The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Osinbajo

  • Corruption, ethnicity Nigeria’s real enemies, says Osinbajo

    Corruption, ethnicity Nigeria’s real enemies, says Osinbajo

    •Adeboye dedicates Ecumenical Centre 

    Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo yesterday identified the elite, corruption, ethnicity, religion and other parochial interests as the real enemies of peace, unity and development of Nigeria.

    Speaking at Igbogene, Yenagoa, Bayelsa State, at the dedication of a 10,000-seater Ecumenical Centre built by the Governor Seriake Dickson administration, he said the country was standing on a threshold of the most significant moment in history.

    The edifice was dedicated by the General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) Worldwide, Pastor Enoch Adeboye, amid prayers and thanksgiving.

    It was done in the presence of clerics, including ex-President of Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) Pastor Ayo Orisejafor.

    About 15,000 persons, including dignitaries from all walks of life within and outside the state gathered inside and under canopies on the premises to inaugurate the worship centre described as one of the best in Africa.

    American gospel singer and multiple award winner Ron Kenoly as well as other singers entertained the crowd.

    The vice-president, represented by the Chaplain of Aso Rock Chaplaincy, Pastor Seyi Malamo, said the country had been presented with the greatest opportunities to build and become Africa’s largest economy not only by the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), but also in efficiency and productivity.

    “The building being inaugurated today is the house of God. We stand on the threshold of perhaps the most significant moment in the history of Nigeria. It is a time for economic challenges, ethnic and religious tension. I say that we stand on a threshold of the most significant moment in our history, a time to build.

    “It is a time when by sheer grace of God, we have the greatest opportunities to build and become not just Africa’s largest economy by GDP, but also the most efficient and most productive.

    “By 2050, Nigeria will be the fourth largest nation by population in the world and we can like China also become one of the most 10 successful economies in the world.

    “This is our best moment because we have shown that despite the lowest earnings from oil in the last 15 years and in 2016, we can still build and be involved in capital projects. How is that possible? It is by the grace of God and a commitment to build.

    “We have shown that as difficult and painful as recession may be, we have the capacity to come out of it and begin the building of an economy that emphasises productivity and will provide enough jobs. We are in the pains of childbirth and we will soon experience the same sweetness and joy of childbirth.”

    Osinbajo said corruption, ethnicity, religion, parochial tendencies and the attitude of the elite remained a hindrance to progressive moves.

    He said the attitude of the elite was one of the biggest problems of the emerging new Nigeria, as they were always thinking alike, regardless of their political, religious and tribal leanings.

    To build a new Nigeria, the vice-president advocated new men and women of all faith and ethnicity committed to a country run on high values of integrity, hard work, justice and patriotism.

    Pastor Adeboye described the building as magnificent. He prayed for Dickson and his wife, who knelt before him.

    The cleric said despite his busy schedule, he came to Bayelsa to dedicate the centre because of his love for the state.

    Dickson said the building was erected as an interdenominational place for Christians.

    The governor signed the Ecumenical Centre Management Bill 2017, which was given accelerated hearing and passed into law by the House of Assembly.

    He appointed Mr. Dotimi Amatare as the chairman of the management board.

    Dickson thanked the lawmakers, led by Speaker Kombowei Benson, for passing the bill. He enjoined the management board to preserve the edifice and make it available for Christians.

     

     

     

  • I didn’t call restructuring agitators political jobbers, says Osinbajo

    I didn’t call restructuring agitators political jobbers, says Osinbajo

    Vice President Yemi Osinbajo has expressed surprise at a news report quoting Afenifere leader Chief Ayo Adebanjo as saying he described those agitating for restructuring as political jobbers.

    A statement by the Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Laolu Akande, said at no time did Osinbajo say that those asking for restructuring were political jobbers looking for appointments.

    He said: “The video, audio tapes and full text of his speech at the National Security summit organised last week by the Department of State Services (DSS) are publicly available.

    “While several newspapers and media outlets reported Prof. Osinbajo’s said speech last Wednesday, not one of the publications made such a blatantly inaccurate claim that he said those asking for restructuring were political jobbers.

    “Besides, the debate on restructuring is an important one and the calls for restructuring cover a wide range of legitimate and constitutionally valid issues. Indeed, all Nigerians have both a right and a duty to advance their arguments on the subject.

    “The Acting President himself has expressed support for state police based on the community policing model, advocated for devolution of powers to the states and fiscal federalism. Besides, the Buhari administration has been active in supporting states rights in several ways, including in fiscal matters and will continue to do so.”

     

  • Osinbajo to speak at OPTS’ business anniversary

    Osinbajo to speak at OPTS’ business anniversary

    Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, will be the keynote speaker at the Oil Producers Trade Section (OPTS) business event to mark its 55th anniversary.

    OPTS is the oldest and foremost sectorial group for operators in the upstream oil and gas industry, and an arm of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI).

    The event, which will hold on November 2, at the Eko Hotel & Suites, Victoria Island, Lagos, will feature discussions that will help move the oil and gas industry forward.

    With the theme Nigeria, An Investor Friendly Destination,’ the event is to discuss strategies to attract investments in the upstream oil & gas industry as well as showcase the OPTS and its achievements since 1962.

    OPTS Chairman and Managing Director and Chief Executive of Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited (SPDC), Mr. Osagie Okunbor, said the event, apart from commemorating OPTS’s 55th anniversary, would help attract more investment to the industry.

    “The upstream oil & gas industry is very important to our country as it generates up to 90 per cent of our foreign exchange earnings. So, it is one of the most important sectors of our economy and we want to build an OPTS group that is well-placed to contribute to policies and laws that ensure that this sector of our economy works very well,” Okunbor said.

    He added that OPTS member-firms are proud of their achievements and contributions to the Nigerian economy over the years and are ready to contribute to the continued growth of the industry and Nigeria despite the current challenges in the global markets.

    Aside from the Vice President, Prof. Osinbajo, a number of other notable speakers from Nigeria and the global energy sector are also billed to attend the event. They include the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, the Minister of Trade & Investment, Dr. Okey Enelamah, the Chairman of Dubri Oil and first indigenous Chairman of OPTS, Dr. Uduimo Itsueli, Dr. Tim Okon, Special Adviser, Fiscal to the Hon. Minister of State, Petroleum Resources, Mr. Bismarck Rewane, Managing Director and Chief Executive, Financial Derivatives Company Limited, and the Leader, McKinsey Oil & Gas Practice, Europe, Middle East & Africa, Mr. Occo Roelofsen.

    The OPTS is a sub-group of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce & Industry (LCCI) and is an umbrella association for local and foreign-owned companies registered in Nigeria who hold an Oil Prospecting Licence or Oil Mining Licence.

    From an initial three member-firm at inception, the OPTS has grown to 27 members, including some of the leading names in the Nigerian Upstream Oil and Gas industry and its members account for over 80 per cent of the production volumes in the industry.

  • Secret corporate ownership a global problem, says Osinbajo

    Secret corporate ownership a global problem, says Osinbajo

    SECRET corporate ownership is a global problem and bane of growth in resource-rich countries like Nigeria, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo has said.

    He spoke at the Beneficial Ownership Conference of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) in Jakarta, Indonesia yesterday.

    The vice president’s speech was made available to reporters in Abuja.

    He cited a 2014 report by the One Campaign entitled, “One Trillion Dollar Scandal”, which showed that developing countries loose one trillion dollars annually to corporate transgressions.

    Osinbajo said most of the funds are traceable to the activities of companies with secret ownership.

    “Another report that may enjoy mention here is the 2015 report of the High Level Panel on Illicit Financial Flows from Africa chaired by former South African President Thabo Mbeki.

    “The panel stated in its report that Africa had lost more than one trillion dollars over a 50-year period, and that Africa loses more than 50 billion dollars annually to illicit financial flows.

    “Most of these illicit flows are perpetrated in the extractive sector and through companies with hidden ownerships,” the vice president said.

    Osinbajo said Nigeria was still struggling with the negative impact of the use of corporate ownership secrecy by senior government officials and their cronies to corner juicy contracts in the extractive industry.

    He specifically mentioned the celebrated Malabu scandal of the 1990s, which, he said, remained the subject of criminal and civil proceedings in many parts of the world.

    According to him, the court cases involved huge legal costs, while the full benefit of the natural resource remains unexploited for the benefit of the people of Nigeria to which it belongs.

    Osinbajo said: “So, for us in the developing world and especially in Africa, breaking the wall of secret corporate ownership is an existential matter.

    “It is for us literarily a matter of life and death. Masked or hidden corporate ownership is deeply implicated in the sad story of our underdevelopment.

    “Yes, we know that anonymous companies are not always illegal or are not always designed to harm.

    “But we also know that secrecy provides a convenient cover for the criminal and the corrupt. And we are not just operating from the theoretical or hypothetical standpoint.”

    The vice president said the problem was a global one driven by an inter-connected world where the foothold of anonymous companies does not respect the developed/developing divide.

     

     

     

     

  • Osinbajo, Saraki , Kukah for public lecture/award

    Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo (SAN) and Senate President Bukola Saraki are among dignitaries expected at a public lecture/awards by the Epiphany Azinge Foundation.

    It will hold on November 13 at the  Shehu Musa Yar’ardua Centre, Abuja.

    The Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese,  Matthew Hassan Kukah, will speak on the theme: Nigeria in search of a detribalised race.

    Delta State Governor, Dr. Ifeanyi  Okowa, House of Representatives Speaker Yakubu Dogara, Senator Grace Bent, Prof. Anwalu Yadudu, former governors Peter Obi (Anambra) and Donald Duke (Cross River), Minister of Power, Works and Housing Babatunde Fashola (SAN), activist-lawyer Femi Falana (SAN) and Sokoto State Governor Aminu Tambuwal are among the expected guests.

    The event will be chaired by former Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Mohammed Belgore.

     

  • Osinbajo to Commonwealth lawmakers: legislate to improve lives of Africans

    Osinbajo to Commonwealth lawmakers: legislate to improve lives of Africans

    Vice President Yemi Osinbajo yesterday charged members of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA) to make legislations that will help secure the future of Africans and the continent.

    He gave the charge while declaring open the 48th Session of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (African Region) in Owerri, the Imo state capital.

    Osinbajo urged African leaders to go beyond rhetoric and offer values, saying democracy would be of no meaningless if it cannot improve the welfare of Africans.

    He also urged the parliamentarians to help secure democracy in the continent, pointins an attack on democracy in one part of Africa should be seen as an attack on all.

    Osinbajo said: “The power and responsibility for rewriting the story of Africa lies in our hand.

    “We will be charlatans of the worst order if our leadership does not secure the future for our people while providing for the present.”

    He noted the legislature and the executive have a duty to the people and must ensure harmony and stability for the system.

    Osinbajo however stressed that “even when the two arms of government agree, it must not become a conspiracy against the people”.

    He observed that the 2063 African renaissance target as projected by the session proceeds on the strength of the confidence that the 21st Century is Africa’s century.

    Osinbajo asked African leaders to begin to pay attention to the issue of regional integration in the continent, regretting that ease-of-doing-business is still a major challenge.

     

  • FG has released $2m part payment for 2nd Niger Bridge, says Osinbajo

    FG has released $2m part payment for 2nd Niger Bridge, says Osinbajo

    Work on the 2nd  Niger Bridge seems to be on course with the release of $2million (N612m) by the Federal Government for the commencement of the project.

    The money was released “about two days ago,” Vice President Yemi Oshinbajo said yesterday in Awka,Anambra State as he flagged off the governorship election campaign of the All progressives Congress (APC) candidate,Mr.Tony Nwoye.

    The bridge is to link Asaba with Onitsha,the chief commercial city of the state.

    Osinbajo said: “We are not making promises for nothing. The 2nd Niger Bridge, we have been talking about it for a long time. But for the first time, President Muhammadu Buhari went by himself to negotiate the facility to do that bridge.

    “And that is why the 2nd  Niger Bridge is in our current budget and we have provided it.

    “In fact, I am being reminded that just two days ago, the Sovereign Wealth Fund paid $2bn for that same project. So we will definitely see our 2nd Niger Bridge. We will not make promises we cannot keep.

    “Under the old administration, I will not mention them by name, they said Lagos to Calabar will go from Lagos to Calabar, there was no connection to the Southeast.

    “It was when President Muhammadu Buhari came that we redesigned the Lagos-Calabar in order to pass through Onitsha in the first place.

    ”By that new design, we also have the Port Harcourt-Maiduguri railway that has a connection to Umuahia-Owerri and Enugu-Awka. So all of these, we will not make promises we cannot keep. Every promise we make, we will keep.

    ”This state was the first state to receive our home-grown school feeding. This Anambra was the very first state that we gave money for that programme. And we have already in 807 schools, here in Anambra State where these young children (primary schools) are already fed.

    “We have over a hundred thousand children that are already fed here in Anambra State, and that is an APC programme, our home-grown school feeding programme.

    ”We have engaged over a thousand cooks, over a thousand people are cooking. We have our N-Power programme for young graduates.

    “Already we have employed over 4,000 graduates and we intend to increase the number.

    ”The APC government is making progress and the president is not relenting in getting it right for the people and that is why Tony Nwoye is being presented to you today to join the train “

    Osinbajo also said attention will be given to federal roads in the Southeast.

    He said President Muhammadu Buhari loves the people of the state and is willing to  do everything to  please them.

    Osinbajo said the APC was now prepared, more than before, to take over the running of the affairs of the state by winning the  November 18 governorship election.

    He said Anambra,being the gateway to the Southeast, means a lot to the APC.

    Governor  Rochas Okorocha of Imo State, who described himself as the APC lone ranger governor in the Southeast, expressed confidence that he would soon have a fellow party man as governor of Anambra in Nwoye.

    Governor Nasir El Rufai of Kaduna State said the time had come for the APC to reap the suffering he was made to go through when he visited the state to give a helping hand to Senator Chris Ngige during the 2015 elections.

    The chairman of  the Tony Nwoye Campaign Committee and Bauch State Governor  Mohammed Abubakar   said he would deliver Nwoye to the people of the state on November 18.

    Labour Minister Chris  Ngige said nobody can cheat APC during the election as was the case in the past.

    He said: “That time, we no get papa or mama. But today, we have all of them and even more.

    It is their turn to cry.”

    President    Buhari is scheduled to visit Anambra on November 14 to formally hand over the party’s flag to Nwoye.

  • Osinbajo, Dangote for Edo summit

    The Vice-President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, is to lead industry titans, including Africa’s richest man and President of Dangote Group Aliko Dangote to the maiden Alaghodaro Investment Summit.

    It will be hosted by Edo State government in Benin City, from November 10.

    The three-day summit, with the theme: “Envisioning the Future,” will explore opportunities for local and foreign direct investments in the state by highlighting its competitive advantage across sectors.

    Also expected at the summit are local and international business leaders and investors, bankers, financiers, industry experts, policy makers, diplomatic community and academia.

    The summit will showcase the reform the Governor Godwin Obaseki administration has carried out in critical sectors, such as the Private Property Protection Law, which sanitised land acquisition and use, the planned development of 58 tourist sites to unlock its tourism potential, and incentives for investment in the agricultural sector through public private partnership, among others.

    Chairman of Alaghodaro 2017 Organising Committee,  Asue Ighodalo, said: “The world over, governments are looking beyond oil to alternative revenue sources, in order to ensure sustainable development. We must also get creative and take action today for our future and the future of our children.”

    He said the key areas of focus at the event would include law and order, civil service reform, agriculture, manufacturing, transportation, forest regeneration and conservation, education, health care as well as arts and culture.

    Ighodalo said the summit was part of the response of the government, under the leadership of Obaseki, to the imminent threat of an oil-dependent economy.

  • Osinbajo, others for Anambra APC rally

    Osinbajo, others for Anambra APC rally

    Vice President Yemi Osinbajo will today lead 19 All Progressives Congress (APC) governors to kick-start the party’s governorship campaign for Dr. Tony Nwoye in Anambra State.

    Also on the train are: Senate President Bukola Saraki, APC senators, House of Representatives Speaker Aminu Dogara and the party’s House members, especially from Anambra State, as well as captains of industries, ministers and party chieftains.

    Addressing reporters yesterday in Awka, the state capital, the Chairman of Tony Nwoye Campaign Organisation and former Finance Commissioner Azuka Okwuosa said APC was ready for the November 18 election.

    The party’s rally, he said, will hold at All Saints Cathedral Church in Onitsha.

    According to him, the campaign train will move to the various local government areas.

    Okwuosa said: “We know the people of the state will vote for APC because the state has been like a sheep without a shepherd in the past few years.

    “This election will be judged on ideological basis. We are more than ready to fire from all cylinders. Our candidate has been tested and people trust him.

    “We are showcasing Nwoye, who is coming to transform Anambra and connect the state to the national grid.”

    Also, the Director General of the campaign organisation, Osy Ezenwa, noted that APC does not believe in name-calling because it is running issue-based campaigns.

    Ezenwa, who is a former Secretary to the State Government (SSG), said the people would witness great things when Nwoye becomes governor on November 18.

  • Osinbajo, Kachikwu, Baru meet in Villa

    Osinbajo, Kachikwu, Baru meet in Villa

    Vice President Yemi Osinbajo on Wednesday met behind closed doors on oil upstream issues involving the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Ibe Kachikwu and the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Maikanti Baru.
    Kachikwu, in a leaked letter to President Muhammadu Buhari had accused Baru of awarding $25 billion contracts without following due process.
    Speaking with State House correspondences after the meeting, Kachikwu said: “Its a meeting on upstream meeting, a normal typical meeting. It was largely AGIP bringing some information to the Vice President on where they have been in terms of Okpai, in terms of  Zabazaba Deepwater oilfield, in terms of the cash call exit which they are doing with NNPC, basically updating him, asking for areas where they need some assistance from government officials to sort of fastrack. It was normal upstream meeting.
    Asked if the GMD was part of the meeting, Kachikwu said “Definitely, of course.”
    On the extent the issue of cash call was   discussed,  he said “Yes we did only to the extent that a few completion items on NNPC, largely the opening up of the escrow accounts and that type of stuff which they need to fasten up on.
    “But we are far gone on that, instalmental payments are already going on, I think NNPC is undertaking by October or early next month to complete that whole process. So it is going on very well.
    Asked if petrol price will come down before Christmas because of improvement of revenue, he said “I will like the GDM who does the commercial aspect to comment on that, I will need his position before I can even comment on that.”