The report that the new Lekki deep seaport lacked the infrastructure needed to efficiently kick-start the seaport and the rescheduling of the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) to hold in 2024 in Cote d’Ivoire by the Confederation of African Football are some of the leading stories in Nigerian newspapers on Monday.
The Guardian reports that hours after the first vessel berthed at Lekki deep seaport, stakeholders and residents along the corridor have expressed worry with the slow response of the Federal and state governments to providing the infrastructure needed to efficiently kick-start the seaport, amid concerns that Apapa experience, especially, as it relates to cargo evacuation and chaotic gridlock, may resurface at the Lekki corridor.
Indeed, there are expectations from the Lekki port, which is projected to regain the maritime business lost to ports of Lome in Togo, Abidjan in Cote d’Ivoire and Accra in Ghana, as well as enable the country leverage the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA).
The Lekki port is expected to relieve the congestion and heavy gridlock along the Apapa and Tin Can ports corridor, while offering support to the growing commercial operations across Nigeria and the entire West African region. It was designed as a major trans-shipment hub that will service the regional sea routes and the hinterland at the same time.
On Friday, three Ship-to-Shore cranes and 10 Rubber-Tyred Gantries critical to the commencement of operations of the $1.5 billon Lekki deep seaport arrived in Nigeria from Hong Kong ahead of September.
Their arrival, according to the Managing Director of the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), Mohammed Bello-Koko, represented a major step toward birthing Nigeria’s first deep seaport.
“For us at the NPA, the coming on stream of Lekki Deep Sea Port symbolises a lot of positives. Apart from being Nigeria’s first deep seaport, Lekki Port will also be the first fully automated port at take-off. This provides an insight into the path we are already toeing as a management team to govern the operationalisation of not just the forthcoming Badagry, Ibom and Bonny Deep seaports, but also of the reconstruction of the aged Tin-Can Port, where work will commence immediately the transport ministry and FEC approve.”
The newspaper says that the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) has now been scheduled to hold in 2024 in Cote d’Ivoire, says the Confederation of African Football (CAF), President Patrice Motsepe.
The competition was to hold between June and July in 2023, which is the peak of rainy season in Cote d’Ivoire.
“We cannot take the risk,” the South African said yesterday, in Rabat, Moroccan capital.
With the World Cup in Qatar taking place in November and December this year, the decision has been taken to postpone the finals rather than bring them forward.
It means the AFCON will be held between January and February for the second time in a row, after this year’s tournament in Cameroun.
In 2017, CAF announced that it would move the finals from their traditional January/February slot to June/July in a bid to avoid repeated disputes with European clubs forced to release players in the middle of the season.
“January is not the ideal time because of the European clubs, but it is the only choice we have,” Motsepe said.
The Punch reports that a waste recycling company, Freee Recycle Limited says Lagos State generates 870,000 tonnes of plastic waste annually.
Speaking at an event recently in Lagos, Managing Director of BASF West Africa, Jean-Marc, described the volume of waste generated by the state as a source of wealth for the state.
According to him, there is a huge market in waste recycling saying Nigeria still has a long way to go when it comes to the issue of waste, adding that the volume of waste in Nigeria and the total value in the emerging market is becoming a problem.
Jean-Marc added that the name change from Freetown recycling to Freee recycling will immediately provide solutions to the problem and people will start seeing big opportunities in waste recycling.
“When we collaborate the first thing we look at is that we share common values and passion but measuring your success is very critical and you can only look at it from the total value of society’s perspective. We often see piles of plastic waste in Lagos, and everybody drops it in the garbage and they don’t even care about it. Look at it as mining in that particular pile you might have five to seven different types of plastics some of them have electricity value tied to them and others have a growing value chain for recycling”
Also speaking at the event, the Managing Director of Freee Recycle Limited, Ifedolapo Runsewe, said the announcement of the name change to the general public and their new identity signifies the commencement of their pan-African agenda.
She said Freetown Recycle Waste Management Limited started in Nigeria in 2018 with plans to expand into other African countries.
The newspaper says that the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited and Sahara Group, through their joint venture business, WAGL Energy Limited, are set to develop and construct jetties across West African countries to boost the supply and penetration of Liquefied Petroleum Gas, popularly called cooking gas, in the sub-region.
The Managing Director, WAGL Energy Limited, Emmanuel Ubani, said in a statement made available to journalists on Sunday by Sahara Energy that discussions were already at advanced stages for the first in the lot.
He said the move was part of several efforts by the company to take advantage of the opportunities in the energy transition space.
He said WAGL had embarked on developing infrastructure to take beneficial advantage in the emerging energy transition era.
While acknowledging growing LPG demand in Africa, Ubani, advised that more strategic policies and investments were required to further promote and deepen the product’s utilisation in rural communities in the continent.
According to him, for LPG to increase to a significant or dominant market position in Sub-Saharan African countries, an enabling environment for the sector must be put in place.
The Nation reports that the Inspector-General of Police (I-G), Mr Usman Baba, has called on police operatives to embrace holistic and effective intelligence gathering in the prevention of crime and criminal activities in the country.
The Force Public Relations Officer (FPRO), CSP Olumuyiwa Adejobi, said this in a statement in Abuja.
Baba said preventive policing was important because it prevented the occurrence of crime, engendered peace and ensured provision of optimal policing services to the citizenry.
The I-G said his administration would not relent in fighting crimes, criminality, and general state of insecurity to a standstill in Nigeria.
He commended the Police Command in Oyo State and the Force Intelligence Bureau Intelligence Response Squad (FIB-IRT) for their recent successes in crime fighting.
He said the operatives recorded the successes through deployment of technologically advanced assets, community based and the traditional policing methods and improved police visibility.
Baba said the achievements were recorded via identification, trailing and arrest of criminal suspects through actionable technical and human intelligence.
He said the intelligence led to the arrest of six members of a notorious bank robbery gang after concluding plans to execute a bloody bank robbery attack on a new generation bank within the Ibadan metropolis in Oyo State.
The I-G said the FIB-IRT had also arrested five members of a fraud syndicate specialised in hacking into bank accounts of individuals and corporate bodies to steal monies.
GIK/APA