FG to Complete East-West Road 2022

By Adedapo Adesanya President Bola Tinubu on Monday asked South African companies to consider investing in the Nigerian solid minerals development sector, promising them a conducive environment. Mr Tinubu made this call when he held talks with his South African counterpart, Mr Cyril Ramaphosa, in New York City ahead of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA). According to a statement by the Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr Ajuri Ngelale, the Nigerian leader advanced his economic development diplomatic drive for investment attraction during the engagement. He told Mr Ramaphosa that, “South African mining industries have a

By Precious Olisa The Zamfara State Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Sokoto State has upheld the election of Mr Dauda Lawal as the governor of the state. Mr Lawal emerged victorious in the election after contesting to govern the state on March 18, 2023, under the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). He defeated the immediate past Governor of the state and current Minister of State for Defence, Mr Bello Matawalle, with an impressive margin of 65,750 votes. The returning officer for the poll had announced that Mr Matawalle, the candidate of the All-Progressives Congress (APC), secured a total

By Aduragbemi Omiyale The Vice President, Mr Kashim Shettima, has charged the National Assembly to continue to cooperate with the executive arm of government, noting that governance is a collective responsibility and not a personal endeavour. He said this at the retreat for the leadership of the 10th National Assembly last Friday at the Four Points by Sheraton, Ikot Ekpene, Akwa Ibom State. Mr Shettima said the administration of President Ahmed Tinubu was committed to safeguarding Nigeria’s democracy and maintaining the fraternal bond between the two arms of government. He described the composition of the federal government as well as

By Adedapo Adesanya The two leading opposition presidential candidates in the 2023 general elections, Mr Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Mr Peter Obi of the Labour Party, on Tuesday, approached the Supreme Court to upturn the judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC), which on September 6, affirmed Mr Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as winner of the exercise held on Saturday, February 25. Mr Atiku, in his Notice of Appeal predicated on 35 grounds, insisted that the tribunal, in the judgment delivered by Justice Haruna Tsammani, committed grave error and miscarriage

By Modupe Gbadeyanka President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday approved N30,000 as the new national minimum wage in Nigeria. On Tuesday evening, the President received report of the tripartite committee he set up in November 2017 to look into the minimum wage, which is presently at N18,000. At a meeting held on Monday in Abuja, the committee, which comprises labour unions, organised private sector and the government, it was agreed that N30,000 will be the new wage. Receiving the report today, Mr Buhari thanked leadership of the organized labour and private sector as well as representatives of state and federal governments

By Dipo Olowookere A deal for the supply and installation of a pasta processing plant in Nigeria has been sealed between BUA Group and FAVA Spa of Italy. The agreement between both organisations will require the Italian company to build a pasta processing factory for its Nigerian counterpart in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, with a total capacity of 720 tonnes per day of pasta. According to the BUA Group, one of Africa’s leading foods and manufacturing conglomerate, the facility will be done across five lines and would be completed next year. The company stated that when completed in 2021, the

By Dipo Olowookere Investors at the nation’s stock market were left in severe pain on Tuesday after they had expected that the market would maintain the positive momentum it recorded at Monday’s trading session. But activities of profit takers did not let this dream come true as selloffs in stocks like MTN Nigeria, GTBank, UBA, Lafarge Africa and eight others inflicted a cut of about 0.58 percent deep on the exchange at the close of transactions. Consequently, the All-Share Index (ASI) reduced by 140.06 points to 26,244.39 points from 26,384.45 points, while the market capitalisation decreased by N68 billion to

By Modupe Gbadeyanka Dangote Flour Mills, a new generation bank, MTN Nigeria and Obajana Agrosacks Limited have been dragged before a tax appeal tribunal for north central zone sitting in Jos, Plateau State, for tax evasion worth hundreds of millions of Naira. The firms were sued by the governments of Benue, Kogi and Kwara States. While Dangote Flour Mills was sued by Kwara State government, MTN Nigeria was sued by Benue State government, with the financial institution and Obajana Agrosacks Limited sued by Kogi State government. The Tax Appeal Tribunal is empowered to adjudicate over disputes arising from Companies Income

By Modupe Gbadeyanka The ‘B’ long term and ‘B’ short term global scale counterparty credit ratings have been assigned by Standard and Poor’s (S&P) to the United Bank for Africa Plc (UBA). S&P explained that UBA’s market position is supported by its good franchise in the corporate and retail segments in Nigeria as well as geographic diversification, with operations in nineteen African countries (Nigeria inclusive). These ratings on the pan African lender are at par with S&P ratings on the Nigerian Sovereign. More so, S&P’s ‘B’ rating is the highest rating currently assigned to any Nigerian-based financial institution, thus reinforcing

By Modupe Gbadeyanka For the third consecutive month, the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which measures inflation rate, depreciated to 17.24 percent in the month of April 2017 from what was recorded in the previous month. This information was revealed on Tuesday, by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). The stats agency explained that the drop in the inflation rate to 17.24 percent in April from 17.26 percent in March shows a sign of ease in the already “high food and non-food prices, as well as favourable base effects over 2016 price.” According to the NBS, increases were recorded in all

By Modupe Gbadeyanka For the first this week, the stock market in Nigeria closed in the green zone for two consecutive days after reversing its downward trends that started last weekend. At the end of trading activities on Thursday, capital market indicators moved in the positive direction, though the volume of shares exchanged today finished lower than what was sold the previous day. The Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) all-share index improved by 111.39 points or 0.43 percent to close at 27,236.78 points compared to the 21.87 points or 0.08 percent it added on Wednesday, closing at 27,120.39 points. Likewise, the