Nigeria Content Online

On
Sunday, 30 May, the last Aero Contractors flight to Abuja was delayed
for over an hour because of an altercation on board. After check in
formalities have been concluded, it turned out that five passengers did
not have seats; the aircraft had more passengers than it could carry
legitimately.

The
five refused to disembark, insisting that they had to get Abuja, having
paid fully for their tickets and after being checked in formally. The
argument went on until a man volunteered to get down, saying he could
make his journey the next day. Gradually, four others disembarked, and
the five protesters were airlifted to Abuja.

Though
Aero rebooked the passengers for the next flight, the first on Monday
morning and also gave free one way tickets to them, usable within a
year, and also paid the taxi fare back home for the first passenger who
volunteered to get down, the incident again highlighted the problems
besetting the airline.

Increasingly,
travellers are getting piqued with the manner in which Aero Contractors
attends to customers who booked their tickets online, just as the
experience raises the possibility of a faulty computer system for its
online booking.

Embarrassing acts

Describing
the act as “inhumane”, some of them disclosed that passengers who book
online are treated poorly, compared to those who purchase their tickets
at the ticketing and reservation stands of the airline.

“After
joining their (Aero) Owerri to Lagos flight, I could not travel back to
Owerri with my return ticket on their flight when I got to the airport.
I was told that the aircraft was filled and my seat has been taken over
by another passenger, who I guess, paid cash for his ticket,” said a
woman who gave her name as Nkechi.

Nkechi,
who admitted that she benefitted from the low online fare of the
airline when coming to Lagos from Owerri, however, argued that the
carrier should make necessary provisions for whatever seat they sell to
travellers, “whether online customers or not.”

“It
is inhumane to stop one from travelling when he or she has made
arrangements of leaving that day,” she said. “They should know the
number of passengers who booked online and those who purchased tickets
directly at the airport for any aircraft, so as to stop embarrassing
people by telling them that they cannot fly because the aircraft is
filled.”

Another
traveller, who prefers anonymity, disclosed that on getting to the
airport at the stipulated minutes before the departure of her flight,
she was denied access to the aircraft on the grounds that her seat has
being sold out to another customer, adding that she booked online.

“I
couldn’t fly for they told me that my seat has been sold out,” she
said. “I was also told to pay an extra amount for the regular seat in
order to be able to travel, can you imagine this?” The passenger, who
was on her way to Calabar, the Cross River State capital from Lagos,
maintained that she followed all requisite procedures provided by Aero
on its website directing passengers on how to book and when to arrive
the airport for their flights, yet she was unable to fly.

“I
arrived at the airport 30 minutes before departure, and I did pay for
the ticket with my ATM card as they said online, but I cannot
understand why they had to sell my seat to another person,” she said.

Aero
Contractors has been at the forefront in online sale of promotional low
cost tickets, ranging from N3, 000 to N7, 000 for one-way flights,
which has created a surge in their ticket sales.

However,
series of calls and text messages to Simon Tumba, the media consultant
for the airline, did not yield positive response, as he promised to
react to the complaints of the aggrieved customers but did not do so
for two days.

In an attempt to
unlock the untapped potentials of Nigerian women and increase their
contribution in export trade, the Nigerian Export Promotion Council
recently conducted a training for women in export business.

Speaking at the
training on Tuesday in Abuja, Usman Gwandu, a director in the Ministry
of Commerce and Industry, who represented Jibril Martins-Kuye, the
Minister of Industry, said that if Nigeria is to realise its full
potential, gender issues which are at play in economic, social,
political, and other spheres ought to be addressed.

Mr. Gwandu said
many international and national initiatives have been undertaken to
address gender-related issues in society, but very little has been done
to exploit the opportunities that women contribute to national
development.

“In this context,
NEPC-Women in Export Development programme set a centre stage for the
development of the Nigeria women in the export sector”, an initiative
which, according to him, is worthwhile, relevant and commendable.

“Obviously, the
export sector can play a fundamental role in transforming the country
when targeted interventions are made in shaping the minds and actions
of Nigerian women. Vision 2020 can also be achieved when production
activity and potential of both men and women are recognised, harnessed,
and utilised,” he said.

The NEPC-Women in
Export Development Programme is aimed at mainstreaming gender
perspective, using relevant, targeted support policies and services to
empower Nigerian women’s capacity, competence, and competitiveness in
non-oil export trade.

Encouragement for women

David Adulugba, the
executive director of Nigerian Export Promotion Council, said an
increasing number of women now participate in processing of
agricultural products, and harnessing their potential for export is
necessary.

“The women
population is high in Nigeria and much of the interventions are not
directed at them. They have the capacity, the ability, the patience,
the natural endowment, and they are more in the rural areas. So, we are
focusing on them to exploit their potentials, and help them to develop.
We are encouraging women to look for local resources around them and
produce not only for Nigeria, but for the international market.”

The idea is that
women in rural areas should form cooperatives, which NEPC will link
with exporters who need their products. The products will be packaged
to international standards.

Mr. Adulugba stated
that “NEPC has 15 zonal offices, 36 state offices, and we are sieving
this down to their level, so they can relate with the offices in terms
of guidance on packaging.”

The programme
provides assistance to participating Nigerian women in core critical
export services areas, which include market intelligence, capacity
building, technical assistance, market linkages, access to finance,
export advocacy, and trade facilitation.

The federal
government appears desperate to shore up the nation’s proven oil
reserve capacity as the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)
has stepped up oil and gas exploration activities in the Chad Basin.

Though previous
efforts by some of the international oil and gas exploration and
production companies operating in the country had to be called off a
few years ago after they drilled a few dry holes, the NNPC is putting
finishing touches to a comprehensive framework design for the
intensification of exploration activities in the region.

Before now, 23
wells have been drilled with two of the wells, Wadi-1 and Kinasar
encountering non- commercial gas. Already, it was gathered that about
33, 550 square kilometers of three dimensional (3-D) seismic data has
been acquired for processing preparatory for the formal launch of
exploration activities in the area by the corporation.

To ensure that the
latest quest for a sustainable oil find in the region does not end
without success, Diezani Alison-Madueke, the Minister of Petroleum
Resources, is determined to follow through Presidency’s directive that
the NNPC leaves no stone unturned to strike `black gold’ in its search
in the Chad Basin.

Possibility of discovering oil

Though Mrs.
Alison-Madueke was not categorical about the prospects of a commercial
oil find in the region, she was however optimistic that there is a
strong possibility, considering that oil companies operating in
neighbouring countries of Chad, Niger and Sudan have all made
discoveries of commercial hydrocarbon deposits in their concessions,
which have similar structural settings with the Chad Basin.

Discoveries made in
neighbouring countries in basins with similar structural settings
include Doba, Doseo and Bongor all in Chad, believed to have over 2
billion barrels of oil; Logone Birni in Southern Chad and Northern
Cameroun, with over 100 barrels, and Termit-Agadem Basin in Niger, with
over one barrels of oil.

The NNPC New
Frontier Exploration Services Division spearheading the search for
crude oil in the entire Inland Basins is acquiring 3,550 square
kilometers of 3-D seismic data for processing and interpretation, in
addition to the 6000 kilometres of 2-D data that is currently being
reprocessed.

The division, headed by Olakunle Olaosebikan, is working in
consultation with a renowned geophysicist and consultant to the United
Nations, Deborah Ajakaiye, who is leading a team of Nigerian and
foreign geologists and geophysicists in the search for hydrocarbon
deposit in the Nigerian Frontier Inland Sedimentary Basins (NFISB).

South Africa’s food
prices will rise gradually from 2011 partly as the economic recovery
gains pace, increasing the likelihood of more protests, the
Agricultural Business Chamber said on Wednesday.

Households,
especially in the lower-income level, spend a large chunk of their
income on food and higher food prices in recent years contributed to
millions of people’s inability to escape poverty, more than 16 years
after the end of apartheid.

John Purchase,
chief executive of the chamber said any spike in food prices could
signal increased activism and possible strikes by powerful labour
federation Cosatu.

“While food prices
are still coming down at the moment… it is going to bottom out
probably within the next six months or so,” he said on the sidelines of
an agriculture conference. “There will be gradual increases in food
prices, we believe, again from 2011. How big that rise is, is very
difficult to predict.”

South Africa’s
annual consumer price inflation slowed more than expected to a
four-year low of 4.8 percent in April as food price pressure eased,
compared with March’s 5.1 percent. Inflation has slowed sharply since
peaking close to 14 percent in 2008 and food price inflation, the main
driver at the time, has trended downwards, slowing to 0.9 percent on an
annual basis in April.

Protests

Cosatu and Fedusa-
two of the largest union federations in the country — protested
against high food prices in 2008. Although the biggest economy in
Africa has emerged from its first recession since 1992, household
finances are tight after about a million jobs were shed and as debt
levels remain high.

Purchase said the
first sign of food inflation would be seen in the price of maize, which
is expected to ease further in the short-term partly due to a bountiful
harvest. South Africa’s agricultural minister said in April the country
had secured foreign markets to sell the surplus maize produced in the
2009/10 season to help safeguard maize prices for local farmers.

“We have a big surplus of 4 million tonnes and if it’s not all
exported… it’s going to depress prices probably into the next season
quite significantly, that’s why I say there is going to be a time lag
in this whole period,” he said. “As we see economic recovery taking
place we will probably see bigger demand for resources, like oil and
fertilizer … So all this puts pressure on demand for (commodities
like maize) and that’s going to drive up food prices.”

“The downside of
economic illiteracy”. “A rank lesson in how (and why) not to count
one’s chickens before the eggs hatch”. Whatever the choice of
explanations, the debacle at the Federal Accounts Allocation Committee
(FAAC) last week, over distributable funds for the first quarter of
this year was untidy. State governments having earlier rejected the
offer by the federal government to share N362.492 billion as their
allocation for the period, the federal government had to raid the
excess crude account in search of the extra N339.627 billion, which
sub-national accounting units felt was due them on account of the
mathematics of the appropriations for fiscal 2010.

Until the delayed
approval of the 2010 budget, the committee had divvied its pot based on
the assumptions of the 2009 appropriations. With the approval of the
budget for this year, and the new US$67/barrel benchmark price for
crude oil sales, state governments were no longer going to accept
allocations from the FAAC calculated on the lower benchmark (US$45pb)
used for the 2009 budget.

Thus, the
N339.627bn augmentation fund – which was taken out of the nation’s
savings – represented the oil price benchmark differential between
US$45pb, which had been used from January to March this year before the
budget came into implementation in April. However, with oil prices
trending southwards, it is difficult to see how the committee can
continue to meet this new level of financing. Sadly, the excess crude
account is so depleted that it cannot also continue to serve as a
source of augmentation support. Indeed, we should note that this was
not the reason why this fund was set up. Quite clearly, we confront a
very serious problem. Yet, the benefits from all this excitement lie
elsewhere. The cop-outs by which the problem was temporarily resolved
may yet teach us useful lessons.

The first such
lesson is without doubt, the need for us to save as a people. The main
deliverable here is to ensure that the budget is in surplus (public
saving), or that any deficit arises primarily because government hopes
to grow national income going forward. After which, we must create
conditions for all domestic prices, but especially for the price of
most public infrastructure, to move as close to the market-clearing
rate as is feasible, thus ensuring that price distortions no longer
encourage levels of private consumption inconsistent with the need for
private savings. If the Obasanjo administration had not done this, we
wouldn’t have had available to us the balance on the excess crude
account, which we have apparently used up so much that only US$4.6bn of
it remains, from a much healthier US$62bn in September 2008.

Nonetheless, public
sector savings in Nigeria acquire an additional use. The full extent of
the national need for investment in key sectors of the economy, require
that we start to discuss public sector financing in ways that ensure
that it helps the private sector to grow, acknowledges the capacity of
the economy to absorb additional infusions of cash, and recognises the
inter-generational responsibility that arises on account of the nature
of the country’s main source of such spending – a wasting asset that
however well we use it will because of present consumption be denied to
future generations.

On this score planning then ceases to be an act in wish fulfilment
as has been suggested by the penchant of the national assembly to lard
on more gravy on to the appropriation details every year. The US$67 per
barrel estimate on which the current year’s budget is based was always
suspicious. Although signs of a recovery in the world economy were all
over the place, a number of worries were still there. Unusual
government spending is still the main growth driver in most economies
that have showed signs of recovery.

In addition, problems with the
sovereign debt crisis in Europe ought to have alerted our planners to
the unintended consequences of the many fiscal stimulus packages that
governments across the world have in place. Besides questions of the
sustainability of the recovery, it also mattered that it has remained
uneven across regions. All of this still counsel caution in the
national planning and budgeting effort.