The Nation Newspaper

Tag: G7

  • $251m lifeline for African women entrepreneurs

    Leaders of the G7 nations have approved a $251 million package in support of the African Development Bank (AfDB) Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa (AFAWA) initiative to support women entrepreneurs in Africa.

    AFAWA aims to raise up to $5 billion for African women entrepreneurs and the AfDB will provide $1 billion financing. The risk-sharing mechanism used by AFAWA is a practical approach to international commitments.

    It is a direct response to the demand by women to ease access to financing, specifically on the need to establish a financing mechanism for women’s economic empowerment.

    AFAWA was adopted during a summit of African Heads of State in 2015 and assigned to the African Development Bank (AfDB) for implementation.

    The $251 million package for African women entrepreneurs was announced at a press conference at the G7 Summit in Biarritz, France, during the week.

    French President/G7 president Emmanuel Macron said: “I am particularly proud, as the current G7 president, that the programme we are supporting today, the AFAWA initiative, comes from an African organisation, the AfDB, which works with African guarantee funds and a network of African banks.”

    Beninese artist Angelique Kidjo, a guest at the press conference, in her role as programme ambassador, described African women as the continent’s backbone. “I’m thrilled to bring their voice to the G7. AFAWA is essential for our continent,” she said.

    AfDB President Akinwumi Adesina applauded the “extraordinary support of all the G7 heads of state and government, which will provide incredible momentum” to the AFAWA programme.

    “This is a great day for African women. Investing in women entrepreneurs in Africa is important, because women are not only Africa’s future, they are Africa’s present,” he said.

    Adesina said women operate over 40 per cent of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Africa, but there is a financing gap of $42 billion between male and female entrepreneurs.

    ‘’This gap must be closed, and quickly,” the AfDB president said, adding, “This financing effort for women is the most significant in the continent’s history.”

    The initiative, backed by the G7 nations, was based on three fundamental principles. The first was to improve women’s access to financing through innovative and adapted financial instruments, including guarantee mechanisms to support women entrepreneurs.

    In cooperation with strategic partners, the second principle was to provide capacity-building services to women entrepreneurs, including access to mentoring and training courses in entrepreneurship.

    AFAWA also assists financial institutions in responding to specific needs of women-led businesses through specially adapted financial and non-financial products.

    The third principle was improving the legal and regulatory environment, eliminating obstacles that specifically affect women by engaging in policy dialogue with governments, central banks, and other institutions.

    The press conference on AFAWA was part of the G7 Summit’s emphasis on reducing inequality, specifically including a renewed partnership with Africa.

    This partnership will be highlighted by creating sustainable employment and supporting entrepreneurship, particularly women entrepreneurs.

    France holds the presidency of the G7 this year, and Macron is championing gender equality as a major theme of his five-year term.

  • Trump lashes out at U.S allies

    United States President, Donald Trump, has fired off a string of angry tweets criticising America’s closest allies hours after leaving a divisive G7 summit in Canada.

    Mr. Trump said the U.S paid “close to the entire cost of Non-Alliance Treaty Organisation (NATO)” to help protect countries that “rip us off on trade.”

    “Fair trade is now to be called fool trade,” he added in response to the threat of new tariffs against the U.S.

    The BBC reports that Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, has vowed retaliatory action next month over U.S tariffs on steel and aluminium.

    Mr. Trump has also attacked Mr. Trudeau personally, suggesting the Canadian prime minister is “very dishonest and weak” and “acts hurt when called out.”

  • UK productivity lags behind rest of G7

    The UK was much less productive than the rest of the G7 in 2014, lagging by the most since 1991, official figures have shown.

    The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said output per hour was 20 percentage points below the G7 average. The UK was behind the US, Germany and France by a large margin and was slightly worse than Italy and Canada.

    Productivity is seen as key to helping increase living standards in the UK by many experts.

    “These figures show UK productivity continues to lag behind other developed economies,” ONS chief economist Joe Grice said.

    “Since the economic downturn, productivity growth has slowed in most developed economies, but by more in the UK than the average.”

    The Chancellor, George Osborne, pledged in July to take steps to encourage more long-term investment in infrastructure and by businesses to boost productivity.

    Howard Archer, chief UK economist at IHS Global Insight, said British productivity had been held back since the financial crisis by the creation of lots of low-skilled, low-paid jobs where productivity is limited.

    However, Institute of Directors’ chief economist, James Sproule said UK firms should focus on “agility” rather than productivity.

    “The economy of the future looks set to be dominated not by big companies, but by fast, agile, quick-moving and reactive ones,” he said.

    “The firms that can respond to consumer demands most effectively and bring new products and services to market will reap the rewards.”

    Productivity isn’t everything, but in the long run it’s almost everything – as Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman noted 25 years ago in his book, “The Age of Diminished Expectations”.

    “Unless you improve the amount each worker produces, you can’t expect living standards to rise.

    “It’s a harsh verdict on British economic performance that since 1991 when the ONS started making international comparisons, the gap between our productivity and the rest of the world’s advanced economies widened to a chasm.

    “Sure we have had economic growth. But the fact that we’re still 18 per cent less productive than we would have been on pre-crisis trends gives you some idea why that growth hasn’t always flowed through to higher wages.

    If each worker produced more, employers could afford to pay higher wages,” Sproule said.

    The latest official data on UK productivity, released in July, recorded a sharp pick-up in productivity at the start of the year.

    Investment has also picked up. But if we’re going to catch up with the rest of the G7, we’ll have to sustain that for years.

  • What G7 promised Nigeria, by Buhari

    What G7 promised Nigeria, by Buhari

    The G7 group of industrialised nations has resolved to support President Muhammadu Buhari.

    A statement issued yesterday by the Senior Special Assistant (Media and Publicity) to the President, Garba Shehu, said that “at the end of the presentation he made on Monday, the G7 leaders said to him that they recognised the President’s massive amount of confidence and expectations behind his government.

    “They acknowledged him as having emerged from an election adjudged to be the freest in the country’s electoral history, but regretted the severe handicaps his new government has to face from the outset.

    “They told President Buhari that they took cognizance of the fact of the several handicaps, including the lack of resources, leaving him with a government over-stretched in capacity, itself riddled with mismanagement.

    “The G-7 also noted that the country’s army lacked training and equipment with little or no will to engage.

    “In recognition of the fact that the security threat of the Boko Haram had gone beyond Nigeria, equally affecting other countries in the region, the G7 conceded that no one country can tackle it alone.

    “They expressed warm sentiments towards the Nigerian leader and praised him for reaching out to the country’s neighbours and the group of industrialised nations within a week of his takeover of government.

    “In view of the seriousness he has shown in tacking this problem, the group pledged that they would “engage, cooperate and collaborate” with President Buhari’s government in tackling the serious problems that Nigeria faces.

    “They left it to President Buhari to come up with the specifics on his requirements, assuring that they would study the requirements either individually or collectively and offer help. They asked to know the nature and the scale of the problems in order to know the nature and the scale of the assistance they will provide. Suffice it to say that they assured President Buhari that ‘Nigeria will find a partner in the G7.” Buhari, who had the privilege of being the first to address the G7 among the invited presidents and prime ministers, was warmly received at the summit. He returned to Nigeria in the early hours of yesterday.he G7 group of industrialised nations has resolved to support President Muhammadu Buhari.

    A statement issued yesterday by the Senior Special Assistant (Media and Publicity) to the President, Garba Shehu, said that “at the end of the presentation he made on Monday, the G7 leaders said to him that they recognised the President’s massive amount of confidence and expectations behind his government.

    “They acknowledged him as having emerged from an election adjudged to be the freest in the country’s electoral history, but regretted the severe handicaps his new government has to face from the outset.

    “They told President Buhari that they took cognizance of the fact of the several handicaps, including the lack of resources, leaving him with a government over-stretched in capacity, itself riddled with mismanagement.

    “The G-7 also noted that the country’s army lacked training and equipment with little or no will to engage.

    “In recognition of the fact that the security threat of the Boko Haram had gone beyond Nigeria, equally affecting other countries in the region, the G7 conceded that no one country can tackle it alone.

    “They expressed warm sentiments towards the Nigerian leader and praised him for reaching out to the country’s neighbours and the group of industrialised nations within a week of his takeover of government.

    “In view of the seriousness he has shown in tacking this problem, the group pledged that they would “engage, cooperate and collaborate” with President Buhari’s government in tackling the serious problems that Nigeria faces.

    “They left it to President Buhari to come up with the specifics on his requirements, assuring that they would study the requirements either individually or collectively and offer help. They asked to know the nature and the scale of the problems in order to know the nature and the scale of the assistance they will provide. Suffice it to say that they assured President Buhari that ‘Nigeria will find a partner in the G7.” Buhari, who had the privilege of being the first to address the G7 among the invited presidents and prime ministers, was warmly received at the summit. He returned to Nigeria in the early hours of yesterday.

  • Buhari arrives Germany for talks with Obama, G7 leaders

    Buhari arrives Germany for talks with Obama, G7 leaders

    President Muhammadu Buhari has arrived Munich, Germany on Sunday to begin a two-day official visit where he will participate in the G-7 Outreach program for invited heads of government and global institutions.

    Buhari, who was received on arrival by the Vice Minister-President of Bavaria, Mrs. Inge Aigner, was accompanied by Governor Kashim Shettima of Borno State, former Governor Babatunde Fashola, Gen. A. Dambazau (rtd.) and the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Amb. Paul B. Lolo.

    Other invited Heads of States and international institutions who will join President Buhari at the working session with G-7 leaders on Monday at Elmau include President Jacob Zuma of South Africa, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia, President Macky Sall of Senegal, President Beji Caid Essebsi of Tunisia and Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn of Ethiopia.

    The statement reads: “Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi of Iraq, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. Ban Ki Moon, the Secretary-General of the OECD, Mr. Angel Gurria, the Managing Director of the IMF, Mrs. Christine Largarde, the President of the World Bank Group, Dr. Jim Yong Kim, the Director-General of the International Labour Organistion, Mr. Guy Rider, the Chairperson of the African Union Commission , Mrs. Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma and the Director-General of the World Trade Organisation are also scheduled to participate in Monday’s Outreach Session with G-7 leaders.”

    Before leaving Munich for home on Monday, President Buhari will hold bilateral talks with the Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada on the sidelines of the G-7 Outreach Programme.

    He is also expected to meet President Barack Obama, President Francois Hollande of France, Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain, and other G-7 leaders in the course of the Outreach Session and a working lunch at the Elmau Castle.

    The Head of the Bavarian regional government will host a dinner in honour of President Buhari and other leaders invited to the G-7 Outreach Programme on Sunday night.

  • 2015: G7 PDP aspirants insist on Ibadan consensus candidate

    2015: G7 PDP aspirants insist on Ibadan consensus candidate

    The Group of Seven (G7) governorship aspirants in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Oyo State who hail from Ibadan, the state capital, insisted yesterday on producing a candidate for the next election.

    In a communique issued after its meeting, the group explained that its insistence was based on the  recognition of the political realities in the state.

    However, the group said it has never excluded other zones in the governorship arrangements of the party.

    The group said: “We are aware of similar meetings at various zones of the state for the governorship slot.”

    The G7 emphasised that each state has its own political peculiarities.

    It said it was “concerned about winning the next governorship election and forming the next government in Oyo State and therefore encourages contributions and ideas on the best strategies to achieve the objective.”

    The group’s goal drew criticism from Ogbomoso where two other aspirants hail from. They are the immediate former governor, Adebayo Alao-Akala and Senator Ayoade Adeseun. Alao-Akala boasted that he would defeat them. Adeseun said Ogbomoso did not anoint Alao-Akala as the sole candidate. He said the members of the G7 were only exercising their fundamental human right.

    Adeseun said the decision of PDP members in Ogbomoso was to support whoever wins the governorship ticket in any of the political parties, believing that his success in the election would bring benefits to the zone.

    Members of the G7 are Dr Wole Oyelese, Alhaji Hazeem Gbolarumi, Prof. Taoheed Adedoja, Prof. Soji Adejumo, Sen. Teslim Folarin, Seyi Makinde and Dr. Azeez Adeduntan.

  • G7 condemns takeover in Crimea

    The G7 leaders on Sunday night in Washington condemned Russian actions in Crimea saying they would stop their involvement in preparations for a planned Group of Eight (G8) summit in June in Sochi.

    Leaders of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States and the President of the European Council and President of the European Commission condemn the Russian Federation’s clear violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine.

    A statement, from the White House said that the Russian military had complete operational control of Crimea which included 6,000 airborne and naval forces, and they are flying in reinforcements.

    It said Russia’s actions contravene the principles and values on which the G7 and the G8 operate.

    It said that the G7 countries would suspend preparations to take part in the Sochi G8 summit “until the environment comes back where the G8 is able to have meaningful discussion.

    It also called on all parties concerned to behave with the greatest extent of self-restraint and responsibility, and to decrease the tensions.

     

    This was coming after U.S. President Barack Obama spoke with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, British Prime Minister David Cameron and Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski.

    Russian parliament on Saturday approved a request from President Vladimir Putin to use armed force in Ukraine “until the social and political situation in that country is normalized.”

    The move came around a week after Viktor Yanukovych was ousted as Ukrainian president and a pro-Western opposition government came to power in Kiev. Yanukovych fled to Russia.

    The Russian incursion in Crimea has brought Ukraine to “the brink of disaster”.

    Some 200 people protested outside the Russian embassy in Berlin, while 30 anti-Russia activists demonstrated outside NATO headquarters in Brussels.

     

  • G7 governors intact, insists Aliyu

    G7 governors intact, insists Aliyu

    GOVERNOR Babangida Aliyu of Niger State said yesterday in Kano that the G7 governors are still ‘intact’ regardless of the recent defection by five of them from the PDP to the APC.

    Only Aliyu and his Jigawa counterpart, Alhaji Sule Lamido, remain in the PDP out of the seven Governors opposed to what they called undemocratic style of the party’s national chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur.

    Aliyu, on a courtesy visit to Governor Rabiu Kwankwaso of Kano, one of the five that defected, described the G7 as intact and solid, but only pursuing the same objective through different approaches.

    “We are still together as one indivisible body. We communicate, exchange ideas and are pursuing the same objective. Our goal is never different, for your information,” he said.

    What is unfolding in public, according to him, should not be misconstrued to mean that the group is now divided.

    Aliyu, who was accompanied by former Governor of Zamfara State, Senator Ahmed Sani Yerima declared that nothing can separate him from Governor Kwankwaso.

    “All we are doing is a unified idea. We are only strategising towards the same objective,” he said.

    His host spoke in the same vein.

    He said: “Those of us that went ahead were to chart the way for those we left behind for the political commanders to finish one or two things before joining us. Be rest assured that they will join us.

    “We share everything together and people should be rest assured that we are engaging in a political strategy.”

     

  • Pikin Dumps Papa…

    As news filtered in about noon yesterday that the G7 had bitten the bullet, an old song flashed in Hardball’s mind. It goes something like: “What’s that monster in the forest that raises so much hell and will not let us sleep? If it will eat us up let it hurry but it must quit threatening us.” Hardball, of course, speaks about the Peoples Democratic Party (or Pikin Dumps Papa- if you are light-hearted, (PDP)), Nigeria’s shambolic ruling party which has been haemorrhaging since May and seems in danger of achieving a mortal denouement. Lady Macbeth said it better: “If it is done when it were done, it were well it were done quickly…”

    Last May at the party’s convention in Abuja, key members unhappy with the turn of events had staged a walk out and had immediately moved to form what they called New PDP. Notable among such members were seven state governors along with the party structure in their states. But it is hardly done when a critical action like this is taken; consequences often follow in a trail, sometimes like a whirlwind as we have experienced since May.

    The breakaway PDP governors are Aliyu Wamakko (Sokoto); Babangida Aliyu (Niger); Rabiu Kwakwanso (Kano); Sule Lamido (Jigawa); Murtala Nyako (Adamawa); Abdulfatah Ahmed (Kwara) and Chibuike Amaechi of Rivers State. These men of power, in the company of most of their supporters, have declared for nascent All Progressives Congress (APC). This crossing of the Rubicon, so to speak, has immediately diminished the PDP which boasts of being the biggest party in Africa not necessarily to a minority party but to something of ‘the second party’. That is a new reality that will dawn on the remaining members now. Second, this move has exposed the lack of strategic depth of the party, it has shown it up to being a behemoth without a brain box; a lumbering giant. How come several months of negotiations did not make a dent on the rebel governors; not even one of them could be won over. It signposts the weakness in the current leadership of the party or what is left of it.

    In fact the leadership stock has long been depleted and narrowed down to a very few people while the Board of Trustees, the apex elders forum that provides insight, dept and guidance in any party’s crucial affairs is in disarray. A number of the most influential members have been sidelined and they merely sit on the fence and watch the drama play out. Some are known to give tacit backing to the ‘rebels’ and are probably part of the unfolding game plan.

    Hardball squints into his crystal ball at this juncture to determine that this is indeed a day to be noted in Nigeria’s history as a cross-carpeting of this magnitude has never occurred in her annals. It is an augury that is at once dramatic and historic. At issue is presidential power shift which is of course compounded by a leadership most invidious. Are the ‘rebels’ overly pushy and precipitate in their desire to force change? Time will tell as events unfold in the days ahead.

    Back to the idea of piking dumping papa, in African tradition, it is father that disowns and disinherits the child. To have it the other way round is an affront; it is to challenge paternity, a call to arms literally. Again, it is akin to a giant facing defeat and possible annihilation; it will not be as smooth as David felling Goliath with one stone and hoisting his head. That was divine adventure; this is realpolitik. But the intense and heated atmosphere that would ensue would sorely need a leader or healer if you like. If the ultimate purpose of the ongoing politicking is about the people and the polity then you have to preserve the twain first because there will not be a president if there are no people and of course a place to preside over.

  • I remain leader of G7, says Aliyu

    I remain leader of G7, says Aliyu

    Niger State Governor Babangida Aliyu yesterday said he remains a member of the group of seven (G7) governors and the new PDP. He denied a report that he had dumped the group.

    Aliyu spoke when he hosted the National President and other leaders of the Nigeria Civil Service Union in Minna.

    “The newspaper not (The Nation) went to town saying I have pulled out of G7. The truth of the matter is that Babangida Aliyu is still a member and in fact, I am the leader of G7”, he said.

    “I regard that wirte-up as an enemy action. It was planted by people who are interested in breaking our ranks and who try to input motives where there are none. I see the hands of some people I can identify to have sponsored this article. I urge people not to make policies relating to all they read in the papers as some of these articles are sponsored.”

    The report had alleged that the absence of Aliyu at Sunday’s meeting of the G7 was in keeping with his decision to pull out of the nPDP and from the G7.

    But Aliyu said his absence from the meeting was not intentional adding that he was absent partly because of the shift of the time of the meeting and his ill-health.

    He said his colleagues were adequately informed and apologies sent through three governors but wondered why his absence could be misconstrued to mean he is pulling out of the group.

    According to him, “This is not the time for anyone to pull out of the party when out of respect for the office of the President and the President himself, we are discussing. There is no way you can wake up and say you are pulling out when you are already negotiating. You cannot pull out at this moment. The time for decision to be taken will be when we have concluded discussion with the President.

    “After the conclusion and agreement at the end of the discussion, those who may be satisfied with the outcome will take their decision, the same with those not satisfied with the outcome. Despite anyone’s decision, we will still remain as Nigeria.”