Economy
Aliko Dangote Foundation Holds Fundraising for The Africa Center
By Dipo Olowookere
President of The Africa Center in New York City, Halima Aliko Dangote, is organising a fundraising as part of her major responsibility of raising capital for the centre.
The goal is to raise funds to complete the center building in New York.
For this year, three fundraising events have been lined up to achieve this and one would be hosted in Nigeria by the Aliko Dangote Foundation on March 23 at the Eko Hotels & Suite, Victoria Island, Lagos.
The Africa Center in New York City is a non-profit, multidisciplinary institution that provides a gateway for engagement with contemporary Africa, and a platform for the most compelling content from the continent.
The goal of the Africa Center is to help people understand and engage with contemporary Africa.
The center is located at One Museum Mile, at the corner of Fifth Avenue and East 110th Street in East Harlem, Manhattan.
The new location represents a cultural gateway to Harlem the traditional African- American neighbourhood in New York.
The building, designed by architect Robert A.M. Stern, is the first museum building built on New York’s Museum Mile since the completion of the Guggenheim in 1959.
While construction is being finalized, the Africa Center continues to present pop up events in its new space until the building is completed.
It will serve as a cultural centre, and will make the museum accessible to a wide range of people from the world over, thus solidifying the museum’s presence as one of the most challenging and diverse art institutions in the U.S.
The new building will encompass approximately 90,000 square feet (8,400 m2) with 16,000 square feet (1,500 m2) of exhibition space, as well as a theatre, education centre, library, classrooms, event space, restaurant and gift shop.
The growth into the cultural centre has been spearheaded by, among others, Hadeel Ibrahim, daughter of Mo Ibrahim, and Chelsea Clinton.
The focus areas of The Africa Centre’s programming include:
Business: The Center will help the private sector to navigate Africa’s 53 distinct business climates, will make hard-to-obtain data available and understandable, and will facilitate peer-to-peer introductions. The Center will help potential partners find each other, and share best practices from the continent.
Policy: The Center will focus its efforts on linking research capacity with change agents on the ground in Africa, building transcontinental teams to find policy solutions. They will also work to build a broader constituency for good policy through educational initiatives that aim to bring basic “Africa literacy” to a wide range of audiences.
Culture: Building on its history as the Museum for African Art, the Center will be a home for exhibitions, performances and showings of visual, performing, and digital art from Africa
Companies such as Dangote are at the forefront of re-defining for the world what African business is and what Africans can accomplish. Showcasing Africa in a new and positive light is what makes this project worthwhile and something that we can be proud to attach our name to – so long as we are on the Board and able to effectively influence what the Center does.
The ambition of the Center is to become a major rallying point on African issues globally, and Dangote Group’s position and relevance in Africa makes us a natural partner to the project.
Halima Dangote, President of The Africa Center will host an online press conference on Thursday, March 23 at 14:00 GMT.
By Aduragbemi Omiyale
On Tuesday, December 17, 2024, President Bola Tinubu will present the 2025 budget to a joint session of the National Assembly.
The size of the 2025 Appropriation Bill is about N47.9 trillion and would be presented to the parliament for approval.
Speaking at the plenary on Thursday, December 12, 2024, the President of the Senate, Mr Godswill Akpabio, said the presentation by Mr Tinubu would be at the chamber of the House of Representatives.
However, it is not certain if the lawmakers will pass the budget before December 31 to allow for a recent budget cycle of January to December.
Recall that on December 3, the senate approved the Medium Term Expenditure Framework and Fiscal Strategy Paper (MTEF/FSP) for 2025 to 2027.
This was after the President presented this the National Assembly on November 19 ahead of the consideration of the 2025 budget proposal.
In the MTEF/FSP, the government said it planned to borrow about N9.22 trillion from local and foreign sources to finance the budget deficit.
It pegged the crude oil benchmark at $75 per barrel and a daily oil production of 2.06 million barrels at an exchange rate of N1,400 to $1, and a targeted gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate of 6.4 percent.
At the plenary today, Mr Akpabio informed his colleagues that, “The President has made his intention known to the National Assembly to present the 2025 budget to the joint session of the National Assembly on December 17, 2024.”
By Adedapo Adesanya
Nigeria added 150,000 barrels per day to its crude production in November 2024 as it continues to pursue an ambitious 2 million barrels per day target.
According to the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), Nigeria’s oil production rose to 1.48 million barrels per day in November, up from 1.33 million barrels per day the previous month.
In its Monthly Oil Market Report (MOMR), OPEC revealed that at 1.48 million barrels per day, it is the continent’s leading oil producer, surpassing Algeria’s 908,000 barrels per day and Congo’s 268,000 barrels per day.
Business Post reports that OPEC doesn’t account for condensates, which Nigeria’s accounts for in its broader 2 million barrels per day target.
Despite the surge in production levels, Nigeria is still under producing its 1.5 million barrels per day output quota under a deal involving OPEC and 10 other producers known as OPEC+.
OPEC said it relied on primary data gotten through direct communication, noting that secondary sources reported 1.417 million barrels per day as Nigeria’s crude production in November — up from 1.4 million barrels per day in October.
The data also shows that OPEC’s total oil production among its 12 members rose by 104,000 barrels per day in the month under review.
According to secondary sources, the total of the 12 OPEC countries’ crude oil production averaged 26.66 million barrels per day in November 2024.
“Crude oil output increased mainly in Libya, Iran, and Nigeria, while production in Iraq, Venezuela, and Kuwait decreased”, OPEC said.
“At the same time, total non-OPEC DoC crude oil production averaged 14.01 mb/d in November 2024, which is 219 tb/d higher, m-o-m. Crude oil output increased mainly in Kazakhstan and Malaysia,” the organisation added.
In a related development, OPEC trimmed its 2024 and 2025 oil demand growth forecasts for the fifth time this year.
Now, the cartel expects the world’s oil demand growth at 1.61 million barrels per day from the previously 1.82 million barrels per day.
For 2025, OPEC says the world oil demand growth forecast is now at 1.45 million barrels per day, a 900,000 barrels per day cut from the previously expected 1.54 million barrels per day.
On the changes, OPEC says that the downgrade for this year owes to more bearish data received in the third quarter of 2024 while the projections for next year relate to the potential impact that will arise from US tariffs.
By Adedapo Adesanya
The duo of Afriland Properties Plc and Geo-Fluids Plc crashed the NASD Over-the-Counter (OTC) Securities Exchange by a marginal 0.06 per cent on Wednesday, December 11 due to profit-taking activities.
The OTC securities exchange experienced a downfall at midweek despite UBN Property Plc posting a price appreciation of 17 Kobo to close at N1.96 per share, in contrast to Tuesday’s closing price of N1.79.
Business Post reports that Afriland Properties Plc slid by N1.14 to finish at N15.80 per unit versus the preceding day’s N16.94 per unit, and Geo-Fluids Plc declined by 1 Kobo to trade at N3.92 per share compared with the N3.93 it ended a day earlier.
At the close of transactions, the market capitalisation of the bourse, which measures the total value of securities on the platform, shrank by N650 million to finish at N1.055 trillion compared with the previous day’s N1.056 trillion and the NASD Unlisted Security Index (NSI) went down by 1.86 points to wrap the session at 3,012.50 points compared with 3,014.36 points recorded in the previous session.
The alternative stock market was busy yesterday as the volume of securities traded by investors soared by 146.9 per cent to 5.9 million units from 2.4 million units, as the value of shares transacted by the market participants jumped by 360.9 per cent to N22.5 million from N4.9 million, and the number of deals increased by 50 per cent to 21 deals from 14 deals.
When the bourse closed for the day, Geo-Fluids Plc remained the most active stock by volume (year-to-date) with 1.7 billion units valued at N3.9 billion, followed by Okitipupa Plc with 752.2 million units worth N7.8 billion, and Afriland Properties Plc 297.5 million units sold for N5.3 million.
Also, Aradel Holdings Plc, which is now listed on the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited after its exit from NASD, remained the most active stock by value (year-to-date) with 108.7 million units sold for N89.2 billion, trailed by Okitipupa Plc with 752.2 million units valued at N7.8 billion, and Afriland Properties Plc with 297.5 million units worth N5.3 billion.
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