Better deal for indigenous sailors
Nigeria cannot keep applauding its seafarers once a year and then abandoning them to harsh working realities at sea. The renewed call for better welfare is timely because, without sailors, there is no maritime trade, and without maritime trade, the wider economy suffers. The demand for improved welfare is driven by a few hard facts. […]
Mele Kyari: Storm in oil sector teacup
The controversy over the “fitness” of products of the nascent Dangote Refinery has become for some an opportunity to engage in needless witch-hunting and pursuit of selfish interests in our oil industry. The questionable utterances of the Chief Executive of the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulation Authority, NMDPRA, Farouk Ahmed, that products of the […]
The livestock reform Nigeria needs
President Bola Tinubu has taken some firm steps to signal his readiness to address head-on the problems challenging the livestock sector, as well as the headaches the sector poses to the rest of the population. He is prepared to create a separate ministry for it from the current Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development […]
Kidnapping: Zamfara’s big haul
Over a month ago, the Commissioner of Police in Zamfara State, Mohammed Dalijan, announced that a lawmaker, former Local Government chairman and District Head had been implicated in connection with the banditry and kidnapping which has ravaged the state and the North-West for about ten years. Over the past weekend, the suspects who have been […]
INEC and local government elections
Pursuant to the recent Supreme Court verdict mandating allocation of funds due to the Local Government Areas, LGAs, directly to them to enhance their “autonomy”, greater attention of Nigerians is turning to them as serious units of grass-roots governance. That verdict holds that LGAs that are under the unconstitutional “caretaker committees” set up by some […]
Protesters’ grievances must be addressed
It is an irony that President Bola Tinubu is asking peeved Nigerians to give him “more time” to fix the economy. He is asking the people to give him what he denied himself when he took the reins of power on May 29, 2023. Former President Muhammadu Buhari had gamely made financial provisions for the […]
Probe NMDPRA CEO’s weighty claims
Nigerians are shocked by the claim that Dangote Refinery and other startup modular refiners produce substandard products compared to their international counterparts. This controversial allegation came from no other than the Chief Executive of the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulation Authority, NMDPRA, Farouk Ahmed, on July 18, 2024. According to him: “Dangote refinery as […]
Let’s protest responsibly
All appears set for the August 1, 2024 nationwide protest over hunger and hardship, which has been brewing for over one year. Nigerians were still recovering from the “no-money, no-fuel and no-food” economic crisis foisted on them by the expiring President Muhammadu Buhari regime in pursuit of a pointless “naira redesign policy” last year. His […]
Donald Trump’s narrow escape
The United States of America, USA, and by extension the world was saved a major disaster on Saturday, July 13, 2024 when former President, Donald Trump, narrowly survived an assassination attempt by a 20-year-old Thomas Crooks at a Republican Party rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. While he addressed his supporters, several shots rang out. One of […]
Saving Dangote Refinery from “Nigerian factor”
If all was well, Dangote Refinery, the world’s largest single-train, 650,000 bpd capacity oil refinery, would have reached its peak production by now, and our fuel energy challenges might have considerably eased off. Though it was officially commissioned on May 22, 2023, seven days to the end of former President Muhammadu Buhari’s regime, the $20 […]
Amicable agreement on Minimum Wage
Labour must also turn their attention to ensuring that workers at the sub-national levels and the private sector also key into the new national minimum wage when it becomes law
