The political uncertainties, arising from pending policies and issues affecting major industries in Nigeria, including the oil and gas sector, coupled with the postponement of the long awaited elections last week prospective investors will watch from a distance while existing foreign investors would be on their toes. On Saturday, the nation’s parliamentary elections were postponed until Saturday after voting materials…
3 April 2011 Club World Cup runners-up TP Mazembe of the Democratic Republic of Congo cleared the first hurdle without much exertion in pursuit of a record third consecutive African Champions League title. The 'Crows' from southern mining city Lubumbashi took a two-goal advantage over Simba of Tanzania to Dar es Salaam where leading scorer Dioko Kaluyituka bagged a brace…
4 April 2011 The UEFA Champions League quarterfinals get underway on Tuesday evening with two fascinating ties involving Spanish giants Real Madrid and title holders Internazionale of Italy. In Madrid, at the Santiago Bernabeu, Real will host surprise package Tottenham Hotspur in the first leg of their quarterfinal. Amazingly, it will be the Spanish sides first appearance in the last…
4 April 2011 Third division Baroka FC produced the shock of the Nedbank Cup this season, and in many a year, as they defeated Premiership Moroka Swallows 2-1 in their Last 16 clash at the Peter Mokaba Stadium on Sunday. The Limpopo Vodacom League side stunned The Birds with second-half strikes from skipper Katlego Mashego and Khunadi Nkoana, either side…
Ten corps members were held hostage in a village in Nassarawa Eggon local government of Nasarawa State Saturday where they were deployed by INEC to go and conduct elections, after the villagers heard that the election has been shifted till Monday. The villagers insisted on seeing the electoral officer of the local government, Jacob Ajuh, to confirm the postponement before…
The police should arrest and prosecute, in an open and transparent manner, all those involved in violence before, during, and after the April election, executive secretary of the National Human Rights Commission, Roland Ewubare, has said. Mr. Ewubare, who also said the commission is deploying 370 monitors to evaluate the election, said it would not rely on the police to…
Although the Presidential election is barely five-days away, some northern politicians are lobbying the main opposition parties to produce a consensus candidate. To achieve this, they recently initiated fresh talks among Muhammadu Buhari of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), Ibrahim Shekarau of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) and Nuhu Ribadu of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) to…
Award winning singer, TY Bello has released the music video of her latest single, ‘The Future’. The erstwhile Kush singer premiered the Kemi Adetiba directed video across different entertainment blogs, yesterday Sunday 3, April 2011. The music video of the track that preaches hope for a better future for Nigerians is depicted in a manner that sees the songstress going…
Striking oil workers in Gabon stopped the African country’s estimated 240,000 barrels of daily crude oil production, a union official told Reuters on Saturday. “We can confirm tonight that all production has been halted,” said Arnaud Engandji, spokesman for the ONEP oil workers’ union, which wants more local workers in the sector. Gabon is Africa’s seventh largest oil producer. Gabon’s…
Anyone wanting to understand the interest generated by the harmonised version of the 2011 appropriation bill recently passed by both houses of the National Assembly will do well not to look too hard at the numbers. Until we comprehensively reform the framework for managing public expenditure in the country, budget numbers would not be worth the fancy paper on which…
Chidinma Okoro has been unemployed since she got laid off in September last year. Her husband's previously thriving business has struggled for a few years. This made Mrs Okoro's contribution all the more critical for the family. With school fees due, things had become quite desperate. She then heard about a friend who had sold some of her gold and…
Nigeria's expansive budget We run an economy today that is based on budgeting. But, to a large extent, our culture does not encourage budgeting. In advanced economies that we are copying, if one lives on a monthly salary, it is difficult to expect one to share with members of one's family, outside those in one's nuclear family. In some instances,…
The country appears set for another budget showdown as the executive and the legislature resume their long standing disagreement over budget figures. Finance minister, Olusegun Aganga said last week that the 2011 appropriation bill passed by the Senate is not "implementable" due to the alterations carried out by the lawmakers. The Senate last week passed a budget of N4.972 trillion,…
A few more banks have released their 2010 year end results, some of which have fallen below the expectation of industry watchers. However, the trend that was common among the institutions was the drop in earnings, due largely to the reduction in lending. Through a mixture of cost-cutting strategies and efficiency in deploying assets, most of the firms still posted…
2 April 2011 SuperSport United defeated Al Ahly 1-0 in their CAF Champions League first round, second leg match at the Peter Mokaba Stadium on Saturday night, but it was not enough to stop the Egyptians advancing to the second round on aggregate. Leading 2-0 from the first leg, Al Ahly were outplayed by Matsatsantsa on the night but did…