The Federal Government has been urged to set aside 10 per cent of the budget for agriculture to ensure food security.
The sector, according to the Deputy Director, Directorate of General Management, Agricultural and Rural Management Institute (ARMTI), Ilorin, Kwara State, Dr Ademola Adeyemo, is slowly recovering from disrupted farming.
Adeyemo said agriculture is one of the key sectors that have propelled steady and sustainable economic growth. To this end, adequate funding, he said, is needed to help the government follow a clear roadmap for its development.
Past budgets, he said, have not allocated sufficient funds to agriculture, especially in the expansion of infrastructure for growth. Post-Budget analysis revealed that the allocation is not adequate for the boosting of the sector and falls below the international benchmarks. He said key agricultural areas are still underfunded falling short of the Comprehensive Africa Agricultural Development Programme (CAADP) target of allocating 10 per cent of the budget to agricultural sector.
Adeyemo stressed the need to allocate more resources to other key areas such as research and development and provision of extension services and infrastructure. He recognised that several positive measures and pronouncements have been presented in the budget to support agricultural development. He urges the government to ensure that the ideas are backed by implementation.
According to him, sufficient budgetary provisions will translate into a vibrant agricultural sector, raking in revenue into the Government’s coffers and providing jobs for Nigerians to contribute effectively towards economic growth.
He urged the government to employ prudent fiscal discipline as a key to ensuring financial sustainability and quality service delivery.
Adeyemo also asked for doubled efforts aimed at using improved seed variety and diversify on-farm activities. These measures, he added, should be supplemented by enhanced extension services.
He called on the government to enhance the use of science and technology in the pursuit of its policy objective of achieving a competitive, diversified and sustainable agricultural sector.
The Federal Government and other stakeholders have reviewed the progress made under the New Alliance Co-operative. The parties have agreed to improve agricultural investments, food and nutrition security.
The commitments were made under the Comprehensive African Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP).
At a validation workshop on the New Alliance Report in Abuja, the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Sonny Echono, said the New Alliance is a collaborated approach geared towards developing the agricultural sector.
Echono, who was represented by Director, Special Duties in the Ministry, Mrs. Ademola Abiri, said the the government made policy reform commitments and the private sector made commitments on the level of agricultural investments in medium terms. He added that Development partners on their part made funding commitments on medium term, while the civil society was expected to ensure that all the commitments reflect the views of the intended beneficiaries.
The Permanent Secretary disclosed that under the partnership the government is committed to 13 major policy actions in the areas of seed and fertiliser, while the key development partners are committed to funding, equivalent to $500m for Nigeria’s agriculture sector between 2013 and 2016.
He added that international and local business firms are committed to making investments of about $4 billion in the agricultural sector, adding that through the partnerships, more private investments would be seen, thereby improving the environment for investment.
He said annual progress report on the level of implementation of stakeholders’ commitments would be provided at the national and continental level.
Earlier in a welcome address, the Director, Planning and Policy Co-ordination, FMARD, Mr. Rabi Idi – Adamu, said the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition was launched in 2012, with the principle of reaffirming continued donor commitment to reducing hunger in Africa.
She said the workshop would afford participants the opportunity to share the 2014/2015 Nigeria Progress Report of Implementation based on the various commitments of partners for the purpose of consolidation and improvement before its submission to the African Union Commission by August 31.
Expressing support for the workshop, the President and Chairperson, Steering Committee, Nigerian Women Agro-Allied Farmers (NIWAAFA), Mrs. Lizzy Igbine, assured that Nigerian farmers are strongly behind the workshop.
The founding development partners in the initiative are Canada, the European Union (EU), France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom (UK) and the United State (US).
The 10 African countries that initially joined were Benin Republic, Burkina Faso, Cote d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Senegal and Tanzania.
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), has called on Lagos State Governor Akinwunmi Ambode to set up a Visitation Panel in the Lagos State University (LASU).
The union said a panel was the antidote to the myriad of problems facing the institution. ASUU also recommended the implementation of the Universities Miscellaneous Act of 2012, to put the 31-year-old institution on the right path.
•Prof Obafunwa
At a briefing on the university’s premises in Ojo Lagos, Chairman, ASUU Lagos Zone, Dr Adesola Nasir, said following the above recommendations, Ambode should also constitute a Governing Council to appoint a successor to the Vice Chancellor, Prof John Oladapo Obafunwa.
He said Obafunwa being pelted with objects and chased out of the institution by aggrieved workers on Monday, March 16, and prevented from entering, meant he was no longer accepted by the various unions.
Nasir said: “As ASUU, we are not proud when a whole vice chancellor was pelted with sachet water by workers. It shows such a vice chancellor has lost all forms of respect from the community he is supposed to govern. When this happen, the best for such vice chancellor is to resign honourably.Obafunwa’s line of thought does not agree with the people and things have degenerated to a level where he can no longer enter his office.”
He said no matter how deep a crisis is, an ideal vice chancellor must reconcile warring parties through dialogue and cross fertilisation of ideas, noting that Obafunwa has failed to achieve both.
According to Nasir, the allegation by workers against Obafunwa, including the latter’s victimisation and non-promotion of workers, setting up of illegal Budget Monitoring Committee to access the Federal Government intervention fund, victimisation of union heads, inappropriate appointment of underserving staff who are Obafunwa’s cronies as well as using media to disparage workers, among others, are documented in two volumes submitted to government by ASUU LASU, who now awaits its decision.
ASUU lamented that industrial crisis in the university is getting out of hand; hence the union’s intervention to end it for good.
“What we expect from Obafunwa whenever he grants interview in the media is to tell us his achievements in terms of grants that his administration has attracted to the university, the number of Ph.D awardees, and how he has consolidated on the university’s internally generated revenue. But to our disappointment, he keeps painting workers in black. Sincerely, we are all tired of anybody saying: ‘LASU is this or that.’ LASU has had enough problems. All we want are the strides and not pronouncements that would foment more trouble,” ASUU further stated.
ASUU said the union is informed of secret moves by Obafunwa to use some students outside the university to puncture the peace that has since returned.
“Our union is not unaware of some clandestine moves to unleash some ill informed students group mainly from outside LASU to foment additional crisis in the university. Our union wishes to advice our students, who are our ally in the restoration of dignity of LASU to focus on their studies as our members are doing all within their means to ensure a smooth session. Exams have been concluded and scripts marked,” ASUU counselled.
Chairman, ASUU-LASU Adekunle Idris, said against misconceptions in certain quarters, the union is in understanding with the LASU Students’ Union, noting that when the struggle is eventually won, it is the students that stand to reap the greatest dividend.
Meanwhile, LASU Students’ Union has called on Ambode to get the university on full swing with respect to academic activities.
LASUSU PRO, Adebanjo Fatai told our reporter on phone that LASUSU was not interested on whether Obafunwa returns to LASU or not, noting that it is a staff/management affair. Another condition, Fatai stated, was that no leader of the union should be victimised for his or her role in the ongoing crisis.
Fatai said prevention of vehicular movement in and out of the university premises by students on Thursday, last week, was to draw government’s attention to their plight.
“Immediately government heard that we had locked up the two gates of the university, Deputy Governor Dr( Idiat) Adebule had to call and appealed to us on phone.”
He continued: “It is so sad that this is what we had to do (protest) to get government’s attention. Ahead of the protest, we had sent a letter which we copied to the governor, his deputy, Ministry of Education, and all unions in LASU as well as stakeholders in the state for quick intervention, to no avail.
“You will also recall that before we commenced the (first semester) exam, we had made repeated appeals to the government but with no result until we eventually stormed the Governor’s Office in Alausa in a protest, before we could be answered.”
Head of Department, School of Media and Communications (SMC), Pan Atlantic University, Ibeju-Lekki Lagos, Dr James Tsaaior, has counselled higher institutions to engage the government in better relationships to avoid incessant crisis that have the hallmarks in the nation’s education system.
He said this while speaking to reporters at the sideline of the institution’s eight distinguished guest lecture series.
Tsaaior, who spoke at the university’s premises venue of the event, faulted governments’ tradition of not responding to repeated agitations of institutions, coupled with its lack of cooperation.
He said: “There is the need for people in managerial positions in the universities and other learning institutions in the country to have the managerial skill and competencies to be able to curb crisis. But it is also necessary to have synergy between university administrators, and administrators in other tertiary institutions in the country with government.
“If you observe most of the time, the problem is not so much with the institutions, it is also with government. If there have been strikes and industrial actions, it is usually predicated on the unwillingness of government to cooperate with the institutions and that explains why there are unrests. So it is not just the institutions alone, it is also left to government to play its role and play it very reputably.”
Further, Tsaaior said the lecture was predicated upon creating competent and vibrant professionals in the media industry in order to strengthen its role.
“The School of Media and Communications, Pan Atlantic University is a school, which is intended to professionalise the media and deepen its consciousness by those with skilled competencies to make it vibrant and alive to its responsibilities as the Fourth Estate of the Realm. That is essentially why we have decided to organise these lectures; to sensitise the public and to carry out our statutory mandate as a School of Media and Communication,” he said.
The guest lecturer, Anambra State Governor, Dr Willie Obiano, who spoke on the theme: ‘Sustaining the legacy of growth and development in Anambra State,’ was presented with an award of recognition.
There are indications that the Federal Government may have started the process of doubling the two per cent education tax with which it supports the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETfund).
TETfund Executive Secretary Prof Suleiman Bogoro, who disclosed this, said the Federal Ministry of Education had already sent a comprehensive report to the Presidency. It recommended an increase in the tax from two per cent to between three and four per cent.
He spoke in Abuja at an event organised by the Fund tagged: “Institutionalisation of Research and development in tertiary institutions as a launch pad for Nigeria’s technological advancement.”
Bogoro, who said as soon as the Presidency reviews the proposal for the increase in the tax and the National Assembly amends the TETfund Act to accommodate the increase, the fund would play its supportive role as expected.
Said Bogoro: “In a recent report by the Ministry of Education to the Federal Government, the case was made for the increase of the 2 per cent education tax collection by Federal Inland Revenue to raise it to three or four per cent.
“We are supportive of it and we believe that with what we have done and if you notice now, some five years ago there was no African university ranked among the top 100 in Africa, that was embarrassing enough.
“Definitely the process will begin as soon as government gives the go ahead. There is a proposal to Mr. President, government will review and see the benefits and demerits and when government decides they should formally take it up.
“For us at TETFund, it may just be that government has taken a decision and we are supposed to ensure that it is facilitated and whatever contribution we need to make to add to an Executive bill emanating that would raise the collection from two to four percent.
That would mean a lot for us; definitely you cannot change TETFund Act without legislation, it requires the National Assembly.”
He noted that the interventions by the fund in research and development have led to improved performance of Nigerian institutions, some of which according to him, has also impacted on their ranking in Africa.
His words:”Today because of aggressive intervention and concentration of government attention on our public tertiary institutions and with massive support of TETFund we now have 28 Nigerian universities ranked among the top 100 in Africa.
“We are not feeling good that we are still outside the 2000 mark for the world. Out of the 1000 global universities there are only five African universities, three from South Africa and two from Egypt.
“Nigeria is yet to be there. We remain quite embarrassed but you better imagine if we increase the intervention and there is patriotic application of the funds in the priority areas, the ranking of our universities will begin to compete with the very best in the world,” Bogoro concluded.
The nation’s quest for massive development in critical public infrastructure will remain a mirage without a change of attitude by public officers, renowned lawyer and businessman, Dr. Wale Babalakin (SAN), has said.
He argued that the practice, where public officers do not respect terms of contracts and agreements, but see private investors in public infrastructure as either competitors or inferior partners, would continue to work against the quest to overcome the deficit in the provisions and maintenance of public infrastructure.
Babalakin, one of the nation’s pioneer investors in public infrastructure development, spoke in Abuja on Monday at a session organised by the Construction and Infrastructure Law Committee of the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) at the association’s annual conference. The theme of the session was: “Ending the scourge of abandoned projects in Nigeria.”
Speaking on the sub-theme: “The role of private sector and why there is failure in private infrastructural development,” Babalakin argued that the failure of most public and private sectors partnerships (PPP) in the development of public infrastructure was not due to inadequate funding, but of deliberate acts of sabotage by public officials.
Babalakin said it was impossible for the government to fully meet the nation’s infrastructure need without the involvement of the private sector, particularly in the face of dwindling national revenue from oil sales. To him, achieving success requires conscious effort by the government to protect private investors from activities of self-centered public officials.
He noted the financial reality in the country requires that “we must find a way of creating wealth. We cannot continue to distribute largesse.” And that the parameters for wealth creation must be well protected rather than threatened.
Babalakin, who cited examples of how negative attitude of government officials hadhelped to destroy beautifully conceived private initiatives in the past, said, but for lack of cooperation from government officials, such projects that would have helped resolved the current infrastructure deficit, were frustrated.
He equally spoke about the involvement of his company – Bi-Courtney Aviation Services Limited – in the development of the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos (the MM2 project) and the unsavoury experience, resulting from attempts by government officials to frustrate its operations, by constantly flouting terms of the contract.
“From day one, government has violated every clause of the agreement. To the extent that even the intervention of the regulatory body did not deliver a final solution. We have been to courts and we won at every court.
“But till today, we are denied of 60 per cent of our earnings because of the refusal to abide by the terms of the contract. And I said to myself, who is losing? Of course, the nation is losing, because we have judgment of about N132billion damages against the government as at 2010,” Babalakin said.
He argued that, had government officials planned and engaged in rigorous thinking, the current fall in government revenue would not have had huge impact on government’s spending capacity because there were sufficient indicators before now, of impending fall in revenue.
“The substantial buyer of the Nigerian oil is the United States. The US government gave notice that in a few years, it would no longer buy oil from Nigeria. It went further to say it was likely to become self-sufficient in oil production and there was no panic. Rather, we continued.
“The substantial buyer of the Nigerian oil is the United States. The US government gave notice that in a few years, it would no longer buy oil from Nigeria… There was no panic in government circle…Today, the price of oil is hovering around $46 per barrel. And if you are making future sale, you have to give substantial discount. So, that budget, as it is, has failed”
“There was no panic in government circle. All we were told was that we had plan A; we have plan B, and we have plan C. One of the plans was budgeting at $60 something per barrel, which was later reduced reluctantly to $50 something. Today, the price of oil is hovering around $46 per barrel. And if you are making future sale, you have to give substantial discount. So, that budget, as it is, has failed,” he said.
Babalakin asserted that “as long as the government remains irresponsible, you cannot have development. He added that “from my experience, I actually believe that there is a deliberate intention on the part of those in power for projects to fail.”
He said there was need for those responsible for the current state of affairs to account for their actions that contributed to the currently failure of government to address existing infrastructure deficit.
The Managing Director/CEO, Oilflow Global Energy Limited (OGEL), Noah Yakub has called on the federal government to give a close monitoring to the oil and gas industry in Nigeria, saying such is needed for any form of growth to be recorded in the industry.
Yakub, who spoke in Lagos, said there is need for periodic financial audit reports, noting that regular meetings with stake-holders where lapses can be established and consequently ironed out, will also be needful.
He said for any headway to be made in the industry, a lot still has to be done to enhance capacity building, technical and financial growth, especially among Nigerians, having been given the privilege to operate under the Nigerian Local Content Act.
“At OGEL, we are already sailing on the present state of the business environment to actualise our mission towards the global industry growth. With an improved environment as promised by the current administration we shall sail smoothly.
“We have our strategies to operate in the industry. The most important strategy that we put up, is an integration of integrity and performance. With our performance, we also delight our customers with performance icing,” he said.
He pointed out that when technical manpower is supplied, a system is put in place, such that “when they are on vacation, or they are on time off, we develop them by giving them a particular training established as relevant to their field.
“We also have a structured system that recognises and appreciates talents and job performance accuracy. Besides, we also strategise by giving them relationship training in the sense that we train them on how to mix with people that they are not familiar with, how to mix with their bosses, peers and work environment so that they can have a sense of understanding. That is just a few out of the lots of our business strategies,” he said.
Yakub, praised President Muhammadu Buhari for his selection and placement procedure, especially on the recent appointment of Dr. Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu as the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), describing it as a perfect example of putting a round peg in a round hole
Chief Executive Officer, Anabel Group, Dr Nicholas Okoye has stressed the need for government and corporate bodies to invest in people as against infrastructural development.
Speaking at press interactive session, Okoye lamented the quantum leap in the youth unemployment and the extent to which many Nigerians depend entirely on the government to provide everything.
But Okoye who spoke extensively on the strategy for entrepreneurship development explained that there should be a deliberate and consistent policy to expose our youths to entrepreneurial training while the older people should be equally trained and supported.
“Our National Development Strategy Services should be people-oriented. It is good to invest in infrastructural development but it is better to invest in the people who will drive the infrastructure. There is no country that has made progress without development of its people. Our youths have formed an army of unemployed. The list is becoming elongated by the day. There is a great misconception about empowerment of people. Many Nigerians regard empowerment as giving money to people in the name of ‘national cake’. This is not so. Empowerment is more of exposing people to the right skills and such people can efficiently manage the resources,” Okoye noted.
According to him, Anabel Group operates on strategy, leadership and entrepreneurship and the company has developed a number of products aimed at developing entrepreneurship spirit among different segments of Nigerian society.
Commenting on the entrepreneurial products, Okoye noted that Anabel developed start-up Nigeria, a programme that supports entrepreneurs with the right skills and resources.
“We also have Entrepreneurship Development Programme for Women and Senior Entrepreneurs. This focuses on networking, identifying global sources of necessary information and strategic communication. As of now, our focus is on oil and gas, power and information technology sectors. We organise coalition of super mentors for youths as part of our Corporate Social Responsibilities (CSR). Over 55,000 Nigerians have benefited from our coaching and each of them has testimonies,” he said.
Okoye lamented that many entrepreneurs in Nigeria lack bankable projects, skills and proper orientation on the attributes of an entrepreneur.
The League Management Company (LMC) has said its operations have been wholly funded from privately generated income and zero government financial contribution.
Chairman of the LMC, Shehu Dikko disclosed this and other initiatives of the league body when he appeared as a guest on Africa Independent Television’s (AIT) morning show, Kaakaki and explained that the LMC would love to see the government involved in the area of infrastructure upgrade while gradually divesting from club funding.
“Since the LMC came on board, our funding has been sourced from commercial partnerships which is the practice globally and while we appreciate the companies that have bought rights from us, we are still not where we should be financially which explains our recent visit with the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to the Nigeria Stock Exchange (NSE),” Dikko said.
Continuing on government’s role in football, the he said: “In the 90s, the government of Margareth Thatcher in the UK provided over £200m for the upgrading of stadia facilities across England and that contributed critically to what we have today as the best league in the world, and today the UK government is one of the biggest beneficiaries of the EPL, generating billions of pounds in taxes, football tourism, jobs and other socio-economic activities that are hinged on the EPL in the UK.
“We also would seek government’s intervention in this direction and we are not asking for funds to be handed to anyone but for government to directly fund the upgrade of existing grounds and provision of required broadcast equipments and facilities in the stadiums.”
Whilst acknowledging that foreign football, especially the EPL has over-shadowed the domestic league, Dikko also pointed out that it is a global phenomenon which some European countries are also facing.
His words, “We are aware of the seeming preference for foreign football but it is not just football, Nigerians buy foreign cars instead of from PAN, we buy foreign rice instead of local rice etc, but we are working on winning back the minds of the people. It is also not peculiar to Nigeria, go to Malaysia, China, Emirates and even at some point in Germany and Spain, everyone is trying not to compete with the English league”.
He said the LMC has implemented and is also working on initiatives to uplift the league.
“The club that wins the league this season will earn as much as N80million in revenue share, merit award, bonuses and kind and even the relegated club will earn a minimum of N55million. There are incentives for away wins, draws, attracting crowds to the games and we also provide official match balls to the teams including kit bags for the players.
“More importantly, we are seeking pool sponsorship for all 20 clubs so their finances will improve and consequently, the welfare of players as well as drive the commercialisation of the clubs so as to make them attractive to investors,”he said.
Former Rivers State Governor Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi has said his administration left refuted claims by his successor Nyesom Wike that he left an empty treasury.
Governor Wike had consistently maintained that he met an empty treasury when he assumed office.
On Wednesday, in an attempt to justify why he took N30 billion bank loans from Zenith and Access banks within 30 days in office, Wike, through his spokesman, Opunabo Inko-Tariah, told a radio station in Port Harcourt, Today 95.1FM, that he met an empty treasury.
But Amaechi debunked Wike’s claim, saying he left billions of naira in cash and economic assets for Rivers State.
In a statement yesterday in Port Harcourt, the state capital, by his Media Office, Amaechi said his administration left N7.5 billion cash as the balances in the Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) account with Skye Bank, Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) account with Zenith Bank, balances with Access Bank and funds in the reserve fund account at First Bank.
The statement said: “This is besides other balances in the Government House account with Zenith Bank and other government Ministries, Departments and Agencies’ (MDAs’) accounts, such as the Bureau for Public Procurement (BPP). By the time you pull all these together, we are looking at readily available cash in the region of N8 billion to N10 billion left for the Wike administration.
“It’s also pertinent to point out here that Amaechi also left economic assets worth tens of billions of naira for the state. Just like cash, the assets store value. These assets, which are scattered in diverse sectors of the economy, were developed or built or procured with revenue that accrued to the state during Amaechi’s tenure.
“The assets belong to Rivers State, not Amaechi. Some of these assets are yielding revenue to the state’s coffers and many can be easily and readily converted to cash, if the state so desires.
“It is, therefore, disingenuous and fraudulent for Wike to claim that Amaechi left an empty treasury, in his bid to justify the N30 billion loans he collected under 30 days in office.
“Rather than this puerile and silly distraction of always pointing fingers at Amaechi, Wike should explain to Rivers residents what he took the loans for, account for and justify every kobo that has been spent from the loans.”
