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The Nigerian
National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has called on Petroleum Tanker
Drivers (PTD) to give dialogue a chance in the ongoing dispute over the
killing of its members, the seizure of its trucks, and issues of the
retrenchment of its members.

The Group Managing
Director of the NNPC, Austen Oniwon, in a statement signed by the
organisation’s spokesperson, Levi Ajuonuma, on Tuesday, appealed to
parties in the dispute to consider the wider interest of Nigerians in
this usually busy holiday season.

“I appeal to the
tanker drivers to give the Federal Government an opportunity to resolve
the matter and ensure that justice and fairness is done. I am calling
on all stakeholders to rally round to support the stability we have
continued to enjoy in the downstream sector,” Mr. Oniwon said.

He also said that
there is abundant supply of petroleum products across the nation, and
urged consumers not to indulge in panic buying and marketers not to
indulge in any sharp practice that will create undue hardship for
Nigerians.

He further said the
Federal Government is looking into the issue to ensure a lasting
resolution, and called on the tanker drivers to call off their threats
of a strike and embrace the offer of dialogue by government.

The Petroleum
Tanker Drivers, which is a wing of the National Union of Petroleum and
Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG), had on Monday embarked on a nationwide
warning strike to protest what they term the “indiscriminate
victimisation” of their workers by soldiers and the ‘mysterious’
disappearance of petroleum products.

NUPENG’s Lagos zone
chairman, Tokunbo Korede, told NEXT on Monday that the seven days
warning strike is coming after a 21-day ultimatum, which elapsed on
November 26, 2010, following a meeting with the Chief of Army Staff,
the director general of the State Security Service (SSS), the minister
of labour, and the management of the Nigerian National Petroleum
Corporation (NNPC).

He said the failure
of the government officials at the meeting to apprehend and prosecute
the army officials behind the assassination of a tanker driver in Jos
and the disappearance of several tankers, along with their petroleum
products, within military installations has necessitated them to push
their case.

“For how long are
they going to take to fish out those criminal uniformed men who are
behind all this? This is a seven-day warning strike for those saying we
are working on it to bring out a solution. They need to take us serious
because it will be too disastrous for the coming elections,” he said.

The two-day old strike has brought queues back to the filling stations.

Nigeria’s President
and Chairman of ECOWAS, Goodluck Jonathan, has called on the two
candidates in the run-off presidential election in Cote d Ivoire,
President Laurent Gbagbo and Alassane Ouatara, as well as their
supporters, to avoid inflammatory remarks that could instigate
violence, by allowing the will of the Ivorian people prevail through
their votes.

In a statement
issued yesterday on the presidential run-off which took place on
Sunday, Mr Jonathan noted that the “assessment of both local and
international observers indicating the peaceful conduct of the run-off
election so far has been encouraging.”

He urged the two
candidates to “tone down their rhetoric and maintain the peace at this
very critical stage,” before the final results are announced. The
president also urged both contestants to “subject themselves to the
will of the Ivorian people by allowing the votes to be counted in a
peaceful and orderly manner.”

Mr Jonathan said it is imperative that the supreme interest of the
people of Cote d’Ivoire, who have borne the brunt of hardship these
past years, be allowed to prevail at the polls, adding that Nigeria and
the entire member-states of ECOWAS are following the situation in Cote
d Ivoire with keen interest. “We stand ready to continue to render all
necessary support to promote peace, democracy and stability in the
country,” he said.

A newly retired
judge of the Federal High Court, Akinjide Ajakaiye, yesterday, berated
judicial officers for not being sincere with the dictates of their oath
of office.

Mr Ajakaiye, who
has spent 12 years in the service of the Federal High Court, was
speaking at a valedictory session held in his honour by the leadership
of the court. “Since the constitution, which is the organic law of the
land, has empowered the judiciary to do justice to all manner of
persons whether high or low, each judicial officer must then do justice
without fear or favour, ill-will or affection,” he said. “It was trite
that the judiciary is the last hope of the common man, particularly
having regard to the decadent and perilous socio-economic and political
situation of the country.” He added that the judiciary is placed in a
position to enforce and preserve sanity and social stability. “That is
why judicial officers ought to brace up to the occasion and be
circumspect in all they do,” he said.

Corruption in judiciary

Mr Ajakaiye is also
of the view that corruption, which he described as is the main hurdle
to progress in the country, has unfortunately found its way into the
judiciary. “For the judiciary to be able to play the sacred role
assigned to it very well, it must ensure that both the appointers and
appointees to the bench are men of proven honour and integrity and most
importantly those who have fear of God in them,”

The retired just
also said that “appointments should not be based on sentiments,
political considerations; neither should it be at the whims and
caprices of the appointing authorities. Merit should no longer be
sacrificed for mediocrity.” Speaking at the event, the Chief Judge of
the Federal High Court, Daniel Abutu, described the retired judge as a
man who, during the period of his service year, ensured that justice
was dispensed judicially and judiciously. In his remarks, a
representative of the Senior Advocates of Nigeria, Femi Atoyebi, who
described Mr Ajakaiye as a “very special breed”, called for the
creation of a special division of the court to handle admiralty cases
because of its peculiarity. According to him, such creation will
engender expertise and professionalism among judges on admiralty
matters.

The United Nations
Office on Drug and Crime (UNODC) has said that some foreign companies
refrained from investing in Nigeria because of the level of corruption
in the country.

The agency country
representative, Mrs Dagmar Thomas, made the revelation at a roundtable
on the ethical conduct of business in Abuja yesterday. She said the
organisation had conducted a study on how corruption, crime, and
insecurity impacted the marketplace in Nigeria.

“We know that about
10 percent of all companies paid bribes in the year before the study.
About 20 percent, or 450 companies, admitted that in the economic
sector, the payment of bribes to public officials was either fairly or
very frequent,” Mrs. Thomas said.

She noted that not
only did most of the companies lose profit by paying bribes, money that
could have been used for the development of the company and its staff,
many of them also refrained from making new investment for fear of
corruption.

“So, there is an
urgent need to act, since lack of company expansion means lack of
development, also for company staff and workers,” she said.

Mrs. Thomas
commended the country for putting the fight against corruption at the
forefront of its national political agenda and urged it to continue, in
order to reduce the severe negative impact on development, business,
and fair competition.“Corruption, as a phenomenon, is not new; it is
not localised to any culture, profession, or society,” she said.“It
afflicts countries and people worldwide, even more so when a system of
checks and balances are not in place or distorted.

“It is important that the fight against corruption also comes from
the people, is led by the people, and made part of our daily lives,
standards, and behaviours,” she said.

Ben Obi had barely been formally named the
campaign chief for former Vice President Atiku Abubakar before he aimed
a few salvos in the direction of the man everyone loves to hate, Mr.
Abubakar’s estranged former boss, Olusegun Obasanjo.
Mr. Obasanjo, who
was president when Mr. Abubakar served unhappily as his deputy, is
little more than a jester, Mr. Obi said Monday at a news conference in
Abuja, in response to Mr. Obasanjo’s stated reaction to news that his
former deputy had emerged as the “consensus” candidate for the North.

Mr Obasanjo had
last Thursday laughed off the selection of Mr. Abubakar while talking
to reporters in Abuja. Asked to respond to the news, the former
president had simply said, in pidgin, “I dey laugh.” “We look at him
and said the man is always comical with his comments,” Mr Obi said. “We
don’t need to engage him, we don’t intend to engage him in matters of
that nature.” Mr Obi, a former senator, also dismissed suggestions that
the former vice president will face challenges to his membership in the
PDP, as indicated at the weekend by the governor of Akwa Ibom State,
Godswill Akpabio.
He described Mr
Akpabio as a busybody who should not be taken seriously since he is
neither the chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) nor its
spokesman.
“I am happy you
refer to him (Akpabio) as Akwa Ibom State governor and not the chairman
of the PDP. He does not double as the spokesman of the PDP. That is a
busybody,” Mr Obi said.
Mr Obi will run an
Atiku campaign that has just absorbed the campaign organisations of his
three other rivals, all from the political North, who have agreed to
step down for him.

These were former military strongman Ibrahim
Babangida, the former national security adviser Aliyu Mohammed Gusau,
and the governor of Kwara State, Bukola Saraki.
Mr. Obi said the
Atiku campaign also has appointed several officials from the erswhile
rival campaigns. These include Chris Mammah, who will serve as
principal spokesman for the campaignand Bashir Yusuf Ibrahim, who will
run campaign operations.

Police, civil
defence agents yesterday watched helplessly as irate mobs protested the
federal government purported confirmation of the acting Chief Medical
Director (CMD), Giyan Joshua Ndom, a medical doctor, as the head of the
Federal Medical Centre (FMC) in Keffi, Nasarawa State.

The protests, which
was the second in a month, consisting of various interest groups among
who were Islamic religious groups, invaded the streets of Keffi to
stage a protest against the consideration of Mr. Ndom as CMD.

Although during the
first protest on October 27, a truck loaded with armed policemen
cordoned off the premises against the protesters, yesterday’s peaceful
demonstration could not be prevented by the armed policemen who were
stationed there.

The groups
protesting the purported confirmation of Mr. Ndom are: Keffi Concerned
Group (KCG), Keffi Development Foundation (KDF), Jama’atul Izalatul
Bid’awa Ikamatul Sunnah (JIBWIS), which respective leaderships led the
peaceful demonstration that lasted from 9am to about 12noon. Leading
other interested groups including artisans and commercial motorcycles
who bore leaves and placards carrying anti-Ndom inscriptions, the
leaders, Abdullahi Modibbo and Aliyu Bawa, led the protesters through
the major streets of Keffi,

to the premises of the FMC, where some management staff met them to listen to their demands.

Indigenous claim

The protesters said
they do not want an indigene of Plateau State as CMD, alleging that
Governor Jonah Jang has forced many non-indigenes in his state out of
federal appointments.

But they said the
federal government could appoint any person from any state, including
Christians, but not a Plateau man.They also accused Mr. Ndom of
corruption.

But Mr. Ndom said
he was not corrupt, just as he said it was not his fault that he
emerged the best in the screening exercise for the job.

The board has been having difficulties confirming his appointment,
however, for months now because of widespread protests which his likely
emergence is generating in Keffi. Police spokesman in the state,
Richard Jinadu, did not pick his calls for comment, neither did he
respond to a text message sent to his phone.

Nigerian scientists and researchers and
their United States of America counterparts are exploring key issues in
the development of sustainable buildings and information technology
systems in buildings design.

At a four-day international workshop on
innovative design approaches to sustainable buildings, which opened
yesterday at the National Universities Commission in Abuja, Julius
Okojie, the executive secretary of the NUC, stated that there is need
to address the challenges of collapsed buildings in order to place the
country in a good stead to achieve Vision 20-2020.

“This workshop is aimed at providing a
platform for interaction with the view to explore the extent to which
industry approaches to sustainability in the area of focus differ
between Nigeria and the USA,” he said.

“We will develop agenda for future
joint research initiatives that will facilitate knowledge exchange
between the US and Nigeria,” he added.

Mr. Okojie was hopeful that the
gathering would at the end come up with informed decision on innovative
design approaches to sustainable buildings, improve capacity of
Nigerians involved in buildings, and develop agenda for future research
collaborations between both countries. He said the target is to promote
research and development efforts which are of mutual benefits to
Nigeria and the United States.

He further disclosed that Nigeria had
already signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with George Mason
Universities, USA, which is a leading institution in the field of
innovation and entrepreneurial education.

“The MoU specifically focused on the
development of entrepreneurial education, information technology driven
students, resource centre, institutional management, as well as sharing
experiences on university-industry collaboration,” Mr. Okojie said.

The workshop was organised at the instance of the National Science Foundation of the United States of America.

Bala Mohammed, minister, Federal
Capital Territory, who also spoke at the event, explained that when the
issue of buildings in Nigeria is raised today, the first thoughts that
come to one’s mind are the qualification and technical competence of
the experts involved in the entire process, as the decline in quality
of the final output as led to the rampant cases of collapsed buildings
in recent times.

“The challenges of developing
innovative design approaches to sustainable buildings can only be
handled by science and technology experts. As a developing nation with
the task of providing the desired dividends of democratic governance,
which include housing, to about 150 million Nigerians, we are not
unaware of the fact that we can only get there through collaborations,”

Mr. Mohammed said.

President Goodluck Jonathan has approved the appointment of Munzali Jibril as the Coordinator for the take-off of the Police Academy, Wudil as a degree-awarding institution.

The appointment is coming on the heels of the approval given on May 5 this year by the President, in Council, for the up-grading of the Police Academy.

The M.D. Yusuf Committee on the reform of the Nigeria Police Force had recommended that the federal government upgrade the institution to a degree awarding status. In line with this recommendation, the government in 2009 commenced plans to transform the Police Academy which is situated in Kano State to the recommended status.

A statement by the Presidential spokesman Ima Niboro, stated that Mr. Jibril who was a member of the committee put together by the president to advise the federal government on the upgrade “is expected to coordinate all necessary activities to ensure that the academy begins to function in its new capacity as soon as the bill to provide for its establishment and incorporation as a degree-awarding institution is passed into law by the National Assembly and assented to by the President”.

The 59 year-old university administrator is a former deputy vice-chancellor (academic) of the Bayero University, Kano, former provost of the Nigerian Defence Academy and former executive secretary of the Nigerian Universities Commission (NUC).

The Libyan President, Muammar Gaddafi
yesterday demanded 5 billion Euros from the European Union to aid the
control of illegal migration into Europe.

Stressing the need to stop the influx
of illegal immigrants from Africa into Europe, Mr Gaddafi also called
on Europe to reconsider giving asylum to politicians.

He was speaking at the opening of the
3rd AU-EU Summit under the theme: “Investment, economic growth and job
creation” holding in Tripoli.

Vice President Namadi Sambo represented President Goodluck Jonathan at the event.

In addition to the theme of the Summit,
participants also brainstormed on issues related to regional
integration, infrastructure, ICT, science, and private sector
development. Views were also exchanged on energy, climate change,
space, the MDGs, agriculture and food security, amongst others.

The Summit is a concretization of the
Joint Africa-EU strategic partnership adopted in December 2007 in
Lisbon with the aim of enhancing the socio-economic and political
development of both the European Union and the African Union for the
interest of both populations.

This year’s summit is expected to last from November 29 to 30, 2010.

On the issue of Somalia pirates and the
challenge of identifying their sponsors, Mr. Gaddafi asked rhetorically
if the “United States or Somalia is the sponsor”.

Bringing up his clamour for a United
States of Africa, he expressed the need to separate cooperation with
Africa based on the regions; West Africa, South Africa, East Africa or
Central Africa, to a unified collaboration with the continent for
meaningful bargain with Europe.

He also called for the reform of the UN
that will centralize its operations to make all countries equal rather
than a few nations on the Security Council.

Mr. Gaddafi also said he would like to
see the benefits of the Mediterranean Sea impacting on the development
of Africa as well as meeting the energy needs of Africa and Europe,
making a reference to Zimbabwe having the capacity to meet the energy
need of Africa if fully utilized.

He further stated that Africa has
advantage over other continents to utilize solar and renewable energy
sources if properly harnessed.

The Libyan president also called for the shifting of the AU-EU
Summit to four years instead of the existing arrangement of three years.

The challenges of
multiple taxation and the need to improve the revenue of states to
enable them cope with the new minimum wage takes centre stage at the
123rd Joint Tax Board meeting holding in Yola.

The chairman of the
board, Ifueko Omogui Okauro, called for renewed efforts on the part of
tax administrators in the implementation of decisions made at the
meeting. She said the administrators failed to implement the policies
in the past, stressing that the development was responsible for
multiple taxation due to the different approaches to the same kind of
tax matters among member states.

Mrs Omogui-Okauro
said the phenomenon of multiple taxation is not only an “issue of major
concern” but that the “phenomenon has caused a lot of embarrassment to
our country as international communities, agencies and investors have
continued to draw our attention to the harmful effect and impact of
multiple taxation”.

Mrs Omogui-Okauro
who said the meeting with the theme “Imperative of Automation in tax
administration” has become necessary in view of the need to direct the
country’s tax system towards achieving tax payments and collections
that would be real time based.

She, however, said
reduction of multiple taxation would not be possible “without
modernizing the tax operations and infrastructural components which
hugely is obtainable through automation.”

It is expected that
the contract agreement between the joint tax board with the Telnet
consortium the service providers for the unique taxpayer identification
number (UTIN) project which is seen by the tax administrators as a
necessary step towards providing a comprehensive taxpayer database for
all the tax authorities in the country under the joint tax board would
be signed during the session.

The UTIN whose
major objectives among others includes providing comprehensive taxpayer
database has a tremendous role to play in the modernization process of
Nigerian Tax system, Mrs Omogui-okauro said.

At the meeting, the
Adamawa State government said it has recorded tremendous improvement in
the state internally generated revenue.

The state’s
governor, Murtala Nyako said the meeting of the joint, tax board was at
an auspicious time when all the various states of the federation are
doing everything possible to reform the country’s tax system with a
view to increasing internally generated revenue and thus reduce the
burden of taxation on individual citizens.

The governor
represented by his deputy Bala James Ngillari said “the government in
order to ensure prompts returns and accountability of revenue
collection from government agencies has approved the centralization of
revenue collectors.

Similarly, approval has been given for the merger of vehicle
Inspection officers (VIO) to the board of internal revenue for harmony
in road taxes administration.