₦airaland Forum

naijababe:
Personally, this would be an excellent proposal  and I would take it with both hands. The 40b reserves are proved reserves. I reckon the the total resource base including gas will be 4x as much. If the ND states are able to develop infrastructure to access gas markets, they stand to make a helluva money

NG is a helluva lot less profitable than petroleum, I am pretty sure? Haven't looked this up specifically, but remember reading a WSJ article that alluded to this.

Secondly, how are you going from 40 billion proven to even just 20 billion more potential? Let alone on the order of 4X? Why wouldn't someone just want to get his 40 billion (after 20 years, like I said) and then enjoy whatever is found after too?

The operational mode of the new refineries, it was gathered, would be different from that of the existing ones.

The federal government would have no shares or financial contributions to make in the construction and management of the plants as the entire project would be executed with loans sourced by NNPC and the Chinese firm.

The refineries are to be managed by CSCEC consortium upon completion until the full recovery of the loan used on the project. Both Oando Plc and AP Plc, who are among the investors in the refinery project, explained that their foray into refining was informed by the need to bridge the supply gap in the local petroleum product market that is likely to result from the 7 per cent GDP growth that Nigeria is projected to enjoy.

According to the Chief Executive Officer of Oando Refinery and Terminals, Ayo Ajose-Adeogun, the Lekki refinery project has the advantage of proximity to source of crude oil and the market.

The China State Construction Engineering Corporation (CSCEC) recently extended by one year, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) it signed last year with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation for the construction of the three Greenfield Refineries and a Petrochemical plant in Nigeria.

http://allafrica.com/stories/201108012105.html

I like this. Only thing the government provides is a loan. Looks like Chinese, Oando and AP will be the ones running these refineries. Good.

BTW, Gbawe, you mentioned earlier that you didn't think that Femi Otedola was qualified to run a refinery. Does him teaming up with the Chinese to execute this change your mind a bit?

We shall see.

Lagos and Bayelsa refineries are supposed to have capacity of 300K barrels/day, Kogi 150K.

Really hope this happens.

Perhaps this business model where the FG has a small role is the best way going forward?

THURSDAY, 04 AUGUST 2011 00:00 OLUSOLA BELLO ENERGY, EDITOR

Allison-Madueke
The days of importation of refined petroleum products into the country may have been numbered, as the Federal Government recently unveiled an all-encompassing strategy currently adopted to pull up the nation’s refining capacity to over one million barrels per day.

Deziani Allison-Madueke, minister of Petroleum Resources, who spoke on the strategies at the official opening of the Society for Petroleum Engineers’ (SPE) yearly conference and exhibition tagged NAICE, in Abuja recently, said, the nation’s refining capacity would receive significant boost in the next three years, with the coming up of three new refineries and the Turn Around Maintenance (TAM) of the four traditional ones.

The good thing about this is that the Federal Government team would be leaving for the United Kingdom sometime next week to discuss the detailed feasibility study which was completed last July on the three Green Refineries to be located in Lagos, Bayelsa and Kogi States. After this, the financiers and the contractors will also examine the feasibility study and then the investors would be able to determine appropriately the type and configuration of the Greenfield refineries.

This, perhaps, is an indication of the seriousness the government attaches to the realisation of these projects. The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) last year signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with CSCEC for the construction of additional three Greenfield Refineries and a Petrochemical plant in Nigeria.

Under the terms of the agreement, 80 percent of the project cost was meant to be funded with a term loan provided by China Export Credit Insurance Corporation (SINOSURE) and a consortium of Chinese banks led by the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, the world’s largest bank. The projects will cost about $28 billion.

This means that it is not entirely government project and the possibility of it being abandoned half way once they start is very remote With the coming up of the three new refineries and the turn around maintenance (TAM) of the traditional refineries, the nation’s refining capacity would receive significant boost in the next three years. Especially when the TAM is being handled by the companies that first built them to ensure that this time, the facilities will actually give us the result that we desire in this country and take us to 95 percent capacity utilisation in all our traditional refineries.

With a 24-month mandate to fix the old refineries, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has already embarked on consultation to ensure that the TAM takes off next year, and is expected to take off with Port Harcourt Refinery.

The group managing director of NNPC, Austen Oniwon, also supported the minister‘s view when he said: “We are starting with Port Harcourt refinery, and we have engaged JDP of Japan, which is partnering with Tecnimont of Italy and they are currently in talks, with the hope that by the third quarter of next year they will move into Port Harcourt refinery and commence rehabilitation.

It is not just the Turn Around Maintenance; it is the full rehabilitation of the refineries.” He clearly stated that the refineries have no limited capacity, linking the past challenges to imbalance on one of the units. He, therefore, noted that the needed expansion design has been done by the licensor of the unit, adding that “there is not going to be a major change in configuration of the facility, the plant is still the same.

The most important comment on the lips of Nigerians today is that the government should begin to address the issue of refined products. It should take pragmatic steps to remove this national shame brought on us with our inability to refine own product despite four refineries.”

http://www.businessdayonline.com/NG/index.php/oil/25502-govts-target-of-one-million-bpd-refining-capacity-by-2014-reality-or-myth-

9jaganja:
Meaning you the people creates a nation and without them, there will be no nation so the govt must do what will make the people happy!!!

Hmm. What do you mean "the govt must do what will make the people happy?"

Sometimes the people want things that aren't good for them. That will make them happy today, very say in a year or 10 year's time.

I don't really believe in mob rule, I guess? And if you aren't careful, democracy can turn into that.

Most people will vote for the guy promising free amala and pounded yam for all. Yet clearly such politicians will only lead a country to suffering and long-term pain.

Nigeria's oil reserves are 40 billion or so. So you are proposing that the status quo remains on these 40, and that only new finds will they get majority control over?

Eh, if I were a SS man I'd want no part of a deal like that. Likelihood of substantially increasing reserves beyond the current (say +5 billion). . . well, who knows what that probability is. But I'd not want to stake my region's livelihood on what for all I know is a 5 or 10% coinflip

And I have no clue why you are bringing up groundnut in this day and age. I hope your leaders are a bit more creative than that, if they plan on paying the bills

FWIW, if something like this is done, I suspect nobody will really want to leave. After all, what beef will they then have with Nigeria?

If most of my suggestions are put in place, you've turned Nigeria into essentially a stronger version of the European Union. That is nearly as good as outright independence to me.

Give me full control over the affairs in my zone, and I won't oppose the idea of Nigeria.

You again miss the point. It doesn't matter whether the country remains one or not. What matters is that each zone fixes itself, becomes strong and healthy. If a plan like this is implemented, in 20 years time you won't give a damn whether the country is one or not, since you'll be self-sufficient and much better off than today.

The only reason we all keep shouting "one nigeria" is because someone else has something that we need, or think we need. Now granted, we need it today to avoid civil unrest and a massive shock. But if weaned off of this gradually, then the shock will be reduced.

GEJ is correct. Much better to spend the money on education than fuel subsidies.

Or better yet, improved roads? E.g., fixing Lagos-Ibadan road?

All of this arguing over oil misses the point. Is the amount of oil produced going to be enough to power Nigeria (or its components) to a first world status? No, it it will not. 2.5 million barrels of oil shared amongst 160+ million people (and growing!) is not going to go very far, no matter which way you slice it. So does it really matter in the long run whether your zone gets a smaller/larger piece of this finite (and non-growing!) pie?

@ndu_chucks, honestly, even if offshore oil is ceded to the states, under this 20 year scheme, you'll have plenty of time to grow your economy to become independent of it. It really doesn't matter.

If in 20 years time, you are still dependent on the tiny dribblings from your share of those 2.5 milion barrels and STILL haven't found a new revenue source (or better, new revenue sources, plural) for your zone's government, then you are in a helluva lot of trouble. And will have much bigger concerns than whether you negotiated a 10% or 15% cut 20 years ago.

Imo, you should approach this with the mindset that in 20 years time, your region will be self-sufficient enough that even if the SS decides to secede, your zone will be fine.

That is certainly the way I'm approaching this issue, at least. Oil ultimately doesn't matter. It is a short-term crutch my zone is dependent on right now, but certainly with 20 years (and I'd argue as little as 10 years), we can wean ourselves off of it.

Youth service should also be made purely a zonal affair. No more of this slave labor stuff that the FG demands of Nigerians.

oyb:
personally, i agree with this bill

plus no generator for public official

naija hospitals only

public schools only

unless their looting directly impacts on them - nigeria will continue on this path

I just don't understand how they are legally enforceable. How can you make such a law? How is it even enforceable? I don't think you can pass laws anyhow that violate people's rights. I cannot pass a law making someone a slave, for example.

Anyway, if it were me and someone tried to put this law into place, I'd just transfer custody of my kids to a trusted friend abroad, or something.

Aren't there better ways of bring accountability for lawmakers?

Top test takers should go to university. But for the rest, there is nothing wrong with a good technical education that'll prepare them for a career. Being a plumber, electrician, other such careers still can pay very well.

The German model is the one we should adopt, not this useless American model of encouraging everyone to go to university by force

So rather than fixing the Lagos-Ibadan road, power supply, this is the bill these useless politicians have time for?

As my old man would say, they are majoring in minor

1. What is your basis for saying that the 100k they charge doesn't represent a subsidy? Have you looked through their books and verified that the state government isn't sending money the school's way? Perhaps the true cost w/o any state gov't assistance would be N150k.
2. I agree with the idea of "equal shot at life" up to high school level. Past that, should be pure merit/competiton. Imo, let the guys above the 90th or 95th percentile of JAMB test takers get heavy assistance, those at the 85th percentile get some assistance.  I might even be convinced to set the threshold as low as 70 or 80.
But to set the threshold at 32.54, as this guy says with his comment that everyone who got above 180 should go to college (see this chart here for where I got this # from: http://i53.tinypic.com/28br6mo.jpg)? That to me is nonsense. If you cannot even achieve the 50th percentile on JAMB, what business do you have going to college? Let alone asking for assistance to go!

There was that black woman who started off low at some job in an ivy league school, but lied on her resume to get the job.

She eventually rose to the top position in the admissions department of the school. When it was found out that she lied 30 years earlier for the entry level position, she was fired.

I'd find the article, but my google-fu seem to be failing me atm.

I dunno, if you are low-level you can probably get away with it. But I think most prominent people who falsify their achievements here eventually get outed and caught.

Certainly at the level of CEO, VP, federal/state/etc government level, you'd get in trouble if you were found to be a liar

How is this even constitutional? So if your son gains admission to Harvard, he shouldn't go?

Very silly proposal

Who will pay for the education of this engineer who will end up as a cab driver?

If he wants to do it himself, or it is his family and friends paying for it, more power to him.

But if you want to make society in general or the taxpayer to pay for it, I think that taxpayer is entitled to ask some hard questions, yes?

I don't see how it is a good use of limited resources to spend money training an engineer who will end up a cab driver.

I know some folks who go to college here in the US, spend 4 years in university and end up with jobs that only require a HS education to do. And even the US, as wealthy a country as it is, it makes such people bear the costs of such decisions themselves (imagine borrowing $100k to go to college to then get a job that pay $20k or $30k/year. Might sound insane, but people do stupid things like this all the time. . . essentially selling themselves into slavery by borrowing money for a useless education that won't improve their lot in life.)

If even a rich country like the US makes people bear the costs of their educational decisions, how much more a poor country like Nigeria?

edoyad:
it has to do with the requirements the employers ask for.
For instance, You call for applicants who have atleast a B Sc, 3 years working experience and not to be more than 27 years in age. The problem is someone who was originally supposed to spend 4 years in school ends up spending 6 to 7 due to strikes and what not. You then have to spend one year in youth service before getting employed. Now how do you fit 3 years working experience into that resume without shooting past 27 years ?

Got it. Makes sense. So high supply and low demand => age discrimination.

Understandable why people misrepresent things then, I guess.

And in the name of God, hand over all existing federal roads to the zones! No more federal roads! Jesus. Argh. WTF were we thinking letting this incompetent FG be in charge of critical infrastructure like roads? That you have to beg and plead for them to maintain what they own?

Railways as well. . . somehow federal control of this needs to be loosened.

National petroleum subsidy also needs to be removed. Let the regions decide this independently themselves. If the SS for example decides to subsidize fuel for its people, that is fine. Let them do so. But that doesn't mean it should be done in every zone.

The FG should not be the one who determines where airports, universities, etc are built. Cede this power purely to the zones as well.

National distribution grid must also be broken up, in my opinion. Split into 6 pieces, let each zone manage separately. Let each zone decide how it wants to provide power for itself, too.

I remember how OBJ sabotaged Tinubu's efforts to provide power for Lagos. Imagine how much of a set back that was to the fortunes of this country? What if he had been able to pull that off? Wouldn't all of Lagos State be powered today? The state's per capita GDP would probably have been growing 4%+ faster a year (e.g., 10% rather than 6%), if not for that mor0nic and evil decision by OBJ.

Let each zone regulate power, its pricing, etc itself.

If they want to subsize electricity in the NE or NW zone rather than letting the free market determine pricing, they should be the one that bears the benefit/risks of that decision, not all of us.

If in the SW we decide to let the market determine the price rather than providing subsidy, let us also bear the benefit/risks of that decision alone.

edoyad:
She's just an average Nigerian. I can confidently estimate that 60% to 70% doctor their dates of births, first school leaving certificates or year of graduation from college.
Even where i work right now, can you believe up to 80% of us during pre- employment interview presented Declaration of Age certificates rather than Birth Certificates ? This is for people who were born in the late 70s and early 80s.
It's something very common here, not shady, not devious, but common practise.

What is the point of it, though? Is there age discrimination in Nigeria or something? If so, unfortunate.

If we can go back to the old days when the zones/regions were strong, Nigeria can be great again.

There are many different revenue sources the FG gets right now.

My general impression is that the list looks like follows (if we rank by %ge of revenue):

1) Onshore oil
2) offshore oil
3) VAT
4) Customs
5) Corporate Income Tax

But I don't have any hard data to back this up, unfortunately.

All of these should be subject to discussion, I think. I feel that justice demands that the oil producing communities eventually gain control over this onshore oil production. Space it out over 20 years and the non-oil producing parts should be able to grow the rest of their economies/tax bases to compensate for the loss of revenue. We could even do survive if it were spaced out over 10 years, though this would be more painful.

But imo, not only will #1 need to be changed, #2, #3, #4 and #5 will also need to be discussed.

Btw, this is another big part of the constitution that needs to fixed is the limited ability for states to tax. Corporate income tax, the FG reserves for itself. VAT tax, FG again reserves. Even a LG should have the power to charge a VAT if it likes (at least in the US, the equivalent of a LG [a county] can charge its own sales tax.)

And certainly, a state should be able to charge corporate income tax if it wants. No real reason for the FG to retain these powers if we truly believe in federalism.

I'd also like to see regional police. Let the FG retain the army, let regions have their own local police force.

I've already mentioned zonal constitutions as well.

I think if we do all these things, everyone can grow at their own pace. And Nigeria has a much higher chance of remaining one.

What does "guaranteed jobs" mean? What is a "guaranteed" job?

I just don't see why you'll spend more money on increasing the # of university graduates when even the ones you are producing cannot find jobs in the career they were trained for at university.

What is the point of subsidizing the education of another engineer if he will work as a cab driver after he graduates? Seems like a waste, no?

(Btw, I am implicitly assuming that there will some sort of enormous increase in the existing subsidies of university education going on if they plan to go from 400k to 800k by 2016.)

Is this a good idea? Is the 400k/year entering university too low? Sounds like a lot to me, more than enough. Thing is, are there jobs even for the 400k who graduate?

BY NGOZI OBOH
August 6, 2011 09:26PM
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Over one million candidates scored 180 and above in the last Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination and are qualified to gain admission, but Julius Okojie, the Executive Secretary of the National Universities Commission (NUC), said only about 400,000 candidates will be admitted into the university system. He said the facilities on ground cannot accommodate all. He said his new administration will focus on improving access to education and is aiming at increasing the number of students that will be admitted into universities to 800,000 within the next five years. Excerpts:

Stabilising the university system

For us at the National Universities Commission, we have made progress through the reforms we have had. We have more divisions and departments that address issues we are having in the universities. For the first time, we are addressing the issues of entrepreneurship, leadership and counselling and presently, we have talked about improvement in programmes. We are talking about gerontology, mechatronics; new programmes we think that will really push the system forward to address the issues that are our national needs.

To a large extent, we have improved the quality of programming because there are more programmes now with full accreditation.

More than ever before, we have effective monitoring of the university system. Through our prompting, government now has adopted a platform for appointment of principal officers in universities. We have a better deal in terms of the remuneration of teachers today than ever before and because of the in-depth analysis of what the problems were, we have a backlog of history and documents that we can always fall back to address the issues that are germane in the system. More importantly, we have a very strong hold on the university system, whether it is under-graduate or post-graduate. Benchmark minimum academic standard has been provided. Even for post-graduate, we didn’t have benchmark before; we now have started accreditation for MBA.

Now we have expanded access through the recommendation for the approval of private universities. During this period under review, we have almost 30 or 40 new universities. I must say that we now have relative level of stability because we are now addressing the issue of remuneration. The rapport between the commission and the universities out there is not interaction in terms of monitoring. What you see is not all that is going on because we have a lot to do within the system here than just inviting universities and getting their issues resolved.

Increase in funding

There is also more funding through the Education Trust Fund (ETF). Recently, the ETF launched the guidelines for accessing the N3 billion research grant. There is the STEP-B 180 million dollars. So all these are coming within the system. There is also more money in terms of staff development and capacity building. So we have become more effective than ever before. I think that in respect to quality of teachers, we have greater teacher quality today because ETF has in the past three provided a lot of fund for teacher development and retention.

Recently, we created new department to address the issues that are very crucial in the system.

Improving access to education

Now, our target is to ensure that the university system have more programmes that are relevant to national need and that are relevant to addressing global issues. Our target is to ensure that we tag on to the ministry’s objective and the turnaround strategies of making education a priority. Of course we should be talking about more students entering the system. Within the next five years, we should be talking about hitting, 800,000 students in the university system through the normal and natural means. If we improve the Open and Distance Learning (ODL) and the National Open University, we can achieve this. For us to improve access, open and distance learning have become a very critical aspect of our responsibility. Very soon we are going to have interaction with the British Council on ODL. If you look at the ODL in India, it is able to address the issue of access for over 1.8 million. Here we have 1.5 million applicants, but we are not able to take 400,000 students. That is an issue. We are not talking about failure in JAMB. The policy meeting says whoever scores 180 and above can enter the university system. About one million scored 180 and above, but there is no space for them. There are people who are 27 years old still struggling to enter the university; they can go do the ODL, work and go to school. We have provided the guideline for ensuring these things are in place.

Creating minimum academic standards

In the next 100 days, we plan that the curriculum that have been under review will be completed and all programmes that do not have benchmark minimum academic standard will have, because we have to drive that system effectively. Then we must be able to digitalise all the physical masterplan of the university system, so that we can sit down here and monitor what they do.

Then some of the nine new universities are likely to take off in the next 100 days and my belief is that a quarter or more of them would have taken off effectively. We also think that we would have gone through the process of routine responsibility of honouring our distinguished professors. We have a programme we call distinguished professors award. It will take place.

We are going to key into the full programmes of the ministry of education. But more important is that we would set a platform on which we are going to launch the success of education story in the next five years. In the next 100 days we would know what direction we are going and what it takes to achieve it. We will identify the turnaround strategy because from the education roadmap, we are going to pull out what is responsible for the progress we are going to make.

We will have something on the menu. The next 100 days will determine what the next five years will look like.

Staff and student audit

We are also sending out signals that any university that is 15 years and above if it has not made arrangements to move to the permanent site will stand the risk of closing shop because enabling environment for learning and physical facilities are very important. You cannot lock yourself in a two hectare shop and think you will make progress. This is what we are going to do to ensure effective monitoring. We do not keep adequate data. In the next 100 days we want to start staff and students audit. We do not know how many students that are genuinely in the system. Lecturers teach in two or three places and we now have information that some people keep two permanent jobs which is scandalous in the system. We should be able to have some good enough data to take off. If we do that, we will know who is teaching where and where there is deficiency. We cannot be sure we are meeting the demands. Government has to be ready and give it the wings we require by ensuring enough funds for staff development. China and India did it. You cannot pay lip service to staff development.

Instituitional accreditation

We have advertised for accreditors and are harvesting all their CVs. There is a budget for it, which has gone through a process. In the next one or two months, we would have completed the exercise. That is going to happen and there is no doubt about that. The board has approved that we go ahead.

http://234next.com/csp/cms/sites/Next/Home/5738034-146/story.csp

*shrug*

I am sure that they value your opinion as much as I do. So needless to say, they will continue talking

Too many things about this woman are shady

Either the analogy is warped, or you are too slow to pick it up.

In any case, Repubs (when they are in opposition) and Democrats (when in opposition) say dumb things all the time. They also say good things all the time.

That ACN has said one dumb thing now doesn't mean they don't have a right to speak.