11092019 - BAILOUT: Pressure on states as FG starts deductions

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16—Vanguard, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2019 VISIT: Oyo State Governor, Seyi Makinde (middle), General Manager, Treasury Services, Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria, Mr Kabiru Yagboyaju (right) and Group Head, National Housing Fund, Mr Abubakar Musa Omar, during the bank management team's visit to the governor in Ibadan. Oil exploration: Deal directly with us, Iko community tells SEEPCO •Alleges ill treatment by SEEPCO, NPDC By Chioma Onuegbu UYO—INDIGENES of Iko community, Eastern Obolo Local Government Area, Akwa Ibom State have vowed to use legal measures to resist any attempt by Sterling Energy Exploration and Production Company Nigerian Limited, SEEPCO, to prevent Nigeria Petroleum Development Company, NPDC, from having a direct negotiation and agreement with them on all issues relating to the operations of the company in Utapate oil and gas field development project in the OML 13. Elders, women and youths of the community, who staged a peaceful protest against alleged ill treatment by NPDC and Sterling Energy Exploration and Production Company Nigeria Limited, SEEPCO, said the SEEPCO will not be allowed into the town to carry out its operations until it calls for a dialogue and meet directly with them on the vexed issues. Protem Chairman of the community, Mr. Sampson Agba, Youth President, Mr. Evans Toyo, Woman Leader, Mrs. Amira Sampson, Elder David Ufford and others who spoke during the protest, accused the company of using divide and rule tactics to cause problems in the community, insisting that the company must carry out an Environmental Impact Assessment and respect their right to a General Memorandum of Understanding, GMoU. Meanwhile, addressing newsmen, the community solicitor and human rights activist, Dr. Akpor Mudiaga-Odje, said NPDC in partnership with SEEPCO “Are now in the process of operating in full, OML 13, which is substantially located within the precincts and boundaries of our client, Iko community. “The Iko community hosts the largest oil fields, that is, Utapate Oil Fields and a Flow-station in the OML 13 Cluster arrangements as established by the Nigerian Petroleum Development Company, NPDC. Mudiaga-Odje who addressed newsmen moments before the protest, said: “The issues at stake in this context are truly located within the present intention of SEEPCO to commence work with a view of operating OML 13 owned by NPDC. “President Muhammadu Buhari has graciously approved the commencement of operation of OML 13 with a view of raising the national crude oil output to three million barrels per day by April, 2020. “The above was sequel to the payment of the sum of $3.15 billion by SEEPCO to the NPDC for the operation of the OML 13. Needless to say that, the Iko community hosts the largest oil fields, that is Utapate Oil Fields and a flow-station in the OML 13 Cluster arrangements as established by NPDC. “Our clients had expected that the State Government, Eastern Obolo Local Government Council, SEEPCO and Naturals Oil Services Limited, NOSL will directly interface with the Iko community on these issues and more, as duly represented by Our clients. “However, to our clients’ chagrin and utter dismay, SEEPCO decided on the contrary to set up a committee for that purpose, and which said committee does not represent in its true sense the interests of our clients, Iko Community. “Our clients have therefore, resolved unequivocally and unanimously to henceforth deal directly with NPDC on this matter of the operations of OML 13 as they have completely lost faith in the sincerity of SEEPCO and NOSL on this Issue.” Enugu traders protest 2yrs caretakers' administration By Dennis Agbo ENUGU—TRADERS in Ogbete main market Enugu have protested none conduct of election for the administration of the market union for over two years. The traders who carried placards indicating their grievances protested in the council premises of Enugu North local government headquarters along Okpara avenue, Enugu. Some of the placards read: “Ogbete traders don’t want caretakers again,” “Give Ogbete date of election,” “We are not going without date of election,” “Our election should not pass two weeks from today.” Leader of the Concerned Ogbete market traders, Mr. Osita Ike who spoke on their behalf told the chairman of Enugu North local government council, that the over stay of the caretaker committee in Ogbete for a period of two years and one month instead of six months was long over due. He lamented that it was an abberration for nontrader to over see the administration of traders inside the market and called for immediate conduct of election. “Enugu state is one of the most peaceful states and does not need crisis, therefore we are demanding for immediate dissolution of the caretaker government, immediate conduct of election in this month of September 2019,” Ike demanded. Chairman of Enugu North local government council, Hon. Emma Onoh appealed to the protesters to go back to their shops while he dialogues for conduct of election in the market. He charged them not to be violent in their agitation but to maintain peace until the election is conducted. Police dettachment from Enugu Area command supervised the peaceful protest and assured the traders that their compliants would be directed to the appropriate quarters. St Ambrose's Old Students Association meets THE old students association of St Ambrose's College Usiefurun (SACOSA), Udu /Jeremi branch,will host the National General Meeting on S a t u r d a y 14th.September,2019. The venue is Daddy Bakery opposite Udu Market, Ovwian at 11.00am. Technology hands start ups key to $5.1trn FX market More than five years since global foreign exchange (FX) trading was tainted by a rigging scandal, a handful of banks are more dominant than ever and show no sign of weakening their grip on the $5.1 trillion (4.13 trillion pounds)-a-day electronic market. But below the radar a new breed of start-ups is seeking to break their hegemony by pursuing the smaller but higher-margin customer-facing FX business used by asset managers, pension funds and insurance companies. Data analytics firm Coalition estimates the bulk of daily flows are between banks and the majority are likely to remain with the big lenders, notably Citi, JPMorgan, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, HSBC and UBS who together hold almost 45 percent of worldwide FX trading, up from around 35 percent in 2012. The upstarts say banks can read trading patterns to obtain higher prices from asset managers, who should instead save millions of dollars a year, as much as 50% in FX trading costs, by trading directly with each other. Wall Street down as global growth worries hit tech stocks United States (US) stocks fell in morning trading yesterday as weak economic data from China added to fears of a global recession and pushed investors out of riskier technology stocks. China’s factory-gate prices shrank 0.8 percent in August, the sharpest pace of decline in three years, as businesses slashed prices to cope with flagging demand amid a bruising trade war with the United States that has slowed growth in the world’s second largest economy. Microsoft Corporation was the biggest drag on the S&P 500 for the second straight session. Losses in Visa Incorporated and Mastercard Incorporated pulled the tech sector .SPLRCT 1.51 percent lower. Healthcare stocks .SPXHC were down 1.26 percent. Bank stocks .SPXBK were the top boost to the financial sector, rising 1.06 percent, while energy stocks jumped 1.53 percent. U.S. Treasury yields US2YT=RR US10YT=RR climbed to fresh three-week peaks. [US] Trading so far this week has largely been subdued as investors hold out for policy decisions from central banks on potential monetary easing. SoftBank in talks to invest in Latam venture capital funds Japan’s SoftBank Group Corporation is in talks with venture capital firms in Latin America to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in their funds, a move likely to speed up spending of a $5 billion regional venture capital fund, three sources with knowledge of the matter said. So far, SoftBank has only announced direct investments using the fund’s resources, injecting capital into Colombian delivery app Rappi, Brazilian lender Creditas, gym membership app Gympass and Mexican payments firm Clip, for instance. However, SoftBank’s Latin America fund also plans to invest in venture capital funds as a way to further foster innovation in the region, the sources said on condition of anonymity. The strategy will position SoftBank closer to startups that may eventually grow big enough to receive the group’s direct investments. SoftBank executives told fund managers it intends to deploy roughly $500 million in five to 10 funds, one source said. WeWork IPO valuation may dip below $20bn WeWork is considering slashing the valuation of its planned stock market launch to below $20 billion, two people familiar with the matter said, the latest blow to leading tech investor SoftBank Group after limp flotations of Uber and Slack.. Having previously hoped to be in a position to begin its roadshow to pitch the initial public offering (IPO) to investors as early as this week, We Company may now wait until Monday of next week, one source also said. The valuation for the money-losing U.S. office-sharing startup could be as low as $15 billion-$18 billion, one of the sources with direct knowledge of the matter said, roughly a third of the $47 billion We Company was valued at when Softbank made a follow-on investment in the company. Stories credited to Reuters & BCC
TWENTY years ago, the British government pledged to end child poverty within a generation, choosing to centre its domestic policy on achieving equal opportunity for all its citizens. With 1.1 million children lifted out of poverty by 2010, the UK was on track towards achieving this goal although a change of government (with its budget cuts and austerity measures) has jeopardised these aims. Nonetheless, in 2010, all political parties in the United Kingdom renewed their promise to British children through the Child Poverty Act, a national pledge to sustainably impact generations of present and future citizens. Imagine if 20 years ago in Nigeria, on the strength of our return to democracy, then President Olusegun Obasanjo had committed significant resources towards improving early education or if the National Assembly had made “the law the public conscience”, to quote a philosopher, Hobbes, wouldn’t the fates of the army of young people recruited by Boko Haram or the Niger Delta Avengers have been different? Marginalisation of millions Rather than supervise the defunding and privatisation of Nigerian education (and many other national assets), and, therefore, the marginalisation of millions of Nigerians who cannot afford the fees of private universities and secondary schools operated by then members of government, our democracy could have been built on a surer foundation by refusing to see poverty as inevitable and by showing real commitment to eliminating a social situation which contributes in no small measure towards ethno-religious conflict. The same could be said of many African nations grappling with insecurity and xenophobia. The poor blame foreigners for deprivation, ignoring the real issue: globally, democratisation came with political rights but not with the concomitant economic opportunities which assure national stability and cohesion. Nigeria must show leadership in Africa: besides Benny Hinn THE Israeli televangelist has renounced the prosperity gospel which he helped popularise around the world. In a live broadcast and to the shock of many, he said: “It’s an offense to the Lord, it’s an offense to say give $1,000. I think it’s an offense to the Holy Spirit to place a price on the Gospel”. He also called tithing extortion, a “gimmick” to “squeeze” money out from a congregation. Much damage has been done to the psyche of developing countries through the commercialisation of religion, where one buys forgiveness for misdeeds, like in medieval Poverty in a world of plenty: A legislative challenge actively condemning xenophobia (and recalling our long history of supporting antiapartheid regimes in southern Africa), we must develop a state whose moral principles of solidarity and equality are translated into law. Nigeria, with its many people and ethnic groups, is a potential template for managing plurality in the modern world, if lawmaking in our society adheres to the principles of nation-building. Our National Assembly must imbibe positive change into the fabric of our society, assist democratic ideals to veritably take root in government and governance by passing bills that fix pressing social concerns and entrench them, so they become a part of the public mindset, not to be challenged or undone by ill-meaning politics or politicians in the future. After the Second World War, the welfare state in Europe was legislated into being, creating the inalienable right to certain free or subsidised government •Benny Hinn times, on the strength of one’s offering. The damage done to the rule of law and to public ethics and values cannot be quantified. services. Ironically, although these policies, by investing in citizens, helped create the stability and democratic politics The Nigerian National Assembly can show leadership in Africa by setting a national pro-poor agenda and dialoguing with people, involving them in lawmaking of the West in the 20 th century, in Africa, the IMF and World Bank advocated drastically cutting public services, the effects of which we are just realising today, nearly 30 years Power probe THE sixth House of Representatives probed the Olusegun Obasanjo administration’s spending $16 billion on power. In 2008, the Ndudi Elumeluled House and ad hoc committee on power investigated and revealed, on live television, what was alleged to be the practice at the time: contractors without any proven ability or capacity surprisingly received multi-billion Naira contracts which they were unable to execute, thus resulting in work being abandoned around the country. Following this, another probe was announced involving the ninth Assembly which should pick up where its predecessors left off. Without resolving the Vanguard, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2019 —17 later, when advanced Only parliament can ensure economies which continued to that we start to spend on invest in their people have healthcare and education been able to maintain countries again, through their approval invested in the same largely of laws and budgets which steer progressive goals. policy implementation in a propeople direction, creating an We must realise the consequences of deregulation inclusive economy, without (which is already being which the lofty goals of peace challenged around the world) and cohesiveness will remain a distant dream. Imagine if members of the National Assembly from the North, for example, passed bills to assist poor farmers in insuring their crops against desertification and climate change, the effects would have been felt across the Sahel. Support to farmers through laws to promote access to fertilizer and other agricultural necessities would impact food security. With food security, combined with a legislative agenda to combat climate change, would Boko Haram have found it so easy to recruit? We must legislate on lasting social protection mechanisms coupled with rural and urban and the withdrawal of the state, the consequences of the defective provision of national services by incompetent private entities (e.g. in our power sector), a model that has made a handful of people rich, leaving the majority without access to much needed facilities or public assistance. This is what the masses in South Africa should be angry at, not the presence of equally poor Nigerians etching out a living. But elites around the world have mastered the eternal art of divide and conquer. The rise of populism in the US, the UK and Brazil where the poor of these countries are pitted against immigrants and minorities is an electoral strategy. Can the parliaments of the world, the people’s true representatives, arise to this century’s challenge, confronting the dangerous absurdity and immorality of poverty in a world of plenty? allegations of large-scale misuse of government funds, we cannot get to the bottom of the frustrations and resentments of Nigerians (and Africans at large) who see a small, affluent section of society continuously access riches and opportunity through its connection to government, while the majority stagnates or falls deeper into poverty. This mystery of poverty for the masses, in a global context of plenty, where we are able to produce more goods and wealth than at any other time in human history, will either be the crisis that prompted true democratic reform or the reason for our demise accelerated by climate change, itself a result of exploitation and unsustainable, unjust economic relations. community regeneration programmes. Unless National Assemblies take legislative action to tackle poverty and make our socio-economic systems fairer and more inclusive, the African continent and indeed the world, will continue to be defined by class conflict masquerading as racist or xenophobic, ethno-religious strife. Increased cooperation The Nigerian National Assembly can show leadership in Africa by setting a national (and why not regional) propoor agenda and dialoguing with people, involving them in law-making. What we need at this time is increased cooperation between the people and governments of Africa and the global South, to learn from each other’s successes and challenges. NASS should provide the platform for ordinary people, constituents, to translate their wishes to government, making sure their demands are considered through budget oversight and ensuring resource allocation meets people’s needs. Finally, in a country which struggles to fund its budgets while many of the wealthiest companies and people get away with paying little to nothing in taxes, where financial impropriety continues to jeopardise government’s ability to deliver services for its people, the National Assembly must urgently propose bills to provide financial justice, rather than what Nigerians have always known, which is exploitation of the majority, in an environment that neither rewards nor promotes justice or common human decency. Tabia Princewill is a strategic communications consultant and public policy analyst. She is also the cohost and executive producer of a talk show, WALK THE TALK which airs on Channels TV.
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11092019 - BAILOUT: Pressure on states as FG starts deductions

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