President Muhammadu Buhari and All Progressives Congress state governors on Tuesday night met behind closed-doors at the Presidential Villa, Abuja .
Buhari had earlier on Tuesday met with the 36 state governors.
The Tuesday night meeting started few minutes before 11pm at the new Banquet Hall in the Villa.
The meeting was still in progress as at the 11.29pm when this report was filed.
President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday said Nigeria will continue to support all efforts aimed at ensuring peaceful resolution of the the Middle East conflict.
Speaking at an audience with the outgoing Palestinian Ambassador to Nigeria, Dr. Montaser Abuzaid, President Buhari reaffirmed Nigeria’s support for the Palestinian cause.
Buhari, according to a statement issued by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, noted that Nigeria recognized the State of Palestine 31 years ago, assuring Ambassador Abuzaid that his administration will maintain and strengthen bilateral ties with Palestine.
The President wished the outgoing ambassador well in his future assignments.
In his remarks, Abuzaid extended the goodwill of Palestinian President, Mahmud Abbas, to Nigeria and congratulated President Buhari on his assumption of office after a peaceful transition.
He appealed for more support from the Nigerian government for Palestinian companies interested in doing business in Nigeria, particularly in the area of construction and provision of critical infrastructure.
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has described as “evasive, diversionary and preemptive,” the present government’s “pile up of excuses” for possible failure in delivering on its campaign promises to Nigerians.
The party was reacting to revelations by President Muhammadu Buhari that the last PDP led administration left an empty treasury, occasioned by unbridled corruption, impunity and mismanagement of public resources.
But in a statement issued on Tuesday by the National Publicity Secretary of the PDP, Chief Olisa Metuh, the party said Buhari and the All Progressives Congress (APC) were privy to the nation’s dwindling economy.
According to the PDP, the economic crisis was triggered by global economic downturn occasioned by fall in international oil prices, even before the start of the last electioneering campaigns.
The party accused Buhari and the APC of choosing to deceive Nigerians with bogus promises, only to now resort to excuses after using the promises to secure power at the centre.
The PDP said it noted with dismay, President Buhari’s statement on Monday that Nigerians should not expect much from his first 100 days in office over claims that he met virtually an empty treasury and huge debts.
The statement said such claims only underlined the fact that the present administration was really not equipped to face the challenges of governance.
The PDP continued: “While we restate our resolve to engage only in credible and issue based opposition, we want the President and the APC to note that their plea for patience from Nigerians does not arise, because ab-initio, there has not been any indication that they are actually serious and determined to deliver on their campaign promises upon which they rode to power.
“Of course Nigerians are willing to support and cooperate with the President, but we are worried that the pictures emerging from his presidency and his party do not in any way inspire hope in the citizenry, especially as they have continued to show that theirs is ostensibly a matter of obtaining power by false pretenses.
“President Buhari and the APC must know that Nigerians did not give them the mandate to engage in frivolous excuses and pleas but to hit the ground running with solutions and quick fixes they promised during the campaigns.
“We ask, is President Buhari’s statement an admission of poor knowledge of national and international economic affairs or does it underscore the lack of capacity and skills by the administration to effectively harness and galvanize resources and potential inherent in Nigeria which has already been nurtured as Africa’s largest economy and one of the fasted growing in the world.
“Even if Nigerians decide to wait endlessly, we wonder how much the President can achieve amidst the flip-flops from his presidency and cacophony of interests from his party leaders struggling to enlarge their selfish political and economic frontiers.
“How can one reconcile President Buhari’s statement with the recent ridiculous and misleading claim by APC’s National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed that this administration has achieved in three weeks what the immediate past administration did not achieve in five years?
“Since after their electoral victory, the APC and the President have continued to expose their lack of commitment towards their campaign promises.”
President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday accepted an invitation from President Paul Biya to visit Cameroon at his earliest convenience for talks on the intensification of cooperation between Nigeria and neighbouring countries in the war against Boko Haram and terrorism.
Receiving the invitation from Mr. Sadi Rene Emmanuel, the Cameroonian Minister of Territorial Administration and Decentralization, President Buhari said he will visit Cameroon for the high-level talks after the end of the Ramadan fast.
Buhari, who said he was putting his experience as a former soldier to good use in the war against Boko Haram, re-emphasized that greater regional and international cooperation was needed to end the sect’s atrocities.
The President, according to a statement issued by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, commended the efforts of all regional governments, including Cameroon to support Nigeria in the war against Boko Haram.
But he called for even greater collaboration among the nations.
He said: “I am happy that the President has sent you. As you must have observed, I was in Niger and Chad over this issue. I planned to be in Cameroon afterwards, but I received an invitation to attend the Group of Seven (G7) meeting in Germany.
“I had to attend the meeting because Boko Haram has been internationalized and it was part of the discussions there,” he told Mr. Emmanuel.
The Special Envoy assured President Buhari of the Cameroonian leader’s “fraternity, sympathy and brotherly commitment” to working with Nigeria to end the Boko Haram insurgency.
“Together, we will reinforce our efforts, eradicate the scourge of terrorism and look forward to better things,’’ he stated
… Days of impunity, fiscal recklessness over – President
… ‘Jonathan’s administration worse than Shagari’s regime’
President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday vowed to recover funds stolen by government officials who abused their offices in the recent past.
Buhari, according to a statement issued by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, spoke at a meeting with the State governors in the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
He also told the governors that days of impunity, lack of accountability and fiscal recklessness in the management of national resources are over in Nigeria.
The President insisted that systemic leakages will be stopped.
He said: “There are financial and administrative instructions in every government parastatal and agency. But all these were thrown to the dogs in the past. Honestly, our problems are great, but we will do our best to surmount them.
“The next three months may be hard, but billions of dollars can be recovered and we will do our best.”
Expressing surprise that the governors had tolerated the atrocities allegedly committed with the Excess Crude Account since 2011, President Buhari promised to tackle the issue decisively.
He declared that the payment of national revenue into any account other than the Federation Account was an abuse of the constitution, adding that what he had heard about activities in many agencies and corporations, particularly the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, was clearly illegal.
On the refund of monies spent on federal projects by state governments, President Buhari assured the governors that the Federal Government will pay, but insisted that due process must be followed.
He promised special assistance for the three Northeastern states that were badly affected by the Boko Haram insurgency.
He also said that a comprehensive statement on the economic and financial situation inherited by his administration will be made known to the nation within the next four weeks.
The President added: “We will try and put the system back into the right position. What happened in the 2nd Republic has apparently happened again, and even worse, but we will restore sanity to the system.”
On an immediate lifeline for states that owe salaries running into several months, President Buhari said that a committee headed by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo will look at the Excess Crude Account and see what can be shared immediately.
The governors led by the Chairman of the Governors’ Forum, Abdulaziz Yari of Zamfara State, according to the statement, had presented a wish list to the President that included:
– Obedience of extant Supreme Court ruling that all monies go into the Consolidated Federation Account.
– An order from the President that all revenue generating agencies must pay into the Consolidated Federation Account.
– Review of the Revenue Allocation Formula.
– Refund of the monies expended by states on federal projects.
– A special consideration for the three states of the Northeast under Boko Haram infestation.
– Full details of the amounts that accrued into the Excess Crude Account from 2011, and how the money miraculously shrank without official sharing.
Governors of the 36 states on Tuesday offered suggestions to President Muhammadu Buhari on way out of the present cash crunch in the country.
While the Federal Government is reportedly owing domestic debts totaling N5.6 trillion, the 36 state governments and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) are being owed N658 billion.
Zamfara State Governor, Abdulaziz Yari, who briefed State House correspondents alongside his Bauchi and Abia States counterparts, Mohammed Abubakar and Okezie Ikpeazu, at the end of the meeting, said that some proposals were tabled before the President during the closed-door meeting.
Some of the proposals given to the President, he said, include reimbursement of some projects sums embarked upon by states instead of requesting for the bailout, extension of repayment periods for loans owed by states whose durations vary between four and seven years to 20 years.
Opposing the operation of excess crude account, Yari said the governors also want first line charges to be stopped like the N1.6 billion tax paid by the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas, saying that should be paid into the federation account.
He said the meeting was not really about bailout but how the states and the Federal Government can overcome the present financial crisis in the country.
President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday met with state governors in the Council Chamber of the State House, Abuja.
The enlarged meeting, which started when Buhari arrived the Chamber at 10:11am, will focus on the prevailing cash crunch in the country.
Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) had last Wednesday resolved to demand payment for various federal projects executed by the states from the Federal Government.
The money, they said, will go a long way in settling the backlog of salaries owed workers in their various states.
While it was claimed that some of the states were being owed between N10 billion and N50 billion, the governors had maintained that there would be no reason for the states to seek bailout from the federal government if the debts had been paid.
But President Buhari had on Monday claimed that he inherited empty treasury from the Goodluck Jonathan’s administration.
Among the Governors present in the Chamber when the meeting started on Tuesday are -Emmanuel Udom (Akwa Ibom) , Bindow Jibrilla (Adamawa), Samuel Ortom (Benue), Kashim Shettima (Borno), Prof. Ben Ayade (Cross River), Ifeanyi Okowa (Delta), Dave Umahi (Ebonyi), Ibrahim Dankwambo (Gombe) and Rochas Okorocha (Imo).
Others are – Alhaji Badaru Abubakar (Jigawa), Nasir El-Rufai (Kaduna), Dr Abdullahi Ganduje (Kano), Aminu Masari (Katsina), Atiku Bagudu (Kebbi), Abdulfatah Ahmed (Kwara), Akinwunmi Ambode (Lagos), Umaru Al-Makura (Nasarawa), -Alhaji Abubakar Sani Bello (Niger), Ibikunle Amosun (Ogun), Abiola Ajimobi (Oyo).
Also at the meeting are – Nyesom Wike (Rivers), Aminu Tambuwal (Sokoto), Darius Ishaku (Taraba), -Ibrahim Gaidam (Yobe), Abdulaziz Yari (Zamfara), Willie Obiano (Anambra), Adams Oshiomhole (Edo), Ayo Fayose (Ekiti), Idris Wada (Kogi), Olusegun Mimiko (Ondo)and Rauf Aragbesola (Osun).
Plateau and Bayelsa States were represented by their deputy governors.
President laments cash crunch on first day at Villa
NIGERIA is broke. The treasury is virtually empty, President Muhammadu Buhari said yesterday – his first at the Aso Villa since his assumption of power on May 29.
Besides huge foreign debts, there are unpaid workers’ salaries. This, to Buhari, is a “disgrace”.
Buhari was speaking at a meeting with State House correspondents at the Villa.
He said: “I hope we are starting and this culture developed, of 100 days, is bringing so much pressure, with treasury virtually empty, with debts in millions of dollars, with state workers and even federal workers not paid their salaries. It is such a disgrace for Nigeria. I think Nigeria should be in a position to pay its workers. This bad management that we find ourselves in, we really need your help to protect us from people before they match on us.”
The chairman of Buhari’s Transition Committee, Alhaji Ahmed Joda, said in an interview published by Sunday Trust that former President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration left a debt of N7 trillion.
“We were told at the beginning of the exercise that the government was in deficit of at least N1.3 trillion and by the end people were talking of about N7 trillion; everything is in a mess and these things have to be fixed,” Joda was quoted as saying.
Vice President Yemi Osinbanjo said before the inauguration of the government that it would inherit a debt of $63 billion.
But former Finance Minister and Coordinating Minster for the Economy Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said the Jonathan administration had a debt of $21.8 billion.
She said the $63.7 billion Osinbajo alluded to included loans taken by governments since 1960.
On his appointment of Femi Adesina, Buhari said: “It is not by accident that I got the best of you to be the special adviser, one of the 15 aides I had to get clearance from the Senate to appoint. He is one of the best presidents of the Guild of Editors that I can have as special adviser. I brought one of the best of you so that he can consistently defend me against you.
“Whether my job is a difficult one or easy is up to him, but I’m here to thank you in advance for what good and ill you are going to do to me.
“I have to quickly come and see you and welcome you to this place. I hope what happened of recent between the former president and one of you will not happen between me and you.”
Spotting a white Babanriga and white cap to match, President Buhari resumed duties for the first time in his office inside the Presidential Villa.
Since May 29, Buhari and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo have used the Defence House, Abuja as their offices to allow renovation at the Villa.
It was not immediately clear excatly when Buhari came into the expansive office as the trekable distance between his official residence and office is not within journalists’ view.
Besides, the list of visitors to the seat of power was unknown as reporters were not allowed to enter the President’s Office.
But photographers and television cameramen had a field day, clicking away before some of the meetings started.
Osinbajo, who arrived at the Vice President’s wing of the Presidential Villa around 9.07 a.m, after spending a few minutes in his office, walked up to Buhari’s office.
He acknowledged greetings from workers who trooped out from their offices to catch a glimpse of him. He was all smiles.
The workrs, who reported early to work, were apparently glad that Buhari and Osinbajo had eventually resumed at the Villa after operating for three weeks at the Defence House, Abuja.
At Buhari’s office, the two leaders met with some of the top presidential aides.
Among those Buhari met with were Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Defence, Ismaila Aliyu, who led security chiefs to brief the President on the security situation in the country.
He also met with the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and later the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefuele.
After the meetings in his office, reporters met Buhari around 5.30 p.m when he came to the Press Centre to meet with accredited State House correspondents.
He was in the company of State Chief of Protocol Lawal Abdullahi Kazaure, Special Adviser on Media and Publicity Femi Adesina and Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu.
Buhari spent 25 minutes with the State House correspondents, shaking hands with them and posing for photographs with the over 80 journalists in the hall.
The Special Adviser (Technical) to former Minister of State for Power, Mr. Darius Dickson Ishaku, and Managing Director/CEO of Mayok Engineering Works Limited, Chief Abayomi Awodipe, charts a roadmap on how President Muhammadu Buhari can solve the power problem. EMEKA UGWUANYI reports.
Solving the power sector problems is not rocket science, Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Mayok Engineering Works Limited, Chief Abayomi Awodipe, has said.
Awodipe is not new to the sector. He has handled challenging jobs in the sector in several parts of the world while working with world’s leading power equipment and facilities manufacturer, General Electric (GE) of United States.
Awodipe, who has completed a blueprint on fixing the power sector that would be sent to President Muhammadu Buhari, listed steps the government could take to tackle Nigeria’s power supply issues.
He said Buhari should set up a committee of experts, about 20 per cent of whom should be politicians and others power in generation, transmission and distribution, stating that the President should ask them to set a goal in the sector and that they sholud be alotted a time frame within which to fix the ills of the power sector.
‘’They should state what they will do in six months, one year and two years to stop this power problem. That committee must not be political and may not even be visible, but they will be doing a lot of work. The terms of reference must centre on how to improve power, and ensure uninterruptible power in Nigeria,’’ he said.
He said the committee’s programme must be such that will deliver 5,000 megawatts (MW) within the next six months to Nigerians. The committee must also look at the distribution system, which he described as rickety.
He said there are technical issues in each of the departments – generation, transmission and distribution, adding that all the technical issues must be resolved toward achieving this output. The only way Nigerians can be happy is to see above 5,000MW and if possible 10,000MW. They must ask for another 5000MW in two years and in the next 10 years, get 10,000MW. Nigeria has 46 power plants and the machines are already there, why can’t these machines work?’’
Awodipe advised the Federal Government to compel all the generation stations to operate efficiently and produce 80 per cent of their installed capacities, and that anything short of that, the management of such companies should be queried.
He recommended that the government should create a code of conduct for contractors handling power projects. According to him, many contractors have come to the sector and left without doing the job not just in the power sector but in the entire economy. For instance, how many contractors are handling NIPP projects, how many have finished? he asked.
“I was the chairman of the committee of abandoned power equipment at the ports. My committee recovered about 400 containers of power equipment. For eight months I was busy running to and fro the ports and delivering the NIPP transformers and materials with the army, so they can finish these projects. How many contractors went to the ports? They only tell you the Customs didn’t allow them. The small transformers you see installed all over the place are of the abandoned equipment. If there was an effective code of conduct, such actions wouldn’t happen,” Awodipe said.
He advised the government to adopt regional grid system as against the national grid system.
He said the national grid system is wasteful and uneconomic because every power generated is sent to the transmission centre where it is allocated to various parts of the country and in the process of transmission to places far away from the centre at Osogbo, a lot of power is lost. The losses are worsened by the weak and unstable transmission network. Therefore, with regional grid system, power generated would not travel long distances before utilisation.
‘’How many of them have been punished for not performing? When the month ends, they get their salaries. Now that the power sector has been privatised, I have reservation because privatisation means results. But, are we getting results? If we are not getting results, who will be blamed? All these are the questions the government must ask,’’ he said.
On revenue loss, I must tell you that Nigeria loses a lot of money. America generates 750,000MW every day, South Africa about 70,000MW, and Nigeria hit a peak of 4000MW and has been dropping ever since, what does that mean? For every 1MW we fail to generate, we lose N1 billion per day. If you have 1MW, multiply it with N8 per kilowatt/hour, you see how much money you will get.
On the calls for review of the privatised generation and distribution assets, Awodipe said the privatisation was okay, but unfortunately, privatisation means results and Nigerians are not seeing the results almost two years into the privatisation.
He said: “The privatisation was good, but the only thing is that we jumped it. What could have been done first was to commercialise them (the power assets) and privatisation will follow later. By commercialisation, I mean the government would have been able to know how feasible and financially viable those assets it wants to sell are. We didn’t look at the viability of each plant or distribution company we sold. Ughelli that has 900MW capacity was only generating 200MW when it was sold. The government didn’t bring the machines or the stations to the viability point of 60-80 per cent. In that sense, the buyers have now seen that what were sold to them are not profitable and they are having problems in generating fund to keep what they bought running.
“They have a legitimate reason but they should have known that before they bought them, so it is nobody’s business. What I advise the new government is to call a roundtable with the buyers, let them have their own independent studies on where the assets were before they bought them, what they have done in two years and the way forward. Let the new government do that quickly and invite those that bought it, tell them we know where we were when we sold it, we know what you have done and this is where we want you to be. Can you meet it or not? If you cannot meet it, we can find somebody who can do it. It is as simple as that. That is my advice. It un-businesslike and might cause a lot of disenfranchisement or even breakdown of the power sector completely if the privatisation is reversed, but it needs a lot of dialogue and review with those that understand the sector. ‘’
“No buyer has added one single thing since they bought it. No station has increased by one megawatt since they bought it and no distribution company has installed anything. Even in my street, we conducted a study and discovered we need a transformer but had to buy it by ourselves because the utility firm refused to bring it. There is actually a lacuna but I advice it is not reversed.
On Ajaokuta Steel Company, Awodipe advised that the government shouldn’t start something it wouldn’t finish.
“Secondly, we change contractors unduly because of political interests. Our iron and steel technology is a Russian technology. I believe the solution to that Ajaokuta is to bring the original manufacturers. There is nothing you can do when you change the contractor handling a project. You don’t hold a new contractor responsible for output issues and this is political. The politicians have to take responsibility for failed technology and industries that we have. That industry will not see the light of the day until we bring the original manufacturers to come and help us to complete it and also unleash on them our Nigerian engineers. We have brilliant Nigerian engineers all over the world and we have failed to tap that. Who knows that I was in GE until I came to Nigeria? I was all over the world – in South America, Saudi Arabia, Europe, among others. Who knew when I came to Nigeria in 1976, that there was a Nigerian who was commissioning turbines all over the world? We have Nigerians that can help solve the problem of the power sector but the government has to encourage those who have gone out to get the technology by involving them in the scheme of things,” he added.
A Group, Youths Change Nigeria, has said President Muhammadu Buhari is the leader of Nigeria, not just of the All Progressives Congress (APC), hence it will be wrong to cloak him in a partisan toga.
In a statement issued in Lagos on Tuesday, the organization’s National Leader, Mr. Seun Bobade, said the moment Buhari was sworn in as President on May 29th, he became the leader of all Nigerians, irrespective of their party affiliations.
“We have been following the controversy over the comment purportedly made by the National Publicity Secretary of the APC, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, that President Buhari is not the leader of the APC. We watched the interview in which Alhaji Lai Mohammed made the comments, and we can say without equivocating that his comments have been taken out of context.
“What we believe Alhaji Lai Mohammed said in that interview is that while President Buhari is a loyal party man and the product of his party’s primaries, it will be wrong for anyone to pigeon hole him as just the leader of the APC, because as President, he is the leader of Nigeria.
“The President himself said that much in his inaugural speech of May 29th. The President said inter alia: ‘I would like to thank the millions of our supporters who believed in us even when the cause seemed hopeless. I salute their resolve in waiting long hours in rain and hot sunshine to register and cast their votes and stay all night if necessary to protect and ensure their votes count and were counted.
“I thank those who tirelessly carried the campaign on the social media. At the same time, I thank our other countrymen and women who did not vote for us but contributed to make our democratic culture truly competitive, strong and definitive. I thank all of you. Having just a few minutes ago sworn on the Holy Book, I intend to keep my oath and serve as President of All Nigerians (emphasis ours).
“We are therefore constrained to warn those who have been seeking to make a mountain out of a molehill over the comment purportedly made by the National Publicity Secretary of the APC to desist from their distracting game, unless of course they have an ulterior motive for pushing their jaundiced views,’’ the Youths for Change Nigeria said.
It reminded Nigerians that in the United States, after which Nigeria has modeled its system of government, the President – at this time Mr. Barack Obama – is not seen and addressed as the leader of the Democratic Party but the leader of the United States of America.
“It may be a different ball game in a parliamentary system, but that is not what our country is practising at this moment,” the organization said.
Youth for Change Nigeria called for an end to unnecessary bickering and controversies that do not contribute positively to ensuring the welfare and security of Nigerians – which is the reason for the existence of any government.