’t pay salaries, the Treasury Single Account, which would promote transparency and accountability in governance, the disappeared fuel queues, fast-tracking of the cleanup of Ogoni land, reduction in the cost of governance, and many others. But I will not focus on all those. The day cometh!

When a new sheriff comes into town, disorder gives way to order. Chaos flees. Impunity is swept away. Laxity gives way to diligence, and people change their old, unedifying ways. When you have a Wild, Wild West situation prevailing, the new sheriff comes, and stamps his authority. Old things then pass away, behold, everything becomes new.

Corruption Flourishing Under Buhari - PDP

...Every discerning mind knows that this administration is not executing a credible holistic war against corruption because it is a product of corruption, surrounded by corrupt persons...

Press Statement

PDP Exposes Corruption Under APC Government…Says President Must First Purge Party And Government

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) says despite the “holier than thou” posture of the present APC government, there is incontrovertible evidence that grave corrupt practices are ongoing and allowed to fester by associates and cronies of government, including former and present APC governors and others who played major roles in financing his campaigns with stolen state funds.

The party said this has created a system that is neck deep in corruption, while the government hoodwinks unsuspecting public with propaganda.

PDP National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh in a statement on Thursday, said while the party is not averse to the fight against corruption, “the onus lies on the APC-led Federal Government to wage a credible holistic anti-corruption war by first purging itself of unclean association and coming out clear on sleazes already going on in government quarters since it took office in May.”

“Whereas the PDP restates its respect for the person and office of the President as well as our support for the war against corruption, it is incumbent on us to alert Nigerians of the prevailing circumstances around this government that are capable of fundamentally undermining good governance if left unchecked.

“Charity, they say begins at home. For the APC-led Government, it has now become a question of “physician, heal thyself”. Every discerning mind knows that this administration is not executing a credible holistic war against corruption because it is a product of corruption, surrounded by corrupt persons; a factor apparently responsible for its obvious blind eyes to huge sleazes now being perpetrated in government agencies by persons claiming closeness to the President.

When Will The World Defeat This Menace?

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

On May 31 every  year, 'World No Tobacco Day' (WNTD) is marked across the world. The theme for the 2015 campaign is: “Stop Illicit Trade Of Tobacco Products.” 

First observed in 1987 following a motion passed by a cabinet of the World Health Assembly (WHA) which received the tacit support of the World Health Organisation (WHO), May 31 has since then been devoted to global campaigns and efforts to significantly reduce (which, I believe, will eventually lead to the total elimination of) the production, distribution and consumption of tobacco which not only ruins the health of its users, but also exposes every other person to serious harm by polluting the air we all breathe.

This is most worrisome given, for instance, a recent study published in the British medical journal, Lancet, which contains the chilling discovery that second-hand smoking (that is, passive smoking by people who are in the same environment with smokers) claims about 600,000 lives annually. 

More disturbing is the revelation that a third of these unfortunate victims are hapless children who inhale poisonous cigarette fumes from their parents or other family members who are smokers. Even much more disturbing is the discovery that as much as six million people die every year from what is regarded as the “global tobacco epidemic.”

Every year, when the World No Tobacco Day  is observed across the world, some definite objectives are targeted. This year’s campaign focused on achieving the following:

Duke/Imoke Tango And The Death Of Honour

By Dan Amor

"If our credit be so well built,
So firm that it is not easy to be shaken
By calumny or insinuation,
Envy then commends us,
And extols us beyond reason
To those upon whom we depend,
Till they grow jealous,
And so blow us up
When they cannot throw us down"-  Clarendon.

Former governor of Cross River State (1999-2007), Mr. Donald Duke and his successor, Senator Liyel Imoke, who governed the state between 2007 and 2015 have been best of friends. They know how they and one of their own, Senator Gershom Bassey, came together and drew up a blueprint for the New Cross River  State prior to the current democratic civilian dispensation in 1999. 

*Duke handing over to Imoke in 2007 

(pix: crossriverwatch)

As progenitors of the intricate power calculus in the state, they know what arrangement they had behind closed doors as to who among the three musketeers would give the first shot at the governorship of the massively agrarian state. They also know how they have been helping one another from when they met up until today. As politicians, they know that crisis is part and parcel of the game of politics. And they have, individually or collectively, been in and out of crisis after crisis in the course of their involvement in the political engineering of the state. It is common knowledge in Cross River State that in 2007, Duke did not support Imoke to succeed him. He actively encouraged and financially supported his Deputy, Walter Nneji to run against Imoke, an aspirant whom Imoke roundly defeated at the primaries.

Yet, since the build up to the 2015 general elections, Duke's political temperature has had to rise to fever pitch time and time again. At a time when even erstwhile strange bedfellows were aligning and re-aligning for relevance, Duke who, at a time, dumped the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on whose platform he rose to power but was brought back by his benefactor, Imoke, was said to have openly lambasted the latter in a clandestine or cavalier manner. According to reports, Duke, against the backdrop of the 2015 political engineering, had an ulterior motive to hijack the party structure from Imoke who ideally was the leader of the party in the state as the then sitting governor. At a reception for Goddy Jedy Agba, a governorship aspirant, by a faction of the party in Calabar, the State capital, Duke was said to have derided Imoke for the crisis that rocked the State chapter of the party.

He was said to have queried the veracity of Imoke's claims on the development of the state vis-a-vis the economic health of the state under Imoke. As though he was out to disparage his successor or to challenge him to another round of political combat, Duke called Imoke a dictator without looking back at how he (Duke) behaved while in power including his relationship with his late Deputy, John Okpa. Like the proverbial monk who wants to have his cake and eat it, Donald Duke is once again in the news, for the wrong reason of promoting mischief. In a cover interview he granted Newswatch Times magazine dated July 2015, Duke gave a false narrative of his relationship with Imoke and his successor's role over the fate of his legacies. It was headlined "How Imoke Ruined My Efforts- Duke." As if that was not enough, Duke granted another interview to a new magazine, The Interview dated August 2015, a section of which was used to attack Imoke.

Nigeria: CBN's New Policy Is Harming Small Scale Businesses

By Okey Ndibe 

President Muhammadu Buhari has yet to outline the direction and goals of his economic policy. Even so, major players in the country’s economy are already feeling the impact of specific policy decisions as they are emerging. For a wide segment of these critical players, the impact is negative, even grave. 

Under Mr. Buhari’s watch, the Central Bank of Nigeria has banned access to foreign exchange to certain categories of importers, including those who bring in toothpicks, rice, vegetable oil and tomato paste. The bank has also placed severe impediments on other businesses, among them manufacturers that import machinery and other goods. 

The motives behind the bank’s recent monetary policies may seem sound—as former Governor Peter Obi recently told reporters in Awka, the capital of Anambra State—but Nigerians appear to be worse off for them. 

With the price of crude oil showing no signs of going north soon, Nigerians are in for a long season of hard times. We just came off an electoral season in which all manner of politicians mopped up dollars for their campaigns. If you factor in the flight of capital—as many foreign and local institutional investors, scared of post-election uncertainty, pulled out of the stock market—the picture is of an economy certain to pass through a significant phase of scarcity and painful adjustment. The pressure on the naira remains enormous, and has led to a significant drop in the currency’s value.

The CBN’s response has been to use monetary policies to defend the naira. In pursuit of this defensive stance, the bank has chosen the role of an umpire determined to favor some players in the economy while rigging out other players. It has given the red card to importers of certain commodities. The bank also made it significantly more difficult for Nigerians to make transactions with their domiciliary accounts. It prohibited cash deposits into such accounts, and set new limits for cash withdrawals from accounts. During foreign trips, the daily withdrawal limit is N60, 000 or $300, a rule that defeats the gain of joining the global financial village of electronic bankcards. 

NERC – Regulating In Whose Interest?

By Idowu Oyebanjo

What exactly is happening in the Nigerian Electricity Supply Industry (NESI)? Whose interests are the leaders serving? Whose interest are the operators of the weak electrical network serving? And most importantly, in whose interest is the The Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) regulating the industry?

*Sam Amadi, NERC Chairman 

(pix: leadership)

These questions have remained with us for a long time now. Each time one examines these questions, more questions come to the fore. Was Nigeria ready for privatisation? Does Nigeria realise that the management of electricity systems is highly technically intensive and would need individuals who know their onions to mediate the course? Is the regulator aware of its role to protect consumers from the regional monopoly of the operators? Why has it taken so long, after "unending" complaints from poor and already impoverished consumers, before NERC was forced by an order from the 8th Senate to carry out what is supposed to be its main function?

Why should consumers be pushed to the wall before a revolution occurs? Why should government wait until a huge crisis of discontent from millions of individuals - North, South, East or West, united in one voice, unleash mayhem on public utility and public officers because of years of neglect and mismanagement of funds meant to provide electricity for the nation? Why is Nigeria yet to have electricity which was discovered over a century ago?

It is widely accepted that regulation, where it is impossible to have competition, as is the case with the distribution of electricity through wires, is a veritable means of providing quality service at low cost to service users. This is true but so much depends on the regulator. The principal role of a regulator in a privatised electricity system is to cater for the interest of the consumers in such a way that operators can make reasonable profit without exploiting the consumers. In this regard, NERC has failed Nigeria woefully in recent times. Why do we say this?

There is ample evidence that NERC has orchestrated a villainous act against customers in the area of estimated billing and fixed charges. In effect, NERC has raised money for the distribution companies (DISCOs) from the pocket of already impoverished Nigerians. With NERC unable to account or monitor how much money has been "borrowed" from individual consumers, this act of treachery is daylight robbery.

Understanding Buhari In 100 Days

By Garba Shehu

THE ENORMOUSLY popular talk show, Berekete on WazobiaFM radio, Abuja station told the incredible, yet true story of the hardworking and respected school teacher somewhere in Plateau state who hanged himself.

He hadn’t been paid salary for seven straight months. He came home to find that no one had eaten and two of the children had medical prescriptions for which there was no money.

President Buhari and Vice President Osinbajo 

He sneaked out without talking to anyone.

After a long while, news came home that he had strangely been caught with a stolen goat.

On his day in court, the teacher confessed to the offense. The reason he stole, he told the local judge, was that he hadn’t been paid for seven months and when he got home to see what he saw, he just couldn’t stand it.

The judge allowed him to go home on bail on self-recognition given, as he said, the good impression the entire village had of the otherwise respected teacher.

All were shocked to find his body dangling from tree the morning after. He couldn’t live with the shame.

In the recommendations and notes the Ahmed Joda transition committee presented to him as President -EIect, Muhammadu Buhari was informed that a section of the Fedaral government as well as 27 states hadn’t paid salaries, in some case for up to a year.

The Joda committee advised that this was a national emergency and should be treated as such.

It is on account of this that one of theactivities- please note the choice of this word:activities, not achievements- of President Muahammadu Buhari in these past three months is the settlement of unpaid salaries. This is going on right now.

Domiciliary Accounts: No People-Respecting Govt Lies To Its Citizens

By Patrick Dele Cole

The principal reason for the heedless pursuit of a cashless society is the belief that this will stop corruption. This is a Western notion which we have embraced fully – bringing lots of jobs to the West – the computers, the dispensing machines, the chips, pin, cards, etc. In the process it has changed banking beyond recognition. The bankers no longer want to see their clients: Their attitude is this: bring your money to the bank, but speak to the ATM. The rationale is fundamentally flawed in a developing economy.

The system – cashless – is presaged by an assumption that all of us have computer related devices – i.e. phones; that we are literate, that the ATMs work, that there is electricity and that ATMs are available nation wide.

If you live in the cities, you may be able to do all of this; ( in Europe and US they even have receiving ATMs where the traders can actually deposit end of day sales, thus we have the beginning of making high street Banks irrelevant and unnecessary.) Bottom line is to reduce cost of banking and increase profit for bank owners.

The question we should ask our Western minders is this: was corruption eradicated or reduced in their countries because their society was cashless? In Nigeria the outcome necessarily is mixed. In my village we have one bank, one ATM, no light therefore most of the time the ATM is not working. The traditional local bank manager is an encyclopedia of local custom, he knows who is coming up in society so that when CBN, for example, intervenes in agriculture the bank manager is able to interpret that intervention to potential clients who stand to benefit.

Such intervention in small scale agriculture may be the saving grace of Nigeria. But our suited CBN bureaucrats obviously have not created the agricultural intervention for the farmers but for a class of fast thinking, fast talking computer literate manipulators, who know how to fill the CBN forms without leaving Lagos, Ibadan, Kaduna, Kano, Maiduguri etc. These city sleek operators are the beneficiaries of nearly all CBN interventions whether for agriculture or transport etc.

Stop Media Trial Of Jonathan’s Regime, Former Ministers Tell Buhari

Text OF JOINT Statement By Ministers In The Jonathan Administration

“We, the Ministers who served under the President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan administration, have watched with increasing alarm and concern the concerted effort by the Buhari administration and members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) to condemn, ridicule and undermine the efforts of that administration, in addition to impugning the integrity of its individual members.

*Jonathan 

“While we concede that every administration has the right to chart its own path as it deems fit, we nevertheless consider the vilification of the Jonathan administration, to be ill-intentioned, unduly partisan, and in bad faith.

“The effort that has been made to portray each and every member of the Jonathan administration as corrupt and irresponsible, in an orchestrated and vicious trial by media, has created a lynch mentality that discredits our honest contributions to the growth and development of our beloved nation.

“We are proud to have served Nigeria and we boldly affirm that we did so diligently and to the best of our abilities. The improvements that have been noticed today in the power sector, in national security, and in social services and other sectors did not occur overnight. They are products of solid foundations laid by the same Jonathan administration.

“Contrary to what the APC and its agents would rather have the public believe, the Jonathan did not encourage corruption; rather it fought corruption vigorously within the context of the rule of law and due process. For the benefit of those who may have forgotten so soon, it was the Jonathan administration that got rid of the fraud in fertilizer subsidies, which had plagued the country for decades. This helped to unleash a revolution in agricultural production and productivity.