The approval of $3 billion World Bank loan to Nigeria and the signing of agreements with seven renewable energy investors are some of the leading stories in Nigerian press on Monday.
ChannelsTV reported that the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed, said that the Nigerian government has secured a $3-billion loan from the World Bank.
According to the Finance Minister, the loan is to be used for reforming the nation’s power sector.
The Sun said that the government has signed agreements with seven renewable energy investors under the World Bank-funded Nigeria Electrification Project (NEP) to provide grants for power projects.
Present at the signing of the deal, which took place at the weekend in Abuja, were officials of the international donor agencies and the Rural Electrification Agency (REA).
The Punch reported that state chairmen of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) will on Tuesday meet in Enugu to discuss modalities to be adopted for negotiations on the consequential adjustments of the new minimum wage with various state governments.
The Nation newspaper reported that the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) is planning another showdown with the Nigerian government over what it called the government’s planned imposition of Integrated Personnel Payroll System (IPPIS) on its members.
The union leaders have summoned an emergency National Executive Council (NEC) meeting where it agreed that the union should begin mobilisation of members for an action against the government.
The Daily Trust said that the World Bank is willing to invest $510 million in three tranches, in the Lad Chad Basin to address insecurity, desertification and humanitarian challenges, among others.
ThisDay reported strong indications that the Presidency has intervened in the controversy trailing the recruitment of about 10,000 constables for community policing ordered by President Muhammadu Buhari.
The Guardian said that beginning from today, Nigerians who use financial institutions’ unstructured supplementary service data (USSD) platforms to transfer money from one point to another are expected to incur additional charges for such services.
The USSD services, include the GTB’s *737#; First Bank’s *894#; Fidelity Bank’s *770#; Access Bank’s *901#; and UBA’s *919# that run on telecoms’ operators platforms. There is an initial charge of N50 by the bank, which will be retained, while customers who use the USSD will be made to pay additional N4.
MM/GIK/APA