Presidential candidate of the Peoples Redemption Party, PRP, Kola Abiola, has vowed to deal decisively with secessionists if elected Nigerian president. Kola Abiola made this vow at a presidential parley organised by the South-West Development Stakeholders Forum in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital. The PRP presidential candidate declared that their action was unconstitutional and amounted to treason. He insisted that he would not accept any action that would threaten the unity of Nigeria if elected, saying his administration would encourage them if only it would not affect the unity of Nigeria.

  A former Coordinator of the Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF) in Borno State, Mr Abba Aji Kalli has raised the alarm that there are over 40, 000 orphans in the state alone arising from the Boko Haram insurgency, warning that unless the federal government comes to their aid and addresses the challenge they pose, it is another time bomb waiting to explode. This is just as he said Nigerian Navy Special Forces have been fully deployed to the Baga end of the Lake Chad basin and restored security to the Lake Chad fringes thereby enabling commerce, especially fishing activities and businesses to resume. Speaking at a briefing in Abuja titled, “Counter Terrorism and Maritime Safety Under Buhari Administration: Encomium for the Nigerian Navy”, organized by Building Resilience Against Violent Extremism, Insurgency and Terrorism (BRAVEIT) on Monday in Abuja, Mr Kalli said, “As I speak, today, we have over 40,000 orphans in Borno. Children with no father no mother and nobody catering for them. This is another time bomb waiting to happen if the challenge is not addressed”. “As I speak, today, we have over 40,000 orphans in Borno. Children with no father no mother and nobody catering for them. This is another time bomb waiting to happen if the challenge is not addressed”. Also Read Insurgency spreading all over Nigeria – Gen Abdusalami Declaring that the insurgency in the northeast is not about religious or indoctrination alone, Mr Kalli accused “France of behind the insecurity of the area especially Borno because of the oil and gas in Lake Chad and large deposit of Uranium in Borno”. He disclosed that going by what the French plan, with support from its collaborators, and the resources they made available to the Boko Haram terrorists group, the Nigerian Military did a wonderful job of degrading the terrorists and bringing life and commerce back to Borno. “I can tell you that Nigeria has won this war with the support of the armed forces. In the history of insurgency war, Nigeria is only country where IDP camps are closed and people successfully returned to their ancestral homes. The Nigerian Navy has taken over Lake Chad and supported by Multinational Joint Task Force, the economy is back and is now booming. This is what they did not want”. In his remarks, the Director of Operations, BRAVEIT, Lawrence Bilal Audu said, “As the Administration of President Muhammadu Buhari winds down in a few months’ time, we wish to note without any fear of contradiction that, Nigeria under his dynamic leadership has made landmark achievements in various strata of the polity particularly in the area of security despite some daunting challenges which may be described as deliberately inflicted.

  The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has announced that it will spend $8.3 billion in 2023 to continue its work tackling poverty, disease, and inequity. In his annual letter, Mark Suzman, the foundation’s CEO, said the board of trustees’ approval of the budget puts the foundation on track to reach an annual payout of $9 billion by 2026. He said the budget also represents a 15 per cent increase over the 2022 forecasted payout which enables the foundation to give away more money than any other philanthropy. Addressing questions about the scale of the foundation’s influence and access to global leaders, Suzman said the it tries to use its privilege to push relentlessly for world leaders to spend their funds to lift up vulnerable populations. Citing examples from its works on climate adaptation for smallholder farmers, malaria, and US education, he detailed how the foundation advocates for solutions and brings diverse voices to decision-making tables. “Our role is to ensure that decision-makers—be the school board members or cassava growers or health ministers—have the best possible options to choose from and the best possible data to inform their decisions,” the letter reads. “And where there’s a solution that can improve livelihoods and save lives, we’ll advocate persistently for it. “We won’t stop using our influence, along with our monetary commitments, to find solutions—as long as hundreds of thousands of children die of malaria just because of where they live, as long as students of color and low-income students don’t have equitable educational opportunities, and as long as famine threatens entire populations.” Suzman said while the foundation was optimistic about the potential for progress, it was also aware that the challenges the world faces would likely not be resolved in 2023. “That means we’ll be looking for even more effective ways to accelerate innovation and spur action toward the global goals,” the letter reads.

  A new report released by Oxfam, an international confederation against poverty, says the three richest men in Nigeria have more wealth than 83 million citizens.   Oxfam released the global inequality report at the start of the annual World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos, Switzerland, on Monday.   In the document, titled, ‘survival of the richest’, the international non-governmental organisation (NGO) said the wealth of Nigerian billionaires has grown by a third since the start of COVID-19 pandemic without a corresponding increase in health budgets.   It also said the richest 0.003 percent of Nigerians (6,355 individuals worth $5 million and above) have 1.4 times more wealth than 107 million of the country’s citizens.     Oxfam said a wealth tax of 2 percent on the millionaires, 3 percent on those with wealth above $50 million, and 5 percent on the Nigerian billionaires would raise $3.2 billion annually.   According to the organisation, the revenue gained from the wealth tax would be enough to double health spending as Nigeria has one of the lowest health budgets in the world.   Commenting on the report, Vincent Ahonsi, country director, Oxfam International, said super-rich Nigerians are not paying their taxes.   Advertisement   “While millions of Nigerians are unsure where their next meals will come from, the super-rich are getting richer and not paying their fair share of taxes but taking advantage of the complexities and loopholes in the tax legislation, as well as the lack of transparency and accountability in tax implementation, thereby depriving the country of the revenue needed for social protection and inequality reduction.”   “Taxing the super-rich and big corporations is the door out of today’s overlapping crises. It’s time we demolish the convenient myth that tax cuts for the richest result in their wealth somehow ‘trickling down’ to everyone else.   “Forty years of tax cuts for the super-rich have shown that a rising tide doesn’t lift all ships — just the superyachts.”   Ahonsi also said, to have a more secure and prosperous society, Nigeria needs to purposely work to reduce inequality, generate more tax revenues from the rich, spend more on health, education, agriculture and social protection; and provide fair, inclusive, and gender-sensitive opportunities for its citizens.       The organisation called on governments to introduce one-off solidarity wealth taxes and windfall taxes to end crisis profiteering.   “Permanently increase taxes on the richest 1 percent, for example to at least 60 percent of their income from labour and capital, with higher rates for multi-millionaires and billionaires,” it added.   “Governments must especially raise taxes on capital gains, which are subject to lower tax rates than other forms of income.”

  A committee of the senate probing the N23.7 trillion spent by the federal government without the approval of the national assembly is seeking more time to turn in its report. In December, the senate suspended a request by President Muhammadu Buhari to approve the sum under what was referred to as the “ways and means advances”. Senators Betty Apiafi and Thompson Sekibo argued that the request was not constitutional. They also demanded that before the upper legislative chamber could approve the request, the senate must have the details of what the funds were spent on. Thereafter, Ibrahim Gobir, senate leader, was appointed to chair the ad hoc committee probing the spending. While speaking on the floor of the senate on Tuesday, Gobir said he could not present the report of his committee because the information requested from Zainab Ahmed, minister of finance; and Godwin Emefiele, governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) was not available. “Unfortunately in the process, we were not able to get the information that we are looking for because the two of them were out of town so it was difficult for our committee to come up with a report as scheduled today,” he said. “We want an extension of about three days to get the information and report to the senate.” While approving the senate leader’s request, Ahmad Lawan, senate president, said the president’s request “is a serious issue”. “The national assembly or the senate is ready to consider the request but we must have the necessary information,” Lawan said. “We are ready to stay here till Friday to consider those things that are important.”

  The Federal Government, on Monday, announced that the licensing round for seven deep offshore open oil blocs, which commenced on January 3, 2023, would last for four months. It invited investors from across the world with capability and experience in deep water operations to embrace the fiscal provisions of the Petroleum Industry Act 2021 and join in bidding for the oil blocs. The Chief Executive, Nigeria Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, Gbenga Komolafe, disclosed this in Lagos at the pre-bid conference for the 2022/2023 licensing round of petroleum prospecting licences in deep offshore Nigeria. The pre-bid conference was held following the announcement of the 2022/2023 mini-bid round exercise on December 22, 2022. Speaking at the conference, which had its theme as “Growing Upstream Investment in Nigeria through Licencing Round: The Bid Process and Opportunities,” Komolafe said the approval of the exercise by the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), was the first in the last 15 years. In his speech, which was made available to our correspondent in Abuja, the NUPRC boss explained the commission had announced the commencement and launched the bid round portal which was officially opened on January 3, 2023. “The exercise is scheduled to last for approximately four months along the following processes: registration and pre-qualification, data prying/purchase, technical bid submission/presentation, technical bid evaluation, and commercial bid conference,” he stated. He notesd that in compliance with the provisions of the PIA 2021 and regulations made pursuant to the Act, the commission issued a licensing round guideline and published a licensing round plan for a total of seven deep offshore open blocs. He outlined the blocs to include PPL-300-DO, PPL-301-DO, PPL-302-DO, PPL-303-DO, PPL-304-DO, PPL-305-DO and PPL-306-DO. Komolafe said, “The seven deep offshore blocks, covering an area of approximately 6,700 km2 in water depths of 1,150m to 3,100m, are on offer in this mini-bid round. “These are intended to be the first in a series of bid rounds aimed at further development of our prospective petroleum basins.” He said the bid rounds were within the context of the commission’s legal and regulatory frameworks, as enshrined in Section 73 of the PIA, which sought to encourage new investors and investments into the next phase of oil and gas exploration in Nigeria. “Let me clearly indicate that this pre-bid conference is a clarion call to technically and financially capable local and foreign investors to invest and take advantage of the generous fiscal and regulatory regime in the Nigerian upstream petroleum sector. “The mini-bid round is a market-driven programme expected to outperform the last bid round which was held in April 2007 during which a total of 45 blocs were put on offer under a different regulatory regime (the Petroleum Act, 1969),” he stated. Also speaking at the pre-bid conference, the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, said the process was formulated in cognisance of global sustainability goals. “On the global scale, the licensing round will no doubt be beneficial to all stakeholders and will in the long run contribute to long-term global energy sufficiency”, he said. According to the minister, interestingly, the oil and gas industry in Nigeria has embraced the reality of energy transition and is taking a strategic position to leverage the opportunities presented by the unfolding era. Sylva also said that seven oil blocs had been listed for the ongoing mini 2022/2023 bid rounds. “The seven deep offshore blocks have been thoroughly evaluated and are believed to have significant potential for hydrocarbon reserves. They are in some of the most promising areas of the deep waters of Nigeria which have been de-risked by other producing fields nearby,” he said.

  Following the burning to death of a Catholic priest in Kafin-koro in the Paikoro Local Government Area of Niger State, aggrieved women and youth have reportedly burnt down the Kafin-koro Police Divisional Office. According to a resident of Kafin Koro, who identified himself simply as Jonathan, the incident began when some women comprising Evangelical Church Winning All and Catholic women groups converged on the premises of the burnt Parish at 7 am on Tuesday to offer prayers against those who burnt the Catholic priest. He said, “As the women were praying, some policemen arrived at the venue saying they were a detachment from the Kafin-koro Police Division drafted to the church to provide protection for them. “The women rejected the protection and requested that the police should leave because the police didn’t provide protection for the dead priest neither did they show up on time when they were called,” Jonathan said that when the police refused to leave the residence of the late priest, the women threw stones and sachet water at the police then the police left. He said the village youths eventually joined the women to hold a peaceful protest but the police started shooting and a villager got killed by a bullet fired by the policemen. “After the prayers, the women were joined by some youths to match peacefully through the major road of the town to the Police Division chanting anti-police slogans to the Police Division to register their grievances as they asked the police to leave the town since their presence is of no security value to the community. “As the police were trying to disperse the crowd, the police began shooting into the air and one of the bullets hit a man who died immediately so that was how the protest turned violent,” he said Jonathan said that the irate youths in the process set the police division office on fire. Bandits on Sunday invaded the Kafin Koro community around 1 am and shot sporadically while heading for the uphill residence of the priest, Isaac Achi, of SS Peter and Paul Catholic Church, Kaffi Koro. Confirming the incident, the Niger State Police Public Relations Officer, Wasiu Abiodun, said, “The bandits reportedly attempted to gain entrance into the residence, but it seemed difficult and they set the house ablaze, while the said reverend father was burnt dead. “A colleague of the reverend father identified as Father Collins was equally shot in the shoulder while trying to escape from the scene. “The lifeless body of Father Isaac was recovered while Father Collins was rushed to the hospital for treatment.” Editor’s Note: This Photo Is For Illustrative Purpose

  Vietnam President Nguyen Xuan Phuc has resigned, state media said Tuesday, after days of rumours he was about to be sacked amid a major anti-corruption drive that has seen several ministers. Phuc has “submitted his resignation from his assigned positions, quit his job, and retired”, state news agency VNA said. Phuc’s sudden departure is a highly unusual move in communist Vietnam, where political changes are normally carefully orchestrated with an emphasis on cautious stability. His resignation follows the dismissal of two deputy prime ministers this month in an anti-corruption purge that has led to the arrest of dozens of officials. He was prime minister between 2016 and 2021, before assuming his role as president. Phuc “took political responsibility as leader when several officials, including two deputy prime ministers and three ministers committed violations and shortcomings, causing very serious consequences”, VNA said.