APA – Lagos (Nigeria)
The report that the Independent National Electoral Commission has budgeted over N3bn to defend the results of the February 25 presidential and national assembly election and the March 18 governorship and state assembly polls in court is one of the trending stories in Nigerian newspapers on Monday.
The Punch reports that the Independent National Electoral Commission has budgeted over N3bn to defend the results of the February 25 presidential and national assembly election and the March 18 governorship and state assembly polls.
The PUNCH reports that several candidates who lost in the elections have filed petitions at the presidential and state election petition tribunals to challenge the outcome of the polls.
So far, over 100 election petitions have been filed by aggrieved candidates and their parties across the country.
The presidential candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party, Atiku Abubakar; the Labour Party, Peter Obi; the Action Alliance, Solomon Okangbuan; Allied People’s Movement, Chichi Ojei, have also filed petitions for the nullification of the presidential election results.
INEC had on March 1 declared the All Progressives Congress presidential candidate, Bola Tinubu, as the winner of the February 25 presidential election, but the five candidates filed petitions seeking the nullification of the poll.
Also, election petition tribunals in over 12 states have equally received petitions from National Assembly candidates who are not satisfied with the results of the just concluded elections.
The states where the petitions had been received included Edo, Plateau, Ondo, Kwara, Ogun, Bayelsa, Oyo, Osun, Ekiti, Bauchi, Lagos and Niger states.
Some aggrieved candidates had protested in Ogun and Nasarawa states, vowing to challenge the results of the elections in court.
The newspaper says that international airfares on Nigerian routes have gone up further by over 20 per cent after foreign airlines raised the exchange rate for ticket sale from N462 per dollar to N551 per dollar, findings by The PUNCH have revealed.
International travellers on Nigerian routes have been paying higher airfares after carriers blocked their inventory of cheaper tickets in order to cushion the effects of the rising amount of trapped funds
The latest increase in the naira-dollar exchange rate for ticket sale by the International Air Transport Association, the Switzerland-based trade association of the world’s airlines, is expected to worsen the plight of Nigeria travellers who are already paying higher airfares.
Multiple travel companies confirmed to our correspondent on Friday that global distribution system companies had notified them of the latest increase.
They said the development was not unconnected with the difficulty faced by foreign carriers in repatriating their ticket sale proceeds out of Nigeria.
According to travel agents, the increase in the exchange rate has led to an over 20 per cent increase in international airfares.
“Virgin Atlantic which has a promo of about N800,000. This same promo is going for about N1.1m as a result of the increase in the exchange rate,” the chief executive officer of a travel agency, who chose to speak on condition of anonymity, said.
As of January this year, foreign airlines flying into Nigeria had about $743m in trapped funds in Nigeria. IATA has said Nigeria has the highest amount of foreign airlines’ trapped funds globally.
Stakeholders and travel firms have, however, emphasised the need for the Federal Government to direct the CBN to expedite the release of the trapped funds.
The Guardian reports that from Lagos to Enugu and Kano to Port Harcourt, there seems to be a breather, at last, for cash-strapped Nigerians, as part of the hitherto withheld banknotes made their way to Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) and banking halls for those who need cash for transactions.
The gradual easing could force the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), which had planned an industrial action on Wednesday to protest the naira scarcity, to retreat.
The National Executive Council (NEC) of the Congress will be meeting on Tuesday to reassess and review cash availability across the nation and finalise its strategies. President of the NLC, Joe Ajaero, disclosed this to The Guardian, yesterday.
Ajaero said the NEC of the NLC would meet tomorrow to review the situation and compliance by banks to alleviate the sufferings Nigerians are currently going through over the naira scarcity.
He said that if the compliance level across the country is high to the extent that Nigerians can easily access their money, the NLC might suspend the nationwide strike.
A source privy to a meeting between NLC and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) explained that the apex bank said it had disbursed N20 billion to banks nationwide, adding that banks in Lagos got N4 billion, while Abuja branches received N2 billion.
The source said CBN promised to continue disbursing more money to the banks to address the scarcity caused by its naira redesign policy.
“We are not going to rely on what they told us that they are pushing; we all go to banks. The Director of Operations of CBN came to meet with us. They said that based on our complaints and ultimatum, they have redoubled efforts. We told them they needed to redouble their efforts to stave off our action. If they pump money consistently, then there would be no need for our actions. The Ministry of Labour will also meet with us on Monday,” the source said.
The newspaper says that there is optimism that the construction of the first Solar Cell Production Plant in Nigeria will drastically improve access to power supply through clean energy.
It is also expected that the facility on completion would crash the price of solar cells hitherto imported. The new plant will produce approximately 25 GWh each year, making it possible to reduce CO2 emissions into the atmosphere by 11,000 tons and replace the use of 5.4 million cubic meters of gas with locally produced renewable energy.
The Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, officially performed the foundation laying ceremony of the first Solar Cell Production Plant in Nigeria. The project is being built on a 15.8 hectres of land in Karu Local Council, Nasarawa State, consisting of more than 30,000 modules.
A solar cell, also known as a photovoltaic cell, is an electrical device that converts light energy into electrical energy through the photovoltaic effect and products of silicon.
Silicon is obtained from silica, which is nothing other than common sand. With the establishment of the plant, solar power supply is expected to be affordable because the most expensive components are the cells.
The plant, when fully operational, will be one of the largest Solar Cell Production plants in Africa. The Managing Director, NASENI Solar Energy Ltd, Dr. Mahmud Jaffar said: “The prices of solar panels in Nigeria will crash once the NASENI plant comes on stream. Nigeria will go into 100 per cent local content manufacturing of solar panels and other electronic materials.”
The Executive Vice Chairman/Chief Executive NASENI, Mohammed Sani Haruna, said that the plant came as a directive from President Muhammadu Buhari, who instructed NASENI to go into full production of solar panel locally.
GIK/APA