Aso Villa Reads for 6/6/18
Every day, we bring you the best stories the media is reporting about the Government of Nigeria.
Daily Trust reports that “the National Pension Commission is to commence verification of prospective retirees of 2019 on June 25, 2018, the Acting Director General of the Commission, Hajiya Aisha Dhir-Umar has said. Aisha explained that all necessary arrangements had been concluded for the commencement of the exercise in 15 centres across the country. She said, “The impending exercise, therefore, necessitated the need to undertake adequate sensitization and public enlightenment in order to prepare prospective retirees on the steps to take towards a hitch free retirement life.”
“One of the former largest chain stores in Nigeria, Leventis Stores will return to Nigeria before the end of the year. The chairman of Leventis Foundation Nigeria, Ahmed Mantey, announced this on Tuesday in Abuja. Leventis stores dominated the Nigerian consumer goods formal retail market in the 1980s alongside the likes of Kingsway and UTC”. All Africa reports that “at a media briefing session at Leventis Foundation Nigeria on Tuesday, Mr Mantey, who is also Non-Executive Chairman of the A.G. Leventis group, disclosed that the first two new stores would be opened in Lagos. He said A.G. Leventis has made a partnership with a South African company called Pick and Pay in light of making the return to retailing a reality. He added that the stores would be operated through a neighbourhood store model, unlike the Shoprite supermarkets currently in operation in the country.”
“The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Mr Ibe Kachikwu has said the return of peace to the Niger Delta, coupled with the discovery of gas resources offshore Lagos will boost Nigeria’s gas supply to the West Africa Gas Pipeline (WAGP) project. According to Daily Trust, “Kachikwu said this yesterday at the 17th Meeting of the Committee of Ministers of the West Africa Gas Pipeline (WAGP) Project in Abuja. WAGP, the first regional natural gas transmission system, is a pipeline that supplies gas from Nigeria’s Niger Delta area to Benin, Togo and Ghana and is operated by the West African Gas Pipeline Company (WAGPCo).” According to the paper, “the 17th meeting which had representatives from the participating countries and WAGPCo, afforded the ministers the opportunity to further discuss issues pertaining to the progress made so far towards the realization of the aspirations which the WAGP was set to achieve. “Nigeria will continue to play her part in seeing that we work together with the aspirations of the project to achieve a greater integration of the West African region,” Kachikwu said.”
“The total value of Nigeria’s merchandise trade rose to N7.21 trillion in the first quarter (Q1) of 2018, signifying a 19.74 per cent rise over the N6.02 trillion recorded in Q4, 2017 and a 35.07 per cent growth from Q1, 2017 (N5.33 trillion). The trade balance in Q1, 2018 was a surplus of N2.175 trillion, which is a 20.95 per cent increase from the figure in Q4, 2017 (N1.798 trillion) and a 221.08 increase from the figure in Q1, 2017 (N677.42 billion). The quarter under review is the first in two years that the trade balance exceeded N2.00 trillion. The strong growth of total trade in the quarter was mainly driven by the strong increase in export, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) revealed in its latest trade figures”. This Day reported this.
“As a commitment to a green and low carbon economy, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) will now recycle damaged polymer based banknotes into everyday use plastics. The bank’s management has also approved the recycling of all waste papers at the CBN into tissue papers which shall be donated to charity as a part of its corporate social responsibility. The CBN governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, stated this yesterday in Abuja at an event the CBN organised to mark the 2018 World Environment Day”. Daily Trust quoted the CBN Governor: “You can count on me and my colleagues, the deputy governors, to act as change champions. As a result, the governors have committees to replacing bottled water with reusable water dispensers and encouraging the use of paper bags as alternatives to plastic bags. Having set the tone at the top, I urge you all to take action to make our plastic consumption more sustainable, by using 97 water fountains strategically situated within the CBN building as source of drinking water.” The apex bank governor also said “Management is also in the process of concluding the recycling of our polymer banknote wastes into everyday use plastics”.
“The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) has announced that it has received another batch of 171 stranded Nigerian returnees from Libya through the assistance of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM). NEMA said the returnees arrived the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) Ikeja Cargo Wing on Tuesday via Buraq Airline with registration number 5A-DMG at about 8:25 p.m and flight number UZ589”. This Day reports that “the agency disclosed that it profiled the returnees, comprising 70 female adults including pregnant women, 90 male adults, three children and eight infants. The voluntary returnees were brought from Zintan District of Libya and eight of them have minor health related issues. The South-west Zonal Coordinator of NEMA, Yakubu Suleiman, in reaction to the hundreds of Nigerians being deported from various parts of the world, urged parents and guardians to desist from encouraging their children or wards from embarking on such perilous journeys of no return “except those that God is merciful with”. While addressing the returnees on their arrival, Suleiman expressed disappointment over parents supporting their children to go outside the country through illegal routes by selling their properties to raise funds for the journey”.
“The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has confirmed that Nigeria has cleared the $600 million blocked funds belonging to international airlines. The funds could not be repatriated between to 2016 and most part of 2017 following scarcity of foreign exchange occasioned by drop in crude oil earnings. Many foreign airlines including Emirates, British Airways, Lufthansa, Turkish Airways, among others operating to Nigeria had accumulated ticket sale earnings in naira to be converted to dollars. However, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) was unable to meet all requests for funds repatriation during the period of the cash crunch. This even prompted some airlines to reduce their frequencies to reduce the blocked funds to a manageable size”. According to Daily Trust “the good news coming from IATA representing global airlines, is that Nigeria had succeeded in clearing the blocked funds even when foreign airlines’ funds are still trapped in many countries. Director General and CEO of IATA, Alexandre de Juniac made the announcement at the 74th Annual General Meeting and World Air Transport Summit in Sydney Australia. “We have had some recent success. The $600 million backlog in Nigeria has been cleared,” said de Juniac who was quoted in a statement sent to our correspondent in Lagos. The IATA report indicates that airline funds blocked from repatriation totalled $4.9 billion at the end of 2017, a seven per cent reduction compared to year-end 2016.”
