The directive by the government to companies in Nigeria to employ qualified Nigerian graduates to understudy expatriates or face sanctions and the move by Vice President to promote national unity despite the differences in religion, ethnicity, political affiliations are the leading stories in Nigerian newspapers on Monday.
The Vanguard reports that the Nigerian government, yesterday, mandated companies in Nigeria to employ qualified Nigerian graduates to understudy expatriates or face sanctions.
A statement by the Chairman of the Special Ministerial Task Force on Monitoring and Enforcement of Nigerian Expatriate Business Permit and Expatriate Quota Administration, Mr. Bola Ilori, said, in Osogbo, Osun State, after it met with representatives of the Nigerian Immigration Service, Nigeria Labour Congress, Nigerian Bar Association, Nigerian Society of Engineers, other professional bodies and officials of the Ministry of Interior.
Ilori, at the end of the meeting, told companies to submit the details of Nigerians understudying expatriates, to verify their sincerity or otherwise to the policy, or face heavy sanctions from the Federal Government.
He said: “Every company must submit the details of Nigerians understudying expatriates in their organisations. They must submit the Tax Identification Number, National Identity Number of each Nigerian understudying expatriate in their companies.
“We have discovered that some of the companies are not sincere, they just want to keep renewing the permits of their expatriates at the detriment of Nigerians. We want to know whether they are circumventing the policy or adhere to it,’ he said.
ThisDay says that Vice President Yemi Osinbajo has emphasised the need for Nigeria to remain an indivisible entity despite the differences in religion, ethnicity, political affiliations, or other diversities among the citizenry.Osinbajo, according to a statement by his media aide, Mr. Laolu Akande, spoke yesterday at an inter-denominational church service to mark this year’s Armed Forces Remembrance Day celebration.
He urged Nigerians, both home and in diaspora, to be committed to ensuring Nigeria’s unity, saying the nation is stronger together than being apart.
Osinbajo, who was represented at the church service by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Mr. Boss Mustapha, said Nigerians “must at every opportunity insist that every great multi-ethnic and multi-religious nation has, through thick and thin, fought to realise the great dividends of diversity and pluralism.”
He reiterated the need for Nigerians to, as a mark of honour for the sacrifices of the men and women of the armed forces, show more commitment to the unity of the nation and the task of building a better society.
The Nation reports that no fewer than 37 travellers have died in two road crashes in Bauchi and Nasarawa states.
Twenty persons died in the Bauchi crash, while a family of six was among the 17 that died in the Nasarawa incident.
The Bauchi crash happened at Tirwun village, a suburb of the metropolis, along Bauchi-Maiduguri Expressway.
The victims were burnt beyond recognition, while two female survivors sustained varying degrees of injuries.
The crash occurred on Sunday evening when a Hummer bus on its way to Maiduguri from Jos collided head-on with a Gulf taxi and burst into flames, eyewitnesses said.
Police spokesman DSP Ahmed Wakil said the bodies of the victims had been deposited at the mortuary of Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University Teaching Hospital (ATBUTH) while the two females were receiving treatment at the same hospital.
The Federal Roads Safety Commission (FRSC) said the Nasarawa incident happened on Saturday night in Akwanga Local Government Area of the state.
The Punch says that since November 13, 2020 when the pump prices of petrol were last increased in the country, the price of the international oil benchmark, Brent crude, has been on an upward trajectory, rising from $41.51 per barrel to close at $51.22 per barrel on December 31.
Fuel marketers had in December expected another upward adjustment of PMS prices to reflect the further rise in crude oil prices. However, a N5 reduction in petrol price, effective December 14, was announced by the Federal Government – a development that left them reeling in shock and questioning the deregulation of petrol price.
Crude oil price accounts for a large chunk of the final cost of petrol, and the country has continued to spend so much on petrol imports for many years amid low domestic refining capacity.
The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, had said in September last year that the Federal Government had stepped back in fixing the price of petrol, adding that market forces and crude oil price would determine the cost of the product.
The newspaper reports that over 205 million telephone subscribers on voice calls were active in the third quarter of 2020, the National Bureau of Statistics has said.
It disclosed this in its just released telecoms data for the second and third quarters of 2020, which focused on active voice and Internet per state, porting and tariff information. In the report, the bureau said,
“Telecoms data for Q2 and Q3 2020 reflected that a total of 196,242,456 and 205,252,058 subscribers were active on voice as against 189,282,796 in Q1 2020.
“This represented a 4.59 per cent increase in voice subscriptions quarter-on-quarter.” Similarly, the NBS stated that a total of 143,636,816 and 151,512,122 subscribers were active on the Internet as against 136,203,231 in Q1 2020.
The Sun says that news of the coming into effect of the Finance Act 2020 following its passage by the National Assembly and speedy Presidential assent only six days later has been received with a mixed reaction of anger, disappointment and frustration in the Nigerian auto industry.
Against the provisions on the 2014 National Automotive Industry Development Plan (NAIDP) {auto policy} documents, the controversial Act reduces duty on imported buses from 35 percent to 10; slashes levy on fully built cars from 35 percent to 5 percent; and trucks from 35 percent to 10 percent.
This is contained in Part VI of the Finance Act 2020 under Customs And Excise Tariff {Consolidation}, etc, section 38, sub-sections A to D.
But, reacting to the act which came into effect just last week, industry stakeholders say the incentive to importers of fully built up {FBU} vehicles represents a policy summersault, which has been the bane of development in many sectors, especially the auto industry.
GIK/APA