Nigerian anti-corruption activists drag Fashola to EFCC over N78 million website scandal

The Civil Society Network Against Corruption, a coalition of anti-corruption organisations in Nigeria, has petitioned the Economic and Financial Crimes
Commission over the “questionable expenditures” of the administration of Babatunde Fashola, the immediate past governor of Lagos State.

In a petition dated August 10 and addressed to the EFCC Chairman, the group called for the probe of the
controversial N78 million spent on the personal website of Mr. Fashola

There was outrage last weekend after analytic firm,
BudgIT, revealed that Mr. Fashola approved, before he
left office, N78.3 million from the state’s treasury for
an upgrade of his personal website.

The contract for the refurbishment of the website was
awarded to Info Access Plus Limited by the office of the
Chief of Staff to the former governor.

The company, however, denied receiving the amount,
insisting that it was paid N10 million.

Other ‘questionable expenditures’

In addition to the amount purportedly spent on the
website upgrade, CSNAC also urged the anti-graft
agency to probe the N1.2 billion spent on the
construction of pedestrian bridges along Eti-Osa – Lekki – Epe expressway “which did not specify the number of bridges.”

Other areas of possible probe include the N17 million
awarded for the provision of wall signage in three
magistrate courts; N3.46 billion spent for the
construction of a beach resort in Ilase; and N61 million
disbursed for a Range Rover SUV and two Toyota Hilux trucks as the official vehicle of Chief Judge of State.

The group also want the EFCC to probe Mr. Fashola’s
spending of N85 million for the repair and replacement
of street signs; N330 million spent on the development
of the residence of Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire, the
immediate past deputy governor; and N94 million spent
on printer consumables.

CSNAC petition came following a similar outcry by
another anti-corruption group, the Coalition Against
Corrupt Leaders.

Debo Adeniran, CACOL’s Executive Director, had stated
in an interview recently that his organisation’s
independent investigation showed that the 1.36
kilometre Lekki-Ikoyi link bridge cost N6 billion, and not
the N25 billion stated by Mr. Fashola’s administration.
Mr. Adeniran also stated that several petitions written
to the EFCC to probe the various projects in the state in the face of the more than N500 billion debt left by Mr. Fashola’s government was ignored.

Another organisation, the Socio-Economic Rights
Accountability Project, had also alleged that the state
refused to disclose details of the US$200 million World Bank education fund during Mr. Fashola’s tenure.

“CSNAC is hereby requesting that these allegations
against the former governor of Lagos State be
thoroughly investigated and the falsity or verity
proven,” said Olanrewaju Suraju, Chairman, CSNAC.

“We would like to believe that this petition would be
given utmost attention as speculations in the media and among the general public is that members of the
governing party currently enjoy special consideration
and therefore not investigated by the anti-corruption
agencies.

“This perception, if allowed to fester, will be detrimental
and dangerous to the spirit of the new wave in fight
against corruption led by the current administration.”

Amosun sacks permsec, 5 others over ‘offensive’ exam question

ABEOKUTA — Governor Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun State, yesterday ordered the sack of six officials of the Ministry of Education, including an acting Permanent Secretary, Mrs Folashade Oresegun, three directors and an examiner over an ‘offensive’ Senior School English language summary passage.

An examiner, Adegbenro Joel had prepared English language exams questions for the third term academic session of the state’s Unified Examination in Public Secondary Schools, which had a summary passage that took a critical look at the alleged negligence of the education sector by the government.

The governor reportedly got infuriated over the development and allegedly ordered the sack of the officials of the ministry that were directly in charge of the examination.

Gov Ibikunle Amosun Those affected were; an acting Permanent Secretary, who was a level 17 officer, Folashade Oresegun; Director of curriculum, Mr. Ganiu Odunsi and a deputy director, curriculum and evaluation simply identified as Mr Majekodunmi.

Others were; the examiner who also taught at Mayflower School, two desk officers whose identity were not known as at press time.

Vanguard gathered that, Oresegun and Odunsi’s sack was converted to compulsory retirement while the four others were summarily dismissed.

Vanguard however, obtained the question paper with the ‘offensive passage’ which in essence examined the situation of the sector in the country.

The passage read; “There is no arguing about the fact that the government is merely paying lip service to the
development of the education. It is true that a lot of money is being spent on education sector but, with little or no impact felt by the people, except where we want to deceive ourselves.

“Many schools run by the government, which were formerly known for academic excellence have suddenly lost their prestige and are living on past glory. No wonder many parents and guardians are left with only one option, to withdraw their wards from these schools to other ones that are better managed.”

When asked to comment on the development, the Secretary to the State Government, Taiwo Adeoluwa told Vanguard on phone that he could not.

Adeoluwa said; “The issue is a civil service matter. The best person to comment is the Head of Service. Please call Head of Service”.

While confirming the sack, Adeoluwa said, “I heard it
yesterday the way you did and I asked them what happened.

It is a civil service matter, and I cannot react to it.”
Attempts to get a reaction from the Head of Service was however unsuccessful as she did not pick her call nor respond to the text message sent to her mobile phone.

Police tear gas Peterside, Abe, others at INEC headquarters

ABUJA—The crisis trailing the conduct of the 2015 general elections in Rivers State took a dangerous turn yesterday, with security agencies attached to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, tear-gassing the candidates of the All Progressives Party, APC, in the elections who had besieged the commission to register their displeasure over what they termed the refusal of the Resident Electoral Commissioner, REC, in the state, Mrs. Gesila Khan to release the documents used for the polls.

The politicians led by the Rivers State APC governorship candidate, Mr Dakuku Peterside and Senator Magnus Abe got more than they bargained for when the police after failing to stop them from getting close to the main gate of the Commission, quickly locked the gate and immediately threw
the tear-gas which left everybody within the vicinity chocking and coughing, ceaselessly.

Meanwhile, INEC’s Director of Security, Shetima Ngelare explained to the gathering that there was no prior knowledge that the APC candidates from Rivers State were coming to the commission, but he received a petition submitted by the party to the commission’s Chairman.

PROTEST: Rivers State All Progressives Congress, APC, governorship candidate, Dakuku Peterside (left) and APC South East Senatorial candidate, Sen. Magnus Abe, gasping for breath after they and other Rivers State APC candidates were tear gassed at the gate of INEC head office, during a protest to the INEC National Chairman in Abuja, yesterday.

Addressing newsmen after the stand-off which lasted over two hours, Peterside said they decided to collectively visit INEC to lay their complaint after the Rivers REC, allegedly refused to give them the documents that were used in the conduct of the elections for them to present at the tribunal.

According to him, the continuous refusal by the electoral body to give them the documents was a calculated attempt to deny them the opportunity of presenting damming evidence to prove that the elections in the state were widely manipulated.

“Before our various petitions were filed, we had through our respective counsels applied to the REC Rivers State for the release of certified true copy of materials used in the conduct of the said elections to enable us prosecute our respective petitions. The law stipulated that we have 180 days within which the petition should be determined but we are being frustrated by the same INEC that caused the whole problem.”

The politicians comprising senatorial candidates, House of Representatives candidates as well as state Assembly candidates arrived the headquarters of INEC at 11.15 a.m., and the security operatives comprising the police and Department of State Services, DSS, stopped them at the barricade just before the main entrance.

Senator Abe told the securitymen that they were at the
commission to register their displeasure to the acting INEC Chairman, Mrs. Amina Zakari over the alleged refusal of the Rivers State REC Khan, to give them documents used in the conduct of the polls won by the candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.

We must have steady electricity for faster economic development – Buhari

Abuja – President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday in Abuja pledged that his administration would ensure steady electricity supply for faster socio-economic development.

Buhari stated this after being briefed by the Permanent
Secretary, Federal Ministry of Power, Amb. Godknows Igali.According to the president, his administration will give the fullest possible attention to boosting power supply in Nigeria because it was convinced that steady electricity will launch the country into faster economic growth.

He said that the Federal Government had already identified the critical problems in Nigeria’s power sector and was taking appropriate actions to address them.

The president revealed that his administration had also
prioritised certain measures in its action plan to boost
electricity supply in Nigeria.

“The problems besetting our power sector are not difficult to identify. Therefore, priorities can be easily set in order to tackle them.

“The problems are more with transmission than generation,and we equally need to secure the power infrastructure round the country.

“We will address all these issues,’’ he assured.
Igali had informed the president that power generation in Nigeria, which was 1,750megawatts (MW) in 1999, had now peaked at 4,600MW.

He added that gas was available to take generation to 5,500MW in a short time, but that the country needed to expand its electricity infrastructure to accommodate additional power generation.

EU bans Nigeria from exporting beans, melon seeds, dried fish, meat, others

Senator Joshua Lidani (PDP-Gombe South) has raised alarm over the health implication of the consumption of foods containing a high concentration of pesticide among Nigerians. Lidani raised the alarm in an interview with newsmen on Monday in Abuja, in the wake of the suspension of some agricultural food exports from Nigeria by the European Union (EU).

The food items banned from Europe till June 2016 are beans, sesame seeds, melon seeds, dried fish and meat, peanut chips and palm oil. The European Food Safety Authority had said that the rejected beans were found to contain between 0.03mg per kilogramme to 4.6mg/kg of dichlorvos pesticide, when the acceptable maximum residue limit is 0.01mg/kg.

Lidani therefore, called on regulatory agencies in the country to rise up to the occasion and save Nigerians from the dangers of consuming foods containing unacceptable levels of chemicals.

“The EU ban should not have come as a surprise to us
because they have very rigorous standards of checking food import especially with the shift towards organic foods. “Unfortunately we do not have similar standards in Nigeria especially as it affects the food we consume.

“We do not have standards of determining whether the foods we consume are noxious; whether they have chemicals that are harmful “NAFDAC and Standards Organisation of Nigeria are supposed to regulate but there is a limit to what they can do. “We are yet to realise the enormity of the problem; so unless we look into the effects of these harmful substances, we may end up having a population that is threatened by diseases such as cancer.

“Cancer is a consequence of eating this kind of chemically harmful foods; so we need to do a lot of work.“ Lidani said that legislators would ensure that the laws establishing the regulatory agencies were strengthened to enable them to check such harmful foods. According to him, once the Senate constitutes its committees, the committees will begin to consider bills on food laws for amended in order to ensure
food safety in the country.

“It is up to us the legislator to strengthen their capacity, to look at the laws under which they are operating so they will not focus on just food that are exported but food that are consumed within. “You also have to educate the populace as to the kind of foods that are harmful; what level of pesticides you should apply (to your agric produce) and what effects the chemical fertiliser that (we apply to agric produce) have on the food we eat.“

The EU had warned Nigeria that the banned food items
constituted danger to human health because they “contain a high level of unauthorised pesticide“. It said it had issued 50 notifications on this to Nigerian beans exporters since January 2013. The pesticide contained in the food items is applied when the products are being prepared for export.

Banks reduce withdrawal limits on ATMs

LAGOS — The battle for defence of the Naira value has
widened, affecting existing withdrawal limits on Automatic Teller Machines (ATMs) and foreign transactions on all existing Naira debit cards (ATM cards).

In the new arrangement, all ATMs that were hitherto enabled for domestic and foreign transactions have been restructured to limit Naira cash withdrawal at ATMs to N60,000 per day while foreign currency is $300 per day. Hitherto, the domestic withdrawal limit was N150,000 per day.

The new arrangement has separated traditional ATM from MasterCard credit card where the former has now been deactivated and can no longer be used for transactions abroad. Hitherto, a single ATM card serves for transactions for both domestic and abroad.

Also, the restructured cards now have spending limits on POS/eCommerce (online shopping) pegged at $300 (about N60,000) per day. Before this, the limit was N2 million per day.

In the new arrangement, a bank customer with multiple debit cards (ATM cards), only the one linked to the primary transactional account will be enabled for use abroad.

Hitherto, such customers could transact with any of the cards that is funded.
However, banks are putting in place alternatives in these adjustments to address the concern of customers who are now being directed by their banks to reapply for a new card arrangement to suit their purposes.

For instance, Standard Chartered Bank has asked its
customers to request a complementary ATM card for
domestic use only so that the original N150,000 daily cash withdrawal limit can be restored and also reactivate POS/ online purchase limit of N2 million per day.

The bank also required their customers to apply for a foreign currency denominated ATM linked to domiciliary account which would be enabled with no daily or annual international transaction limits.

Earlier, Guaranty Trust Bank Plc had informed its customers of its decision to reduce the daily international spending limit on their Naira MasterCard to $300 with effect from yesterday.

In a communication to the customers, the bank explained: “In view of the increased difficulty in sourcing foreign currency to settle international transactions on Naira MasterCards, we
have reduced the daily international spending limit on your Naira MasterCard to $300.This means that you can only spend up to $300 daily when using your GTBank Naira MasterCard for international payments via POS and online.

“You will, however, continue to have the option of paying for medical bills, school fees, mortgages and credit cards using Form A, as these are eligible transactions for foreign currency. Simply visit any GTBank branch to complete a Form A along with the required documents to make these payments.”

These developments were coming on the heels of Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) statement on Sunday that all legitimate requests for foreign currency for eligible transactions, normally referred to as “invisibles,” such as remittances for school fees, student maintenance allowances, BTA, PTA, medical and other eligible transactions, shall be fully met at the official/interbank exchange rate.

A statement from the CBN added that already all the
legitimate demands for such transactions through recognised channels have so far been fully met by CBN.
The statement stated: “The CBN hereby directs all authorised dealers in foreign exchange in Nigeria to henceforth treat as top priority all legitimate demand for foreign exchange for eligible transactions.

“The CBN once again advises individuals that wish to source foreign currency for such eligible transactions to approach their banks with their legitimate demand as the CBN has made adequate provisions of foreign currency for all such legitimate and eligible purposes.

“Furthermore, holders of Naira denominated debit and credit cards shall continue to have access to the use of their cards at ATMs in any part of the world but subject to the annual limit of $50,000. ATM withdraws shall continue to be a maximum of $300 per day.”

Buhari invites Jonathan to Presidential Villa, both leaders discuss ways to stabilise the new administration

Buhari  seeks information  on alternative sources to buy weapons for the refusal  of United States to immediately sell weapons  to his administration
Nigeria’s President, Muhammadu Buhari, met with the
immediate past president, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, at the weekend in the Presidential Villa.

A source said that the meeting between both leaders held in the night and lasted for about one hour.

It was gathered that Buhari invited Jonathan to give him insight into  the ways to stabilise the new administration, especially in the areas of fight against Boko Haram and the purchase of military hardware from alternative sources.

Villa  sources stated that  Former  President  Goodluck
Jonathan also presented detailed information  on the
additional weapons already paid for by his administration, which will arrive the country shortly.

It was gathered that after the meeting, both men parted chatting and laughing.

May 29, 2015, was the last time former president, Goodluck Jonathan was seen at the Presidential Villa in Abuja.