Month: October 2023

A pastor was killed and 3 parishioners were injured in an armed attack at Eagles Christian Center in Newlands, Johannesburg on Friday evening, police said.

The attack was broadcast live on social networks. According to a witness, six armed men broke into the church and opened fire. The attackers appeared to be drunk.

On the same day, in Kathrada Park, near Sophiatown, Johannesburg, there was also a shooting in a pub that left 3 people dead.

Police are currently investigating and arresting the perpetrators in the above shootings

Source: Nam News Network

The Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) has conducted training and empowerment programmes for selected women-owned farmers’ cooperative societies in Oyo State.

The News Agency of Nigeria(NAN) reports that the primary objective of this initiative is to enhance the productivity and export potential of these farmers in the manufacturing and processing sectors within the state.

The Director-General, SMEDAN, Dr Olawale Fasanya, at the closing ceremony of the capacity building for the Women in Self-Employment Programme (WISE-P), in Ibadan, said the training was to enhance the production of high-quality foods.

Fasanya, who was represented by SMEDAN Deputy Director, Special Duties, Mr Tunde Oloyede, said that the programme included entrepreneurship and enterprise training, with a specific focus on Hazard and Critical Control Point (HACCP) and delivery of empowerment equipments.

According to him, the training package, designed to enhance the beneficiaries’ capacity, will not produce quality products that only meet the standards of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) but other international market requirements.

“This capacity building will also create a financial enablement for women cooperatives and their businesses on the needed sound footing for impact – in terms of pride, profit, and diversification.

“The objectives of this programme, therefore, include to encourage more women cooperatives to embrace processing and manufacturing food related products as a viable business option and to encourage the diversification of the economy away from crude oil into non-oil exports,” he said.

Also, Mr Ademola Ojo, the Commissioner for Trade, Industry, Investment, and Cooperatives in Oyo State, urged the beneficiaries to leverage the skills acquired during the training to expand and effectively manage their vocational enterprises.

Ojo said this would help them to focus on wealth creation and employment generation within the cooperative societies.

He noted that it would contribute positively to the nation’s economy and improve the standard of living for citizens.

“I wish to add that the Oyo State Government, under the leadership of Governor Seyi Makinde, will continue to provide an enabling environment for private enterprises to thrive in the state,” he said.

In his lecture, Dr James Marsh, a food safety consultant from HAACP Academy Nigeria (HAN), charged the participants to be mindful of food hygiene, food fraud, food terrorism, bioterrorism and food sabotage in their operations.

He urged the participants to always imbibe and practice food safety so that they could favourably compete with producers in the international community.

“Majority of ailments that people have is as a result of what they eat.

“Life expectancy rate in Nigeria is not an encouraging figure, we need to focus more on preventive medicine through food safety.

“Government also need to do more on food sensitisation,” he said.

One of the beneficiaries from Agricultural Exporting Farmers’ Multipurpose Cooperative Society, Dr Oluwatomisin Olatunji, said that the training had exposed the participants to food safety system that would ensure that Nigeria products are accepted both locally and internationally.

Another beneficiary from Olorunsogo Oba-Agbe Mechanised Farmers’ Multipurpose Cooperative Society, Mrs Damilola Bukola, urged government to ensure strict compliance with food industry regulations.

She said this would help to improve standard of food coming out of Nigeria to international community.

NAN reports that the two selected cooperatives were empowered with dehydrator for drying food products, slicing machine, power miller for milling dried products and automatic sealing machine for sealing finished products.

Source: News Agency of Nigeria

The Fiscal Responsibility Commission (FRC) on Saturday highlighted the risks associated with banks lending in a manner that contravenes the Section 45 of its Fiscal Responsibility Act.

Its Executive Chairman, Mr Victor Muruako, who spoke at a one-day stakeholders dialogue in Lagos, said such manner could also have severe consequences for banks and the Nigerian economy as a whole.

The dialogue was on implementing Section 45 of the Fiscal Responsibility Act.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the commission began discussions with banks and financial institutions in the country to ensure that their lending practices consistently comply with provisions of the Fiscal Responsibility Act(FRA).

Muruako emphasised that although borrowing by the government and public institutions is a tool for development, lending by banks and financial institutions in violation of the provision is unlawful.

Despite the simplicity and clarity of the Act’s language, he pointed out that banks often approve and disburse loans to subnational governments without fully adhering to the provisions of the FRA.

Muruako said: “Not once in the commission’s verification exercises, has it confirmed that a Proof of Compliance With Provision of the FRA was specifically requested for and obtained by a bank or financial institution before lending to any government.

“Also, only one, out of a recent sample of 13 loans to governments across the country, had an associated ‘Cost-Benefit Analysis’, detailing the economic and social benefits of the purpose to which the intended borrowing is to be applied.

The FRA chairman said there lawsuits in courts across the country, challenging the propriety of some bank loans to governments and public institutions, based on provisions of the FRA 2007.

Muruako said: “The unsavory effect of this non-compliance, may spread well beyond the individual banks to the inside macroeconomic space.

“Since the commission has responsibility toward macroeconomic stability, we thought it necessary to hold this stakeholders dialogue to get the perspectives of banks and also stem the tide before it’s too late.

“I urge the banks and other financial institutions to support the bold macroeconomic reform initiative of President Bola Tinubu’s administration.

“By being intentional in helping to reduce the risk of macroeconomic instability through ensuring that their lending practice consistently comply with provisions of the FRA.”

Muruako appreciated the leadership of Access bank for their support in organising the event and stakeholders in the financial industry for their cooperation with FRA.

In his remark, Mr Felix Obiamalu, a lawyer, advised the FRC to work toward engaging the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) and carry them along to ease the implementation of the provision.

Obiamalu, also Associate Director, Legal and Sanctions, Nigeria Financial Intelligence Unit,

stated that the FRA should also be empowered to enforce compliance to the FRA.

This, he noted, could be done by enabling laws to sanction and penalise defaulters of the Act.

In his presentation, Prof. Uche Uwaleke of the Nasarawa State University, Keffi, also harped on the need to curb borrowings from government at all levels.

He said this had become more for consumption, rather than for capital projects.

Uwaleke noted that government borrowings over the years had been on the rise, as the country currently has over N87 trillion public debt.

According to him, this is causing strain on government balance sheet and stifling the nation’s development.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that stakeholders at the dialogue included: representatives of NGF, Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC), Chief Compliance Officers, Chief Risk Officers, Chief Legal Officers and Chief Executive Officers of banks, among others.

Source: News Agency of Nigeria

The Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) says not less than 25 states in the country have passed the Fiscal Responsibility Law.

It also said that 30 state have passed the Debt Management law.

The Director-General, NGF, Mr Asishana Okauru, said this while delivering a goodwill message at the Fiscal Responsibility Commission’s ( FRCs) Stakeholders Dialogue on Implementation of Section 45 of the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) in Lagos.

Okauru, represented by Mr Olanrewaju Ajogbasile, Senior Programme Manager, NGF, said that states were also domesticating core principles of the FRA, regarding fiscal planning and management.

He revealed that 15 states recorded an average monthly debt service that was less than 40 per cent of gross Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) for 2021 financial year and total debt stock at the end of December 2021.

According to him, although section 45 of the FRA is the premise of the deliberation, all sections of the Act or state’s FRL’s, are reinforcing of each other in terms of delivering fiscal sustainability across the tiers of government.

“Unfortunately, certain flexibilities and a weak consequence system, renders full compliance a choice.

“Likewise, fiscal planning has largely remained unrealistic due to paucity of requisite data, low Own Source Revenue (OSR), increase in permanent and development expenditures.

“As well as the susceptibility to volatiles in FAAC, crude oil, inflation rate and exchange rate parameters, among others,” he said.

According to him, the NGF Secretariat will continue to advocate as good practice the tenets and provision of the Act through its engagements, initiatives and discourse around fiscal transparency, accountability and sustainability.

In a keynote address, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Dr George Akume, said that the dialogue was organised to promote the need for subnational to borrow through the right channels and for the right reasons.

Akume, represented by Dr David Eze, Assistant Director, Finance and Account, OSGF, stated that the commission must adhere to laid down rules that ensure that government officials at all levels do not abuse the process of borrowing.

He noted that governments across the world grow faster and better through very good and strong institutions, rules and regulations, hence the implementation of the FRA 2007 is worthwhile.

The SGF stated that there was the need to urgently address some of the excesses and infractions of the FRA 2007, particularly with the banks.

Akume also demanded for adequate machineries to effectively control and properly manage public resources, as public debt lowers the future generation’s well-being.

He expressed worry that the private sector may be discouraged from investing in the states, if the government needs to service debt and also provide a satisfactory environment for investment in infrastructure.

“Although, it is believed that the efficiency and equity benefit of borrowing by subnational government outweighs associated macroeconomic risk, factors such as lack of institutional capacity.

“Also, quest to control subnational government impulse in running excessive deficit and the need to take their fiscal excesses in the area of borrowing cannot be overemphasised,” he said.

According to him, systemic subnational insolvency may impede the growth of the capital market, deter fiscal space for infrastructure investment, threaten financial stability and core public services.

Akume said that might create pressure on the Federal Government to provide financial assistance to ensure a continued provision of essential public services.

The SGF insisted that a disciplined borrowing processes was needed to avoid the potential long term consequences of subnational borrowings of fiscal sustainability and macroeconomic stability.

He stated that FRA 2007 was enacted to ensure the coordination of the national economy policy between various tiers of government.

The SGF expressed that the ACT also enables the monitoring of agencies that were off budget, but whose activities had significant impact on fiscal policies.

He lauded FRC for organising the meeting at a time when the Nigeria economy is faced with key challenges.

Akume said that the country needed to develop strategy on how to structurally reform the economy, move labour and economic resources from low productivity to high productivity sector.

“The dialogue is justified, as the government is damning to get things right from the beginning to avoid mistakes that have dragged the nation into huge domestic and foreign debt.

“Accordingly, this particular direction is to ensure that the nation follows the laid down rules and regulations, in order to ensure prudence, transparency and accountability in the management of public funds and also to depart from such practices that have left so much debt for successive government,”: he said.

Earlier, the Executive Chairman, FRC, Mr Victor Muruako, said that banks and financial institutions in the country must ensure that their lending practices consistently comply with provisions of the FRA.

Muruako, a lawyer, said that to eliminate ambiguity, Section 45(1) of the FRA, all banks and financial institutions shall request and obtain Proof of Compliance with the provision of the Act before lending to any government in the federation.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that stateholders at the dialogue included: representatives of NGF, Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation, Chief Compliance (NIDC) Officers, Chief Risk Officers, Chief Legal Officers and Chief Executive Officers of banks, among others.

Source: News Agency of Nigeria

A legal luminary, Mr Paul Erokoro, SAN, says tendering additional evidence at the Supreme Court is an uphill task that requires a great deal of effort.

According to him, the rules admitting fresh evidence at the Supreme Court are very stringent.

Erokoro made the remark on Sunday in Abuja in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on the type of evidence that can be admitted at the Supreme Court.

He said the general rule is that additional evidence is not encouraged at the apex court.

“The general rules is that additional evidence at the Supreme Court or any Court of Appeal is not encouraged at all, but that doesn’t mean that it is totally forbidden.

“However, the rules for admitting it are very stringent.

“The first is that such evidence is going to be extremely material to the resolution of the issues in the case. That’s one of the hurdles to be crossed.

“The second hurdle is that such evidence could not have been procured during the trial at the trial court by reasonable diligence.

“So it is either the evidence was not available at the time of the trial or it could not, by any kind of due diligence or any reasonable effort, be made available.

“For evidence to be admissible at the Supreme Court or in any Court of Appeal, it has to, at a very minimum, satisfied those two conditions,” he said.

On whether there are provisions in the constitution allowing a party to tender additional evidence at the apex court, the senior lawyer said: “Most of these rules are case laws and the Evidence Act does not specifically make these provisions.”

He stressed that it is only backed by the rules of the court.

“In the case of election petition, the constitution requires that the proceeding be concluded within 180 days at the election tribunal which, in the case of the presidential election, is the Court of Appeal.

“So the Court of Appeal which may have power to admit additional evidence cannot have any jurisdiction if the jurisdiction of the trial court has expired.

“For instance, if a Court of Appeal has within six months to hear and conclude a presidential election matter and the six months have expired, even if the Supreme Court wanted to admit an additional evidence, it doesn’t seem to me that it would be able to admit such evidence after the expiration of the six months,” he said.

According to him, if such evidence becomes available, it is very likely that it cannot be admitted on appeal.

“This is because it may not meet the jurisdictional requirement which is that a court which has jurisdiction to do it, will it have done it at this time.

“And if the period available for the trial court has expired, there is nothing the Appeal Court, in this case, the Supreme Court, can do,” he said.

Erokoro said that the Supreme Court or any appellate court in the country had 60 days within which to hear and conclude election matters.

He said even though the Supreme Court has jurisdiction to hear the appeal, it would have jurisdiction only in relation to the appeal.

“The fact that the Supreme Court has only two months within which to hear the appeal will not revive the jurisdiction of the trial court,” he added.

On whether there is a period within which a Supreme Court can admit additional evidence, Erokoro said: “Except when it is dealing with matters that have come before it under its original jurisdiction, the Supreme Court doesn’t, generally, admit evidence.

“It is an appeal court and its function is to see whether the matter was properly tried at the trial court, and not to admit additional evidence.

“It’s just that there are few exceptions to the rules regards that and those exceptions, I have already explained to you.

“But outside that, the Supreme Court, generally, doesn’t like to admit additional evidence because it is not fair to the trial court which did not hear that.

“Two, you will not give the other party the chance to, maybe, gather evidence that could have contradicted that one.

“So that is why the rules are very strict and that’s why you don’t see it happening all the time.”

He said though the move could succeed, he described it as “an uphill task.”

When asked about grounds that an already decided case can be reviewed at the Supreme Court, he said though the grounds are not determined by law, there are rules of trial that are universal in Nigeria.

“One of them is whether due process was followed, admissible evidence rejected or inadmissible evidence admitted, if trial court failed to act fairly to both sides, if the lower court made mistake as regard the law to be applied, etc.

“So there are so many possibilities that the grounds of appeal can be built around,” he said.

Erokoro said though it was reported in the media that Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)’s presidential candidate in the Feb. 25 poll, planned to file new evidence at the apex court, it was still in the realm of speculation.

“This is actually within the realm of speculation because I have not seen the evidence beyond what the press has reported and I don’t know whether those who issued the documents are prepared to come to court, otherwise, there is a risk of what is called, ‘documentary hearsay,’” he said.

NAN reports Abubakar on Friday sought the leave of the Supreme Court to bring in fresh additional evidence to prove that President Tinubu submitted a forged certificate to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in aid of his qualification for the presidential election.

The documents Atiku sought to tender are Tinubu’s academic records, which were handed over to him by Chicago State University (CSU) on Oct. 2.

The 32-page documents were released to the former Vice President on the orders of Judge Nancy Maldonado of the District Court of Illinois, Eastern Division, Illinois, U.S.

Source: News Agency of Nigeria