The Aluminium Smelter Company of Nigeria (ALSCON) in Ikot Abasi Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom says it is losing 1.6 million dollars monthly due to high cost of production. Mrs Tatyana Smirnova, its Director of Public/Government Relation, disclosed this to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday in Ikot Abasi.
Updated 6 Years ago

The proposed Centenary Village, an ultra-modern city within the FCT to mark the 100 years of the Nigerian nationhood, will cost N3.2 trillion, retired Gen. Abdusalami Abubakar said on Monday. Abubakar, who is Chairman of the Board of Centenary Village Plc, disclosed this while presenting a report to President Goodluck Jonathan at the State House in Abuja.
Updated 6 Years ago

Singapore's prime minister openly criticized the United States over the government shutdown and ongoing deadlock over the debt ceiling, calling them "problems you have created for yourself in a game of chicken." In an interview with CNN's Patricia Wu on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said Americans "are unable to get their act together," and that Washington's behavior sends a "negative signal which will last much longer that the shutdown."
Updated 6 Years ago

Passengers were, yesterday, dazed at the Murtala Muhammed Airport, MMA2 and the General Aviation Terminal, GAT, Terminal 1 as airline operators increased airfares astronomically. Vanguard gathered at the terminal that there was a sharp increase in fares. For instance a 55-minutes flight to Abuja attracted between N22, 000 and N26, 000 in the economy class depending on how early a prospective passenger bought the ticket.
Updated 6 Years ago

As the Government shutdown in the US enters its second week, the country is just 10-days away from default, and the country’s main creditor China has urged Washington to take decisive steps to avoid bankruptcy and ensure safety of Chinese investments. China, the US government's largest foreign creditor, is "naturally concerned about developments in the US fiscal cliff", as Reuters quoted Vice Finance Minister Zhu Guangyao giving the Chinese government's first public response to the Oct 17 US deadline for raising the debt ceiling.
Updated 6 Years ago

World Bank Group is to undertake its biggest financing programmein the Nigeria’s power sector, never seen anywhere else in the world. The Director, Infrastructure Department, International Finance Corporation, IFC, a subsidiary of the World Bank Group, Mr. Bernard Sheahan, who disclosed this at a power summit in Lagos, said the World Bank planned to provide financing for a number of the power projects, such as providing funding for some of the transmission cost and guaranteeing some of the risks in the sector.
Updated 6 Years ago

Sub-Saharan Africa's economic renaissance is fueling an investment drive by fast food joints looking to tap the continent's growing middle class. The likes of Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) and Domino's pizza are opening up in African growth markets from Nigeria to Angola to give consumers a taste of U.S. cuisine.
Updated 6 Years ago

Authorities say Silk Road, the shadowy "deep Web" siteshut down by the FBI this week, was the Internet's biggest destination for drugs and other illegal goods. It had nearly 1 million registered users, the bureau says, and was used for roughly $1.3 billion in transactions over the past two or so years. But shuttering Silk Road and arresting its owner won't be the end of the shadowy black market on the Web, where drugs are far from the only products that can be bought illegally.
Updated 6 Years ago

Association of Bureaux De Change Operators of Nigeria (ABCON) said it fully supports recent measures of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to check money laundering, and other malpractice in the foreign exchange market. Recently, the CBN announced some measures to check money laundering tendencies observed in the foreign exchange market. These include the ban on importation of foreign currencies, and suspension of 20 BDCs for not rendering returns and non-compliance with anti-money laundering regulations.
Updated 6 Years ago

There are far more African billionaires than previously thought, Ventures magazine said Monday in a report on the continent’s mega-rich, but the number of Africans living in extreme poverty has also shot up. Previous Africa-rich-lists named as few as 16 billionaires, but Ventures said its exhaustive research had identified at least 55 on a continent where the wealthy often fiercely protect details about their fortunes.
Updated 6 Years ago