The appeal by the Vice President to Nigerians to put the brakes on the spiraling violence that has pushed Nigeria to the edge of a precipice as the nation cannot afford another civil war now is one of trending stories in Nigerian newspapers on Thursday.
ThisDay reports that Vice President Yemi Osinbajo yesterday rallied Nigerians to put the brakes on the spiralling violence that has pushed Nigeria to the edge of a precipice as the nation cannot afford another civil war now.
He also urged the elite to speak out against forces of division in order to preserve the unity of the country.
However, former President Olusegun Obasanjo is optimistic that the worsening insecurity, as typified by the rising cases of killings, kidnappings, terrorism and banditry, would not consume the nation.
Osinbajo, at a meeting on Tuesday night in Abuja with All Progressives Congress (APC) leaders from the South-east, said whether or not the country would experience another civil war, after that of 1967-1970 that claimed about two million lives, would depend on the actions and inactions of the political elite.
Osinbajo, in a statement yesterday by his media aide, Mr. Laolu Akande, said: “We cannot afford a war in this country…it is the political elite that will determine what will take place. If we keep quiet, if we say nothing and hope that things will just normalise, we may be wrong.
“And we may find ourselves heading for something much worse than we are seeing today.”
The newspaper says that three tiers of government, federal, states and local governments, are in for tough times next month as they may get less from the Federation Account, no thanks to the huge payment the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) would have to make for subsidy on petrol.
Already, the NNPC, which is being made to bear the cost for the price differential between the market price and pump price of petrol on behalf of the federation has served a notice that it will not be able to remit any funds to the Federation Account in April for distribution in May.
In a letter by the corporation to the Accountant-General of the Federation (AGF), Mr. Ahmed Idris, NNPC said it posted a value shortfall of N111.966 billion in February 2021, which will ultimately impact on its ability to contribute to the joint account shared by the federal, state and local governments.
A copy of the letter, signed by the corporation’s Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Umar Ajiya, and dated April 26, 2021, was obtained by THISDAY yesterday. The minister of finance, budget, and national planning; the director-general, Nigeria Governors’ Forum; the director, home finance; and the chairman, Commissioners of Finance Forum were copied.
The Guardian reports that amid mounting insecurity challenges, the Nigerian Government appears to have yet another bout of headache to contend with. The nation’s correctional facilities frequently come under violent attacks leading to jailbreaks and attempted jailbreaks even though billions of naira is budgeted on security and running of various custodial centres.
Many are of the view that these jailbreaks may worsen if strict action is not taken and this could add to the security challenges facing the country as some hardened criminals team up with kidnapping, terrorist and other criminal gangs. Currently, not less than 3,000 escaped inmates are already on the loose.
Tasked with the administration of prisons and other non-custodial measures in the country, the Nigeria Correctional Service (NCoS), formerly known as the Nigeria Prisons Service (NPS), has continued to remain in the limelight as one of the most controversial government agencies in recent times due to the growing trend in jailbreaks.
Even though huge budgetary allocations have been made and billions have been spent by the agency, the situation and plight of Nigerian inmates has continued to remain a topic of discussion as almost all the custodial centres are overcrowded, poorly ventilated and unsanitised with dilapidated structures, while the inmates are poorly fed.
The Punch says that the World Bank on Wednesday said that Nigeria and six other countries were responsible for two-thirds of global gas flaring. It said this in a statement titled ‘Seven countries account for two-thirds of global gas flaring’.
The World Bank stated, “Gas flaring satellite data from 2020 reveals that Russia, Iraq, Iran, the United States, Algeria, Venezuela and Nigeria remain the top seven gas flaring countries for nine years running, since the first satellite was launched in 2012.
“These seven countries produce 40 percent of the world’s oil each year, but account for roughly two-thirds (65 percent) of global gas flaring.
“This trend is indicative of ongoing, though differing, challenges facing these countries. For example, the United States has thousands of individual flare sites, difficult to connect to a market, while a few high flaring oil fields in East Siberia in the Russian Federation are extremely remote, lacking the infrastructure to capture and transport the associated gas.”
The Global Director for the Energy and Extractives Global Practice at the World Bank, Demetrios Papathanasiou, said, “In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, oil-dependent developing countries are feeling the pinch, with constrained revenues and budgets.
The Sun reports that the Executive Secretary, National Sugar Development Council (NSDC), Dr. Zacch Adedeji, has reaffirmed the commitment to Federal Government’s strategy towards achieving self-sufficiency in sugar production through the Nigeria Sugar Master Plan (NSMP).
Adedeji made this declaration during a facility inspection/courtesy visit to the Golden Sugar refinery, Apapa- Lagos.
“Nigeria may have a smooth sail on its projection on sugar-sufficiency as it is now completely refining raw sugar at 100 per cent locally.
The scribe, who has been on an assessment tour of Nigeria’s three major refineries in order to implement the Nigerian Sugar Master Plan (NSMP), concluded the inspection tour with his visit to Golden Sugar, a subsidiary of Flour Mills of Nigeria (FMN) in Apapa-Lagos. Also, tour is the Council’s mandate to implement the NSMP policy to the brim whose whole point is backward integration.
“We have done excellently well in refining raw sugar based on the Nigerian Sugar Master Plan implementation,” Adedeji said.
GIK/APA