The call by some Senior Advocates of Nigeria, lawyers, civil right groups and some branches of the Nigerian Bar Association on Monday for the probe of the erstwhile Chief Justice of Nigeria, Ibrahim Muhammad is one of the trending stories in Nigerian newspapers on Tuesday.
The Punch reports that a few hours after resigning from office, Senior Advocates of Nigeria, lawyers, civil right groups and some branches of the Nigerian Bar Association on Monday called for the probe of the erstwhile Chief Justice of Nigeria, Ibrahim Muhammad.
They unanimously said that the allegations against the former CJN should not be swept under the carpet.
Muhammad’s resignation was made public on Monday morning. According to reports, he tendered his resignation on the grounds of ill-health, barely a week after 14 Supreme Court Justices, in a joint petition, levelled grave allegations of maladministration and financial impropriety against the Bauchi State-born jurist.
The news of his resignation caught the nation unawares on Monday morning as his media aide, Ahuraka Isah, who initially denied it, subsequently confirmed the development. President Muhammadu Buhari swore in the next most senior justice, Justice Olukayode Ariwoola, as the acting CJN at the Council Chambers of the State House, Abuja.
The President, who noted that he received the resignation letter of the outgoing CJN with mixed feelings, conferred upon Muhammed the national honour of Grand Commander of the Order of the Niger.
In an unprecedented development in Nigeria’s judicial history, the Supreme Court justices had in a leaked letter, accused Muhammad of abandoning his responsibilities and diverting funds meant for the running of the Supreme Court.
The newspaper says that the Federal Government may have raked at least N2tn from the 2020/2021 marginal oil field bid rounds, according to findings by our correspondent.
In the Nigerian context, marginal fields include fields with reported reserves and production potential, which are, however, deemed marginal for a variety of reasons. Notably, marginal fields exist under current Oil Mining Leases.
After 18 years of the last bid rounds, Nigeria through the defunct Department of Petroleum Resources, put up 57 onshore, swamp, and shallow offshore terrains fields for bidding, and had set May 1, 2022 for the issuance of licences to winners.
However, the licences were not issued due to delays in payments of the fees and bonuses by the winners of the oil fields, unconfirmed sources close to the situation said.
Findings showed that each of the awardees paid a total of N48bn (fees and bonuses) to gain access the licence, resulting in combined revenue of over N2tr for the Federal Government.
The Guardian reports that the Nigeria Liquefied Petroleum Gas Association (NLPGA) has argued for consensus over gas policies that will aid domestic consumption and transition to Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), otherwise known as cooking gas.
President of the association, Nuhu Yakubu, during the association’s yearly conference and exhibition themed, “Energising the Future: LPG as a sustainable fuel in African Economies”, emphasised the need for consensus building, especially for national gas policies that can accentuate opportunities in the LPG industry and facilitate the complete transition to LPG.
According to him, NLNG’s LPG supply intervention remains Nigeria’s most significant domestic energy policy, going by its interventions in the domestic market as well as production and supply prospects from its recent commencement of the LNG Train 7 project
He explained that to ensure a steady supply of products, deliveries were made with NLNG’s dedicated vessel to all NLNG’s approved domestic receiving terminals in Nigeria.
The company had recently announced that it is dedicating 100 per cent of its LPG production to the domestic market, as well as commenced deliveries of propane into the domestic market from 2021.
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, also charged stakeholders in the Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) sub-sector to ensure that they put Nigeria’s interest first.
Obasanjo argued that the domestic market has so much potential as the fastest-growing LPG market globally.
The newspaper says that Nigeria’s women football national team, the Super Falcons, arrived in the capital of Morocco, Rabat, yesterday, from Casablanca, ahead of the 2022 African Women Cup of Nations, which kicks off on Saturday in four centres across the North African country.
Nigeria are the defending champions and they seek to win their 10th crown in 12 editions of the championship, which pits the best African countries in a battle to decide the best football playing nation among the lot.
According to thenff.com, the Super Falcons have opened their camp in Rabat, where they will train for seven days before their opening game against the biggest challengers, South Africa, on July 4.
Nigeria will also play against Botswana on July 7 and Burundi on July 10 in the group phase of the competition.
All four semifinalists in Morocco will qualify to represent Africa at the FIFA Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand next year, with the fifth-placed team handed an opportunity to also gain a place through a playoff tournament holding early next year.
Before leaving for Morocco yesterday, top officials of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) hosted them to a dinner on Sunday, where they charged the team to strive to win their 10th title of the championship.
The Nation reports that Nigeria’s mobile network operators (MNOs) last year recorded 14.86 per cent increase in total assets, despite global challenges and domestic inflationary trend that impacted operating expenses.
According to financial data obtained from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), the MNOs as at last December reported total assets of N3.955 trillion as against N3.444 trillion recorded in comparable period of the previous year.
The report also showed total operating cost (opex) of N1.658 trillion in 2021 compared with N1.395 trillion recorded the previous year. This translated to an increase of 18.74 per cent from the figure reported in 2020. Total revenue nonetheless witnessed an increase of 22.29 per cent.
The increase in operating cost of the MNOs may not be unconnected with the ever increasing cost of doing business across the country, no thanks to excruciating energy cost, multiple taxation and regulation and other asphyxiating factors.
The data indicated that telcos recorded an approximate total revenue of N2.774 trillion in 2021 as against N2.268 trillion in 2020, an increase of 22.29per cent.
On capital expenditure (capex) the end of last year, the operators reported a total capex of N1.124 trillion as against N831.976 billion in 2020.
GIK/APA