FG Approves Payment of Withheld Salaries of Lecturers

By Aduragbemi Omiyale The immediate past Director of Google West Africa, Ms Juliet Ehimuan, has been appointed to the board of directors of Zenith Bank Plc. Ms Ehimuan, who is also the founder and chief executive of Beyond Limits, will serve on the board of the tier-1 financial institution as a non-executive director. A statement from the lender on Tuesday disclosed that the appointment of Ms Ehimuan, which has been confirmed by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), will take effect from August 29, 2023. In a statement to the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited, Zenith Bank said the appointee has

By Modupe Gbadeyanka About 170 of the 200 graduate trainees of Flutterwave (85 per cent) have been absorbed into the organisation as full-time employees after the completion of their programme. The leading payments technology firm in August 2022 launched its Graduate Trainee (GT) scheme to nurture young talents seeking clear career growth opportunities in technology. Some days ago, a graduation ceremony was held in Lagos to celebrate the end of the rigorous 12-month-long paid traineeship scheme. The participants were put through technical and soft skills and practical experiences. “We are excited that our aim of giving 200 extremely bright young

By Aduragbemi Omiyale Mr Farooq Oreagba has been chosen by the board of directors of NG Clearing Limited as the new Managing Director/chief executive, subject to the approval of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). He is replacing Mr Tapas Das, who occupied the office for three years and demonstrated exceptional leadership and strategic vision, driving NG Clearing to a phenomenal historical achievement of clearing the first exchange-traded derivatives contracts in West Africa. Under his guidance, NG Clearing developed a world-class clearing and settlement system that has successfully integrated with the key exchanges in Nigeria’s financial markets. A statement issued

By Modupe Gbadeyanka The salaries of employees of Mediacraft Associates Limited, a leading Nigerian full-service Public Relations and Integrated Brand Communications Consultancy firm, have been increased by 15 and 25 per cent. This was confirmed by a statement from the organisation as it celebrates its 20th anniversary this year. It was disclosed that the gesture was to reward the efforts of the workers toward the growth of the company and to cushion the current hardships in the country due to the removal of petroleum subsidy. According to the chief executive of Mediacraft Associates, Mr John Ehiguese, the salary increase had

By Adedapo Adesanya The NASD Over-the-Counter (OTC) Securities Exchange on Monday, September 28 continued its positive run into the new week as the unlisted securities market reached its highest point since the beginning of the year. At the session, the total value of equities trading on the bourse increased by 0.07 per cent or N400 million to N538.52 billion from N538.12 billion. This appreciation was boosted by a bellwether stock, FrieslandCampina WAMCO Nigeria Plc, which recorded another jump in price. The milk producer moved up further by 41 kobo or 0.3 per cent to N137.91 per share from N137.50 per

By Dipo Olowookere Global Credit Ratings has affirmed the national scale ratings assigned to Wema Bank Plc of BBB-(NG) and A3(NG) in the long-term and short-term respectively; with the outlook accorded as Stable. A statement issued by the local rating agency explained that it affirmed the rating because the mid-sized bank has recorded some improvements lately. It said Wema Bank was presently focusing on deepening its market share particularly within the retail banking segment through increased presence and digitisation. The lender’s risk-weighted capital adequacy ratio (CAR) improved to 14.3 percent at FY17 (FY16:11.1 percent), supported by a reduction in risk

By Adedapo Adesanya Lagos State generated a sum of N753.46 billion, about 39.7 per cent of the total internally generated revenue (IGR) of Nigeria in 2021, according to the latest data on states’ IGR released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). The total IGR recorded by the 36 states of the federation rose beyond pre-pandemic levels after it dipped in 2020 due to the lockdown measures put in place by the federal government to curb the spread of the pandemic. The NBS said the states, and the federal capital territory, generated N1.89 trillion as IGR in 2021, about 21.5

By Virusha Subban There was more good news for the successful implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement in December 2022, when a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed between the United States (US) Trade Representative and the AfCFTA Secretariat at the US-Africa Leaders’ Summit (Summit) in Washington DC. The MoU covers expanded engagement between the two regions and intends to “promote equitable, sustainable, and inclusive trade; boost competitiveness; and attract investment to the continent.” It was also announced at the Summit that the US intended to invest $55 billion in Africa over the next three years

By Adedapo Adesanya MTN Nigeria Communications Plc will receive €100 million credit facility from the European Investment Bank (EIB) to speed up its network expansion programme. According to a corporate disclosure by the company, the investment will aid the acceleration of 4G coverage in Nigeria and expand broadband access in line with MTN’s 2025 ambition strategy. The statement further explained that the transaction represents EIB’s largest financing for mobile telecommunications network expansion in Africa. It will help improve network capacity across the country to accommodate rising data traffic and enhance coverage in Lagos and Ogun states. Commenting on the deal,

By Dipo Olowookere Not less than 577 companies have submitted bids to secure the insurance renewal contract for oil and non-oil assets of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC). This information was made known on Tuesday at the public opening bids measure aimed at providing a level playing field for all bidding firms. The breakdown of bidders shows that 245 brokers tendered for oil assets, 251 brokers tendered for non-oil assets while 37 insurance companies tendered for oil assets and 44 tendered for non-oil assets. Speaking at the event, NNPC Group General Manager, Risk Management and Insurance, Mr Modupe Bameke,

By Dipo Olowookere The Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) further depreciated on Tuesday by 0.17 percent, extending the year-to-date loss to 14.27 percent. It further caused investors at the market to lose N22 billion of their investments. The decline followed the outpowering of the bulls by the bears during the trading session, leaving the market breadth negative as a result of the 19 price losers and 13 price gainers. Losses were posted by industrial goods index (-0.25 percent) and insurance index (-0.37 percent), while gains were printed by banking index (0.38) and the consumer goods index (0.05), with the energy index

By Modupe Gbadeyanka Bullish trend on the trading floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) was sustained on Friday on active bargain hunting by investors, Business Post reports. This left the stock market to close for the week today with 1.66 percent rise, extending the rally to second trading session. Furthermore, the market breadth ended positive with 25 gainers and 12 losers, while the year-to-date return expanded to 37.38 percent. In addition, the All-Share Index (ASI) rose by 603.98 points to settle at 36,920.56 points, while the market capitalisation propagated by N208.2 billion to finish at N12.7 trillion. Though the