The Federal Government has said the ongoing reforms in the transport and other sectors of the economy are yielding positive results, especially in the rail sector where over one million litres of fuel are being transported on a daily basis just as 200 communities have been connected by rail. This was disclosed yesterday in Abuja by the Director General of the Bureau of Public Service Reforms, Dr. Joe Abah, during the inauguration of the 24-man steering committee on Public Service Reforms by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Anyim Pius Anyim. According to Abah, "the reforms in critical sectors like power, agriculture, ports, transports, pensions, electoral system, judiciary, rule of law among others, were already yielding visible results. "The trains are back for the first time in 30 years, 30,000 passengers have been moved in two months, over 200 communities are now connected by rail, while one million litres of fuel are now being moved daily by rail." He added that the reforms had resulted in airports being refurbished for the first time in decades, NAFDAC laboratories accredited to the highest international standards, stability of electricity in the country approaching realisation, fertiliser fraud drastically reduced and improvement of more than 1,664 kilometres of key roads. The Secretary of the newly constituted Committee also listed the mandate of the committee to include providing technical leadership for reform at the level of planning, design and implementation; and initiate action on reform at the different fronts, monitor and evaluate implementation of the reforms for impact and effectiveness. He said they were also expected to generate feedback information to guide periodic review; interact/dialogue with donor agencies/stakeholders and inform the Federal Executive Council (FEC) on reform implementation efforts on a regular basis, and brief the National Council on Reform quarterly." Anyim while inaugurating the committee, said the absence of the Steering Committee on Reforms had limited government's capacity to provide coordinated technical leadership and effective monitoring and evaluation of all public service reforms efforts.
Updated 6 Years ago

Investment in the Nigerian telecommunications in the past 12 years is now worth $25bn, President Goodluck Jonathan has said. Jonathan said this at the Nigerian Investment Forum organised at the Royal Pavilion, Impact Exhibition and Convention Centre, Bangkok, Thailand, on Wednesday. It was part of the ongoing ITU Telecom World hosted by the International Telecommunications Union, a statement by the Ministry of Communications Technology stated. The President, who was represented at the forum by the Minister of Communications Technology, Mrs. Omobola Johnson, said Africa presented new opportunities for the world and Nigeria was at the crest of whatever Africa had to offer. He said telecommunication was the fastest growing sector of the Nigerian economy, performing twice as much as the next sector – building and construction. According to him, the telecommunications sector, which is growing at 30 per cent per annum, is contributing eight per cent to the nation’s Gross Domestic Product. Jonathan said the strength of the Nigerian telecommunications industry could be seen in the fact that operators had staked $25bn on the expansion of the industry in the past 12 years, adding that there was still immense opportunities for growth.
Updated 6 Years ago

The reality is that unemployment in Nigeria is ridiculous, especially considering the incredible need for human energy in its development. Worse still is the extreme lack of gainful employment opportunities in spite of the country’s huge human capital resource. This is a paradox. In Nigeria neither employees nor employers are satisfied with the services received from one another. The problem of employment in Nigeria is not a lack of job opportunities; it is the lack of gainful employment, it is a dearth of qualified candidates, a minutia of willing hands/ unavailability of interested participants, a confusion of expectations and a character of corruption. Now I do admit that last paragraph can create some confusion but don’t worry, this is not an article, it is a conversation and as we walk through the matter at hand you will understand.
Updated 6 Years ago

Hounrable Dayo Bush-Alebiosu is the Chairman, House Committee on Treaties and Agreements, which was inaugurated in the House about a year ago. In this interview with Aviation reporters, he speaks on several issues in the Nigerian aviation industry including the failure of the management of Dana Air to complete payment of compensation to families of crash victims over 16 months after the crash, the recent crash involving Associated Aviation Limited and the imbalances in the Bilateral Air Services Agreements, BASA, Nigeria signed with several countries. Excerpts:
Updated 6 Years ago

The committee’s optimism, Sanusi said, was based on the fact that, first of all, the incoming US Fed chairman “does not see tapering as imminent given the ongoing dispute around the budget and the weakness of the economic recovery”. He further observed that in England, although recovery appeared to be firmly on track, the Bank of England was clearly not going to consider raising rates until unemployment falls to 7 percent, probably in late 2014. Besides, according to him, the Bank of Japan was likely to continue with its policy stance until inflation reaches its target, which is a long way off as the European Central Bank has just lowered its benchmark rates to avoid deflation. The MPC also noted that the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) was expected to reduce its debt by N1 trillion in December 2013. The CBN directed that AMCON redeem its bonds for cancellation by exchanging them with FGN treasury bills on its books. Consequently, the only impact of the repayment was that AMCON’s balance sheet and the contingent liability of the Federal Government from its guarantee of AMCON bonds would shrink by N1 trillion, the governor explained. “This is positive for the economy and the credit rating of the Federal Government and the banking industry. Its impact on the market will be minimal given that only AMCON’s balance sheet is affected significantly and AMCON is not a player in these markets,” he added.
Updated 6 Years ago

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has said that macro-economic environment remains strong in Nigeria despite adverse conditions in the global economy and threat to security in the domestic economy. It noted that the global economy has, in the past few years, witnessed financial crisis characterised by rising debt profile worldwide. Tunde Lemo, the apex bank’s deputy governor, operations, who stated this in Abeokuta, Ogun State, at the Egba Economic Summit with the theme, ‘Leveraging Micro, Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (MSMEs) for Development: Prospects, Challenges and Opportunities’, noted that secretariesthe economy has seen over dependence on oil, inadequate infrastructure, high inflation, rising unemployment, huge import bills etc. A statement made available to BusinessDay quotes Lemo as saying that the development of MSMEs holds the key to structural transformation required to achieve the goals of Vision 20:2020. Continuing, he said, “MSMEs is the solution to the upward trend in unemployment in the country”, adding that MSMEs provide a platform for employment and wealth creation, reduction in poverty and rural-urban drift, arresting youth restiveness and crime.
Updated 6 Years ago

Foreign investors’ holding in the Federal Government Bonds has continued to grow, hitting $5.112billion as at the end of 2012 following the transformation of the market by the Debt Management Office (DMO). Prior to the establishment of DMO in 2000, debt management operations in Nigeria were undertaken in an uncoordinated fashion by various agencies of government leading to inefficiencies and less positive impact on the economy. However, through the transformation efforts of agency, the debt management system has improved leading to many benefits. And one of the benefits, according to Director-General of DMO, Dr. Abraham Nwankwo, is the increase in foreign exchange inflows that had led to growth in external reserves and stability of the naira through the participation of foreign investors in bond market. Nwankwo disclosed that as at the end of December 2012, foreign investors’ holding in FGN securities amounted to $5.112 billion, compared to about $500 million as at the beginning of 2012. He added that the share of foreign investors had been rising consistently moving from 1.66 per cent as at the end of 2011 to 10.26 per cent as at the end of 2012. This has improved to an average of 16.1 per cent and has been averaging 16.1 per cent between January and June 2013.
Updated 6 Years ago

The relentless drudgery of working nine 'til five is a common gripe all over the world, but according to a survey by recruitment website Monster.com, U.S. workers hate going to the office the most. The survey, which was sponsored by Monster.com and conducted by market research firm GfK, found that 15 percent of American workers said they disliked or hated their jobs. This was the highest level of job dissatisfaction among workers surveyed in seven countries. GfK interviewed 8,000 people as part of the survey over the telephone, including 1,007 respondents based in the U.S. For the countries profiled – Canada, France, Germany, India, Netherlands, UK and U.S. –respondents were asked to choose one of five options when asked how they felt about their jobs: love it, like it a lot, like it, don't like it, don't love it at all. Of the U.S. candidates, just over half said they liked or loved their jobs, while 31 percent said they were merely satisfied. However, despite having the highest level of dissatisfied workers, the U.S. also clocked the highest amount of workers who said they loved their jobs so much they would do it for free, at 22 percent. Canadians are the happiest workforce, according to the findings of the survey, with 64 percent liking or loving their jobs and only 7 percent saying they disliked or hated work. Other happier workforces included the Netherlands and India, where 57 percent and 55 percent of the respondents said they were happy in their jobs, respectively. India had the lowest level of respondents saying they hated their jobs, at 5 percent.
Updated 6 Years ago

A surge in car shipments spurred Japanese exports to their biggest annual increase in three years in October, suggesting a gradual pick up in global demand will help underwrite a sustainable recovery in the world's third-largest economy. The 18.6 percent increase in exports in the year to October blew past the median market forecast for a 16.5 percent rise and accelerated from a 11.5 percent gain in September, data by the Ministry of Finance showed on Wednesday. Significantly, exports also rebounded in volume terms, rising 4.4 percent from a year earlier, in a sign the global economy is gradually recovering mainly on strength in advanced nations. Sluggish exports have been a source of concern for policymakers as shipment volume has struggled to pick up despite a weak yen this year due to slowdown in emerging economies, which faced capital outflows on expectations the U.S. Federal Reserve would soon roll back its massive monetary stimulus. While the yen has fallen around 14 percent against the dollar in 2013, exports growth has largely disappointed early expectations. The Japanese economy has been humming along nicely this year on the back of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's massive monetary and fiscal expansionary policies, dubbed Abenomics. Still, headwinds from weak capital spending and depressed global demand have somewhat clouded the outlook. The October data should provide some relief for the government, which is hoping a recovery in overseas demand will cushion the blow from a sales tax hike next April, which could crimp private consumption "U.S. private-sector demand remains strong and European economies appear to be bottoming out. If advanced economies recover, Japanese exports can rise more," said Takeshi Minami, chief economist at Norinchukin Research Institute in Tokyo.
Updated 6 Years ago

JPMorgan Chase & Co said it routinely overstated the quality of mortgages it was selling to investors, and it agreed to pay $13 billion to settle related charges with the U.S. government, federal officials said on Tuesday. The behavior that the largest U.S. bank admitted to, authorities said, is at the heart of what inflated the housing bubble: lenders making bad mortgages and selling them to investors who thought they were safe. When the loans started turning bad, investors lost faith in the banking system, and a housing crisis turned into a financial crisis. The civil settlement marks the end of weeks of tense negotiations between JPMorgan Chase, which is looking to move past the legal issues that have plagued it for more than a year, and the U.S. government, which is under pressure to hold banks accountable for behavior that led to the financial crisis. JPMorgan said it has set aside all the funds it needs to cover the settlement, meaning the deal will have no impact on its earnings. The deal resolves most of its mortgage issues with federal authorities, the bank said. JPMorgan's shares rose 0.7 percent to close at $56.15 on Tuesday. But even after the settlement, the bank faces at least nine other government probes, covering everything from its hiring practices in China to whether it manipulated the Libor benchmark interest rate. It may still also face criminal charges linked to mortgage matters. The bank said last month it had set aside $23 billion to cover litigation expenses. At issue in Tuesday's settlement was the long chain of parties between the original mortgage lender and the ultimate investor in the loan. Often smaller lenders would make a mortgage loan, and sell it to a bank, which would package loans into bonds, and in turn sell them to investors. This chain allowed capital to flow to loans that arguably should never have been made. "Without a doubt, the conduct uncovered in this investigation helped sow the seeds of the mortgage meltdown," said U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder in a statement. The investors that bought these mortgage bonds demanded that the loans be of a particular quality. JPMorgan said the loans met the guidelines, but one of its employees said they did not, the bank admitted. Due diligence firms that reviewed some of those loans for JPMorgan in 2006 and 2007 said that 27 percent of them did not meet underwriting guidelines, but the bank still packaged at least half of those into mortgage securities, the government said.
Updated 6 Years ago