The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Danbazzau

  • Ekwunife, Danbazzau, Eweka, Zwingina, 70 others head APC congresses, appeal panels

    •Party cautions against unilateral postponement of congresses

    THE All Progressives Congress (APC) has inaugurated five-member committees to conduct state congresses in different states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) on Saturday.

    Three-member committees were also inaugurated to entertain appeals that may arise from the State Congresses.

    Some state congress chairmen are H.E. Pius Odubu (Adamawa); Gen. Danjuma Danbazzau (Taraba); Prince Austin Eweka (Kano); Senator Domingo Obende (Niger); Senator Jonathan Zwingina (Abia); Senator Olugbenga Obadara (Delta); Senator Uche Ekwunife (Lagos); Mathew Omegara (Ondo); H.E. Peter Obadan (Ogun); H.E. Abdullahi Gwarzo (Oyo) among others.

    The appeal committees have among others H.E. Chris Akoma as chairman of Ebonyi State; Gbenga Elegbeleye (Rivers); Bashir Lado (Ogun);  SAbubakar Maikudi (Bauchi); Ambassador Jerry Ugog (Kano); and Kogolo Peter (Imo).

    APC National Organising Secretary Senator Osita Izunaso, who inaugurated the committees on behalf of the National Chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, told the committees members the congresses must be conducted in strict conformity with the official APC Guidelines for State Congresses.

    Izunaso said the committees were expected to hold meetings with stakeholders in the respective states on Friday before Saturday’s nationwide congresses to elect state executive committee, which include the official 17-member State Working Committees.

    The organising secretary urged the committees to ensure a free, fair, democratic and transparent process. He also warned against unilateral postponement of state congresses without approval by the party’s National Working Committee (NWC).

    Izunaso: “Don’t deny anybody who has a payment teller a form. It is undemocratic… You don’t have the power to postpone the election. If you go to a state and you find out that it is impossible to conduct the election, you inform the NWC for approval. The National Convention is close by. We want to conclude these processes as quickly as possible.”

    For the Appeal Committees, Izunaso said every petition from individuals who contested elections must be entertained. He cautioned the appeal committees to gauge the security situation in their respective state in deciding where to hold appeal sittings.

    He said the NWC has the final decision on appeals.

     

     

    “If the place is volatile for the Appeal Committee, and they cannot sit there, you can sit in Abuja,” Izunaso said.

     

    Protesters demand APC National Organising Secretary’s sack

    •’Allegations are false’

    SOME members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) yesterday stormed the party’s national secretariat and demanded the sack of the National Organising Secretary, Senator Osita Izunaso.

    They accused him of manipulating the recent ward and local government congresses in states.

    The group, under the auspices of Democratic Youth Congress for Buhari 2019, arrived at the APC secretariat in two luxury buses, carrying placards with inscriptions “Sen. Osita must go”.

    The protesters, who were led by a serving House of Assembly lawmaker from Nasarawa State, Kassim Muhammad Kassim, accused Osita of indirectly working for opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to frustrate re-election of President Muhammadu Buhari in 2019.

    In a complaint letter addressed to the APC National Chairman, Chief John Oyegun, dated May 17, the protesters called for a fresh ward congress in Imo State and some other states where there are issues to be settled.

    The letter, which was presented to the party leadership, was copied to the President, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Police Commissioner and the FCT Director of Directorate of State Services (DSS).

    It, however, took the stiff resistance of the police and other security agents at the APC headquarter to prevent the protesters from gaining entrance into the premises.

    But responding on behalf of Izunaso, former Speaker of Imo State House of Assembly, Ibejiako Ernest, dismissed the allegations, saying the protesters should not be taken serious.

    Ernest, who also served at the Federal House of Representatives, said: “I can tell you that all the allegations are false. Senator Izunaso has conducted himself decently since he became the National Organising Secretary of our party, the APC. As a good son of Imo State, he has done his best for the party.”

     

     

     

  • Senate summons ministers, AGF, four firms over e-passport deals

    Senate summons ministers, AGF, four firms over e-passport deals

    The Senate ad hoc committee investigating alleged misuse, under remittance, and other fraudulent activities in the collection, remittance and expenditure of internally generated revenue by MDAs has invited the Attorney General of the Federation, Mr. Abubakar Malami, Minister of Interior, General Danbazzau and  Accountant General of the Federation, Ahmed Idris over alleged shady deals in the production and sale of e-passport.

    Also summoned by the committee to shed light on the multi-billion naira production and sale of e-passport includes four companies.

    They are to appear before the Senator Solomon Adeola led committee to explain their roles on e-Passport production and other immigration related issues that the companies performed on behalf of the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS). The firms were said to have entered into public private partnership (PPP) arrangement with the NIS over the years.

    The invited companies included Contec Nigeria Ltd, Greater Washington Nigeria Ltd, New work Solution and Investment Ltd, and Iris Smart Technologies which works on e-passport production, expatriate residence permit and alien card and related immigration.

    The companies are also said to have contractual agreements to perform some revenue generating service on behalf of the NIS “with the companies withholding a hefty percentage of revenue that would have accrued to the Federal Government.”

    Senator Adeola issued the invitation following the presentation made by the Comptroller General of Nigeria Immigration Service, Mr. Mohammed Babandede, on the revenue profile of the service. The committee wanted to know how generated revenue, “running into billions of naira and dollar, were shared by the companies, NIS and the Federal Government.”

    Adeola said, “I am at loss why huge part of revenue generated by NIS continued to be paid to private firms in the name of PPP that should actually be based on Build Operate and Transfer (BOT).

    “We cannot continue to deny Nigerians the benefits that would accrue to them through increase revenue to government coffers instead of huge earnings for private concerns.

    “This is an area that government can generate huge revenue. There is need to get clarifications on this issue from all the parties involved.”

    The CG of NIS, in his presentation, noted that the reasons for entering into PPP arrangement at the time the government did was attributed to inadequate funding and late release of budgeted sums, multiple acquisition of travel documents and poor revenue generation. He added that the private partners provided all the funding while money realized in the course of issuing facilities is shared with government in order to allow the private partners recoup their investment.

    The Immigration boss said that for the period of investigation by the Senate between 2012-2016 total remittance to Federal Government stood at over N17 billion and over$112million.

    He noted that “revenue accruing to government has increased almost a hundred fold since the introduction of these (PPP) agreements”.

  • FEC approves N4.5bn for prisons vehicles, transformers

    The Federal Executive Council (FEC) on Wednesday approved the purchase of 320 prisons operational vehicles at a cost of N3.5 billion.

    It also approved the purchase of three transformers of 150 MVA‎ to be installed in power sub-stations at Kumbotso (Kano), Shiroro (Niger), and Oshogbo (Osun) at a cost of N1 billion.

    The Minister of Interior, Abdulrahman Dambazzau, and his Power, Works and Housing counterpart, Babatunde Fashola, briefed State House correspondents at the end of the meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari.

    Also at the briefing were the Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed and Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Ibe Kachikwu.

    Dambazzau said the vehicles are to convey inmates to courts in order to speed up trial, adding that awaiting trial inmates constituted 70 per cent of the 65,000 prison population.

    He said: “In our efforts to strengthen criminal justice system and also contribute towards decongesting the system, we presented a memo for the procurement of 320 operational vehicles for the prison service at the cost of N3.5 billion.

    “This procurement is from local manufacturers, assemblies and vendors within Nigeria and the effort is to follow through government policy in ensuring that most of the procurement of equipment and such vehicles are done locally. That will also provide opportunity for job creation and things like that.”

  • UI names Danbazzau as board chairman

    UI names Danbazzau as board chairman

    Authorities of the University of Ibadan (UI) have announced former Chief of Army Staff, Gen. Abdurrahman Danbazzau (red), as chairman of its Advancement Centre. The pro-chancellor, Dr. Umar Musa Mustapha, who made the announcement during the inauguration of the members of the board, said he was happy that the university is making good choices.

    According to him, the university recently appointed as its new Vice-chancellor, Prof. Idowu Olayinka, “and now, we have got another egghead as chairman of the advancement board.”

    He said: “The federal government cannot completely shoulder the responsibility of funding universities and we want to be nationally competent and internationally relevant as a university. We are aware of government effort but we as a community should do more. What is available should be put into good use. We believe that the board will not disappoint us,” he said.

    An elated Danbazzau said he and his team would work to achieve the dreams of the institution’s founding fathers. The board is expected to enhance the financial base of the university through philanthropy for the development of the university’s capacity to fulfil its mandate.

    According to Danbazzau, “we are not only going to make friends, we will keep old friends. We will not only sustain UI as a leading brand, we are also going to project it into the future. We will use our knowledge and experience to advance the cause of this university. The members of this board are people with great experience and integrity,” he noted

    Other members of the board include former Nigeria’s ambassador to Zambia and Malawi, Mrs Folake Marcus-Bello, daughter of late former governor of old Oyo State, Chief Bola Ige, Barr. Funsho Adegbola, Chief Olabisi Ogunjobi, Mr. Hyacinth Kyaagba, Mr. Asue Ighodalo, Dr. Kaine Dosekun, Mr. Babatunde Dabiri and  Dr. Yemisi Shyllon.