Hello fellas,

So sorry for the delay. MTN decided to show me ni o

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Hello folks. Was not sure where to post this but since it has stuff to do with cars and roads, I have decided to drop it here.

So guys, relax and enjoy the ever eventful commute between Lagos and Ibadan on the popular Lagos-Ibadan expressway.

Ehen, people

I dey enter Lagos/Ibadan express o. I'll take pictures as promised and open a thread later today and show you guys the link.

Abeg someone should put big stout in the cornerpiece of the fridge in aticipation of my arrival. It is not good to drink & drive.

Cheers mates.

Hmmn...

Oloso na the 'living ponmo' o

People I hail o.

Bros OAM4J, my sis Berem, for your kind words, wishes and effective effectiveness. I will do as bidded tomorrow.

Abeg gimme that single tree that makes a forest... The one and only big stout, criminally cold.

One cannot kill himself jare.

Any thing on the asun guy yet? Na wa o

berem: Have your drink.

There have been threads about the Lagos Ibadan expressway undergoing repairs. Can you please confirm if the contractors handling the road are on ground?

Thanks jare. God bless. This beer cold die. Ebariba

As of today, there is no significant work going on o. Between Ibadan and Ogere Toll gate, RCC has cleared the bush of selected parts of the median. That was all RCC has done.

Shortly after Sagamu, (en route Lagos from Ib) to your left on the outwards Lagos inwards Sagamu axis, it appears JB is setteing up a camp... and it appears they are really slow in setting it up. In fact equipment there today was not as many as the equipmet moved there when bros Jona announced the initial award on TV. Some red and white brick barrier can be seen, but not indicative of major works on going. No lights, warning to road users, or heavy duty grading, excavation scapping etc.

Will take the road again on Friday. I hope I can do that during the day. I'll take pictures of eveything on-going and make available.

Nice to meet y'all

Make una no vex. My first name na Niyi. I don tay for this Nairaland gaan, but recently I just dey siddon look.

I don waka naija and obodo oyinbo wella, so my views on politics are a little different from the regular Joe's.

My favorite drink is the one and only St. James' Park, aka 1759, aka Udeme, aka Guiness Stout... Preferrably the big bottle.

Abeg, OAM4J when you wan employ person wey dey do asun? That suya don tire person like me. Cow meat no dey digest easily like goat own. Age no favor boys again o. Digestive system dey quick vex. Try do something abeg.

Who dey bring my stout na?

*Looks around* I hail o, people.

Can I have big stout jare...? Mortuary Standard. The drive from Ibadan to Lagos has worn me out. The pot-holes dem dey vex.

berem: So you want to give bribe? Okija you are a disappointment.! I know of someone who does drivers license and you collect it shaparly. The new drivers license o! she's in Lagos anyway. na backyard business she dey do sha.Original drivers license!! she works with FRSC I don't know much about the vehicle plate number.

Nne, abeg gimme the link to this license woman na... The horror movies coming out of folks that have been to FRSC scares the &$#*@! outta me o

Even South Africans complain about that scam called dstv...

http://m.news24.com/channel24/Pages/Comments/CommentList.aspx?aid=cfca7166-718b-4aed-93ac-9891bd1ef06c&sid=4&cid=5591

What is going on with regards to the Second Niger Bridge is PRELIMINARY works. The president will actually flag off the commencement of the main work. With regards to the Lagos-Ibadan road, if the contractors are not on site now, then maybe they'r waiting for heavy rains to abate. The road is in the 2013 budget so nothing will stall work.

^^^
Sincerely, this is the first time I am hearing a whole CIC flag off stuff. I'd think the finishing deserves the revelry. My thoughts.

However, we have had the longest August break in years. Lots would have been achieved had work started immediately. Oyo, Osun and Ogun state Governments are carrying on with constructions even with the 'rains' using less advanced contractors. It is only in Nigeria we hear excuses of not being able to construct roads during the rains. This was a clear diversionary tactic in the military era. Sad it is surfacing again.

JB does massive contructions inside water worldwide. I doubt some West African rain can hinder them from working. We have to demand what we want, else...

I did Lagos-Ibadan again today as I informed earlier. Status: Same ol', Same ol'

Cheers

awodman:
Did you go near Luboro junction or the RCCG?.. because according to the Channels Tv report,that's where work is been concentrated for now

Dude, there is no way you'll commute the entire express without passing through the zone you just mentioned.

When the road reconstruction was awarded on TV in November last year, we saw loads of equipment on that road and it was the work done then that still makes the road passable till date.

Like I said earlier, I'll be on that road again tomorrow and I'll report if there are any repairs on it.

awodman:
Don't come here and lie and expect to go away with..contrary to your claims work has started on that road


www.channelstv.com/home/2013/08/02/frsc-cautions-road-users-as-work-begins-on-lagos-ibadan-expressway/

I took the road on Wednesday morning and not an iota of work has started on it.

I'll take it again tomorrow and I'll give updates if anything has been done.

Here we go again...

Was it so difficult getting messrs Julius Berger and RCC handle this? Or does the president's word not hold water as he awarded this himself on national tv? Or do I say his decision was not thought through? IF (note the word 'IF') true, could it be the same way a lot of 'Presidential' decisions are taken without an appropriate 'thinking through'? #mythoughts.

Seven construction firms have been shortlisted for the reconstruction/rehabilitation of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.

This is coming at a time that the traffic situation at several bad portions of the road has worsened due to the advent of the rains. And as the condition of the road continues to deteriorate, gridlock has become a constant feature on both sides of the highway.

The names of the shortlisted firms, according a source at the Federal Ministry Works, have been sent to the Bureau of Public Procurement for ratification.

The source said the BPP was expected to issue a certificate of no objection, which would clear one or two of the construction companies for the project.

“Once the BPP has issued the certificate of no objection, the ministry will present the name(s) of the contractors to the Federal Executive Council for final approval,” the source said.

Although the cost of the reconstruction could not be ascertained at press time, it was learnt that the Federal Government would fully fund the project.

The Minister of Works, Mr. Mike Onolememen, had last year announced the termination of the concession agreement with Bi-Courtney Highway Services for the reconstruction of the 125-kilometre road, accusing the firm of serially breaching the terms of the contract signed by it and the Federal Government on May 26, 2009 under the late President Umaru Yar’Adua.

Julius Berger Nigeria Plc and RCC Nigeria Limited were immediately hired to take over the job. The former was given the Lagos-Sagamu Interchange end, while the latter got the section between the interchange and Ibadan.

However, their remedial work was only to prepare the road for the high volume of traffic during the 2012 Christmas and the New Year festivities.

Since the two contractors withdrew from the road at the beginning of this year, motorists and commuters have been encountering serious gridlock and have been exposed to avoidable accidents and robberies following the deplorable state of the road.

But the ministry said it had to return to the drawing board to prepare a fresh design for the road and get contractors to bid in line with due process guidelines.

The minister had said on a television programme monitored in Lagos last week that the new design would incorporate a fly-over at the Redeemed Camp area to reduce traffic jam.

He said, “We plan to construct a flyover around the area where we have a number of churches, which usually lead to bottleneck, particularly around the Redeemed Church.

“We have now introduced a flyover around there to separate the traffic to the church and the thorough traffic that is traversing from Lagos to other states. That is going to solve the problem around the Redemption Camp permanently.”

Onolememen also said, “We opened the bids (for Lagos-Ibadan Expressway) last year and we have finally analysed the bids and they have gone to the Bureau of Public Procurement for letter of no objection.

“Once we receive the letter of no objection from BPP, the project will be awarded and Nigerians will once again see contractors in full swing.”

Under the Design, Build, Operate and Transfer agreement with Bi-Courtney was expected to refurbish the road with N89.53bn and collect tolls on it for 25 years in order to recoup its investment.

The scope of work involved the provision of two additional lanes in either direction between Lagos and the Sagamu Interchange, making it four lanes; the provision of associated facilities for the security and welfare of road users, as well as ensuring a free flow of traffic.

http://www.punchng.com/news/seven-firms-shortlisted-for-lagos-ibadan-expressway-reconstruction/

freezy: Just press the 'ignore' button. It works wonders.

visalo:

Who is your pay master? Tinubu or APC? what make you to classify east west road as terrible experience...is it because portharcourt to warri which use be to 3 to 4hrs has being reduced to 2:30mins jouney due to the massive contruction going on that road. Please don`t come and misinform people with lies on this forum....it is a pity that some of us are head bend on alter of hatred to criticize the president for every thing...please stop this kind of game because it will not favor you in any way..both section of warri to patani is almost fully dualized...the only section that remain now is the yenagoa and ahoda...portharcourt to uyo is almost 80 percent completed. work is going on in all the bridges.

Paymaster? That is the most "un-cerebral" response I have seen in a while. I narrated my experience from PH to Yenagoa, and you say Paymaster? But then, how come that the part I travelled coincides with the part that is uncompleted? Jeez. Anyone that has done the route I went through will validate my statements. I only hope you have the intellectual capacity to understand my points. Eiiish.

Sincere 9gerian:
The Oyo-Ogbomoso road is actually in three sections and what was completed is section I. Sorry I didn't add that. The Makurdi- Gboko roads was listed under ONGOING projects. As for the Lagos-Ibadan road, what the two contractors went in to do on the road between December and January was emergency palliative repair (ie repair of very bad portions), the same thing that was done on Enugu-PH road. Considering that the road is already expired, it is possible that new very bad portions have developed again. However, the road has been slated for full reconstruction beginning this year.

If interventions on all the roads listed under ONGOING projects does not qualify as massive, then maybe you should tell us the definition of massive. Some of those roads, as a unit, are upto hundreds of km. Eg, the East-west is over 300km, the Kano-Maiduguri is over 400km,etc

By the way, are you insinuating that all media houses should be closed since "a good job speak for itself"

On the contrary, not at all. That was totally unnecessary. Media houses will always continue to exist. We cannot begin an education of the economic impact of media houses here. At a certain stage in this country, power improved tremendously. We all acknowledged that improvement. Media houses too. That is what I mean when I said to 'Speak for itself'.

I have already defined what I felt massive ought to be. Maybe I have huge hopes and expectations (and a massive appetite too). I only feel that this topic does not aptly describe the actual state of roads which I am familair with.

Thank you.

ogugua88:

[size=13pt]Lol. I've always known cement and concrete to be used the same. No one makes a deal of that here. Oh well lol.[/size]

Which is where the aforementioned button comes in handy.

ogugua88:

[size=13pt]What exactly is wrong in what I said? The standard road thickness in the US is 11 inches. The German autobahn is 24 or 28 inches, I can't remember. When paving a road, it should be thick for safety purposes. That's common knowledge.

Now, did I say 10-inch cement or 10-inch layer OF cement? Am I still the illiterate?[/size]

Don't mind him, he is just being naughty. He is trying to nail you for using 'Cement' in stead of 'Asphalt' or acceptably 'Concrete'.

Just press the 'ignore' button. It works wonders.

Isn't it ironic that some people want GEJ to fix all the federal roads in 2yrs when state govts have not been able to fix all state roads in 6 or 8yrs. Those who tell us that because one or two roads in their vicinity have not been fixed, NOTHING has been done should be seen as mischief makers, DEVILISH LIARS and propagandists.

The undisputable facts is that federal roads are receiving far far more attention under this govt than ever before in the history of this country.

Activities on the roads in the last 2 to 3years are as follows:

The following roads projects have been COMPLETED:

Vom-Manchok road (Plateau State), Yola-Numan road (Adamawa State), Gombe Bye-pass (Gombe State), Kaduna Refinery road (Kaduna State), Kano-Daura-Mai Adua road (Katsina State), Aba-Owerri road(Abia State), Onitsha-Owerri road (Anambra State), dualization of Oyo-Ogbomosho road (Oyo State), Ijebu Igbo-Ajegunle-Araromi-Ife Sekona road, section II (in Ogun state), Uba-Mbalala road (Borno state), and dualization of access road to Onne Port (Rivers sate)

Massive work is ONGOING in various other highways in the 6 geo-political zones, including ongoing dualisation of Abuja–Abaji–Lokoja Road; Kano–Potiskum–Maiduguri Road; the Benin–Ore–Shagamu Expressway; the Onitsha–Enugu Expressway; the construction of the Loko–Oweto bridge( across River Benue); East-West road; dualisation of Benin-Lokoja road; Vandeikia-Obudu-Obodu Cattle Ranch road (Phase 1) in Benue State; Mbaise-Ngwa road in Imo/Abia states, with bridges at Imo River (Phase 1); Abriba-Arochukwu-Ohafia road, in Abia State (Phase 1); Makurdi-Gboko road Phase 1 Wannune-Yandev section, in Benue; Ohafia Abia State-Oso in Ebonyi; Sections 1A and 1B of Sokoto-Tambuwal-Jega-Kontagora Roads, respectively in Sokoto State, Kebbi and Niger; Kunya-Kanya-Babura-Babban Mutum Road in Jigawa; Zing-Yakoko-Monkin Road in Taraba; Alkeleri-Bauchi Road in Bauchi; Aguoba-Owa-Mgbagbu Owa-Ebenebe at the Anambra border to the Awaha-Oyofo-Iwollo Road in Enugu State; Ofa by-pass in Ofa council in Kwara; the Ikot-Ekpene border-Ada Owerri dualisation section phase one in Akwa-Ibom, Abia and Imo; Utor Bridge project on Asaba-Ebu-Uromi Road in Delta; Oshodi-Apapa road in Lagos; Ijebu Ode road in Ogun; etc, etc

Bad portions on almost all federal roads all over the country, not mentioned above, are being fixed under a massive intervention called Project Safe Passage. The Lagos-Ibadan expressway and Enugu-Portharcourt roads were among roads that received attention under Project Safe Passage.

The Third Mainland bridge was not left out. Late last year, the EIGHT expansion joints of bridge was re-constructed. Recently, the bridge was re-surfaced by FERMA. Currently, the markings and lighting system of the bridge is being fixed by FERMA, in collaboration with SURE-P.

The ICING ON THE CAKE in the road sector this year will be commencement of work on the Second Niger Bridge (by Julius Berger), and commencement of full re-construction of Lagos-Ibadan and Enugu-Portharcourt expressways.

Hi guys,

I do not go around the entire country on road, but I'll speak for the ones I have passed through recently

1. Completed Roads: Oyo - Ogbomoso: It is far from completion. The only completed part is the Oyo-Ibadan axis. You still have to do the meandering form lane to lane on that axis. May I also point out that this road has a poor connection into the Ibadan major roads? This is evidenced by the annoying traffic build up on the Ojoo-Ajibode (such that people have to divert to Shasha) axis. Note: This road contstruction has been on for close to 10 years or more

2. Makurdi-Gboko is far from completion, Annunne (pronounced Wannune) is also far from completion. I did East-West (PH En-route Yenagoa, and Jesus, that was a horrible experience. I also begin to wonder the definition of 'Massive Construction' because the equipment and manpower on ground does not depict my assumption of what massive ought to be. The London underground is about to have another stop @ the Woolich Arsenal station and yes, I can affirm, that is a massive construction. Contsructions going on at the Ibeche Cement plant in my opinion aptly defines "Massive"


3. It will great to know what "Project Safe Passage" intends to achieve. This is because when the Lagos-Ibadan expressway was awarded to JB and RCC respectively, we all rejoiced that in a few months we'd have a lot of respite on the road. JB and RCC did some remedial work on some parts then and before we knew it, they'd all removed their equipment from the road. The sites are empty now and the road is getting worse with each passing day. On Sunday, I spent 4 hours between RCCG Camp and MFM. Funny there was no accident... Just bad roads. It is very regular. The holes are the sizes of gullies and craters. I begin to wonder how difficult it must be to award a contract for road repairs. You won't believe this, but whilst we were grappling with the traffic situation, a government official with about a 14-Jeep convoy got on the opposite side of the road and drove 'One-way' to Lagos. It was appalling.

One thing I have learnt in the course of my work is that, when you have so much to do, you prioritize such that the activities that have major impacts are completed first. Road construction would have been more effective if the ones with major impacts are constructed first. It could be just me, but I really cannot relate with a large number of roads mentioned in the quote. I am WELL traveled within Nigeria by the way.

A good job will speak for itself. I have seen it happen over and over again. But when you need the media to communicate what I ought to see/feel/enjoy, I begin to do a double take.

Cheers.

This bros is always a spoilsport...

Why must he broadcast during Arsenal's match?

Can't one just enjoy Wigan's win without hypertension on what he is about to slam Nigerians with?

And they are still in the House of Reps... Shior

All these bikini statistics. . .

What they reveal is suggestive; but what they conceal is vital.

sheyie2007: WHo be that guy we de name hin car lilian? Lilian ko bukky ni

Funny, quite a coincidence there. That (Bukola/Bukky) is actually my Lady's name. . .

There she is... Her name is Lilian

Used a BMW 3 series (pre COJA) and a honda Civic 1996 Model before buying mine.

First car I bought on my own was the 2006 Toyota Avensis. I was 28. Bought it for 2m then (2nd hand, great shape).
Sold it on Nairaland for 1.8m. Even Inspired M was interested in the sale back then!

https://www.nairaland.com/212840/lovely-cars-below-1-million/3#3507763 That's the link!

I have since used a 2008 Corolla (Bought brand new in 2008, had an accident in December, 2010. . . Total loss)
2007 Honda accord (A friend lost that to armed robbers August 2012)

And I currently do a 2006 Mercedes C-Class. German machines rock!

9% Inflation and Bikini Statistics

Nigeria, I fear, is in grave danger of becoming a serious country when it comes to data gathering and reporting. Exhibit A: Dr. Yemi Kale, Nigeria's Statistician General in charge of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

You may recall him as the man who broke ranks last year by declaring that the agency's data had found that the number of Nigerians living in absolute poverty had increased by 6 percentage points from 2004 to 2010. This is strange as we would normally expect the government to lie about such figures. Or perhaps, the NBS was engaging in a practice known as 'kitchen sinking' i.e. throwing out all the bad news at once so that anything that comes after looks really good? Let us not be too cynical as there's evidence that the NBS is doing some really commendable work.

Yesterday we were inundated with news about how Nigeria's inflation was now 9%, the first time in 5 years we have hit single digit inflation figure. This has been the CBN Governor's target (single digit inflation) for a while now so I suspect the man must be delighted at the news. But what does this all mean?

Normally we would rely on newspapers to translate statistical jargon into plain English for us but alas, our newspapers are either regurgitating, word for word, what NBS said in their report (BusinessDay) or completely, perhaps mischievously, misinterpreting the information (Punch).

First of all, since we are all learners, we need to go down low to the method used in calculating these numbers (I'm sorry, I won't do it again).

The NBS uses a 'basket' of goods to calculate the CPI. This is not a real basket (or is it?) but an attempt to replicate, as closely as possible, the things that ordinary Nigerians buy regularly with their money. The point of this is to track how prices of the same goods are increasing over time. This tracking can, among other things, influence monetary policy e.g. if prices are increasing too quickly, the CBN might take the view that this is caused by too much money in circulation and will then increase interest rates to make it harder for people to spend money 'anyhow'. Here in the UK, inflation numbers are used to determine a whole range of things from the annual increase in train ticket prices to salary increases. So if inflation is 9% and average salary increases in the same period was 5%, then we know we have a problem as people are getting poorer effectively.

So yesterday the NBS told us:

The composite Consumer Price Index (CPI) which measures inflation rose to 9.0 per cent year-on-year In January (compared to 12.0 per cent in December).

This was the highlight of what was reported. Let's unpack it on a point by point basis.

1. The NBS uses 2009 as its 'base year'. Because this is an index, what this means is that the numbers are incremental from 2009. For example, we can assume that a tube of Close-Up toothpaste was in the original basket in 2009. Let's say at that time it cost N50. In the index, this will be given a value of 100. If the NBS then went to the market in 2010 (they actually do) and found that the same toothpaste had gone up to N55 i.e. a 10% increase, the index then becomes 110, a 10% increase.

2. There are 740 different items - some physical goods, some services - in the CPI basket. That is to say the NBS goes to the market to check the prices of these goods every month. There is bread in the basket, there is wine there. There is also repair of clothing (obioma) and of course petrol as well as dental services and hotel accommodation. You get the gist - they try to gather as much price information as possible.

3. Now most people buy Agege bread every week but don't repair their shoes or clothes every week. They buy vegetables, yams, potatoes and 'soft' drinks also very regularly but can go 2 or 3 years without needing to sleep in a hotel room, yet all of these items are in the same basket. What to do? There used to be a French Economist and Statistician named Etienne Laspeyres who died in 1913. Mercifully, before he left this world he came up with a way of calculating a price index that is now known as the Laspeyres Index. If you do not know what this index means or the formula behind it, I promise you, a single strand of hair will not be removed from your body. But if you insist, it is here.

The NBS uses Laspeyres Index to calculate Nigeria's CPI. In other words it uses a globally accepted standard. There are other methods used by different countries but Laspeyres is very much mainstream.

As stated above, some items are purchased more often than others and as such have more of an impact on the wallet than others e.g. petrol more than shoe repairs. So weightings have to be applied such that some items in the basket carry more weight than others to reflect as closely as possible what Nigerians are spending their money on. Again, for example, we can say that if people buy bread once a week but buy petrol once a month, we will give bread a weighting 4 times higher than petrol etc.

Perhaps I have missed it but I cannot find the overall weighting used by the NBS but I am told by several people that food items account for 60% of the weight of the basket. This makes sense - we have a lot of poor people in the country and a feature of poverty is a lack of disposable income to attend a concert featuring Kim Kardashian. Food comes first.

4. To make things even more complex, there is plenty of price distortion and information asymmetry in Nigeria - the price of bread will vary even within a state like Lagos and there really isn't any readily available way for someone in Lekki to know how much it is sold in Ojodu. Before we then move to other states and start to get all sorts of wildly different prices for the same products. What this means is that NBS cannot sit in Abuja or Lagos and collect prices then tell us inflation is x percent. To arrive at a single inflation figure that will be credible, we need to gather as much information about it as possible.

Thankfully, the NBS seems to have risen to this challenge. It reports that every month 10,534 informants across the 36 states of the federation and Abuja send it around 3,774 prices on various items. Whereas a UK statistician can simply go to Tesco or even online to obtain prices, the job of the Nigerian statistician is infinitely harder and more open to errors due to this manual process of data gathering. But this is far better than pulling numbers out of their behind.

5. We are nearly there. Apart from obtaining prices on a state by state basis, the NBS also splits them into urban and rural prices based on population figures. So the urban prices carry a 46% weight inside the basket while rural prices carry 54%. This is broadly in line with the 2006 census figures per Nigeria's population distribution.

There is also a split between a Farm Produce Index (basically raw food prices) and a Core Index (stuff that's been processed), but we can get away with not worrying about this.

So now we have a fairly rough idea of the plumbing underneath the NBS' headline inflation figures. We can thus interpret the 9% figure better. Again let's do it on a point by point basis.

1. In January 2013, the CPI rose by 9% on a year on year basis. What this means is that when the NBS compared the prices of the items in the basket in January 2012 to the prices it obtained from those informants in January 2013, it found that overall, the basket was 9% more expensive this year than last year. Please note that we are only comparing January 2012 to January 2013 and not anything that might have happened in between.

Imagine a chap named Faye (yes it's a girl's name but for this example it will have to be a guy). Faye only buys 4 items every month when he goes to the market - Yams, Ogogoro, Ponmo and Toothpaste. He also manages to stay sober enough to record the prices he pays for those 4 items every month when he goes to the market. This is what he recorded for January 2012 and January 2013


N
N
Jan-12 Jan-13
Yams 100 90
Ogogoro 50 60
Ponmo 40 46
ToothP 35 49.25

225.00 245.25




2. So is this 9% inflation increase year on year a good or a bad thing? It depends.Compared to January last year, Yams have dropped by 10% in price but sadly his beloved Ogogoro and Ponmo as well as toothpaste have all gone up in price. The total effect of what has happened to him - assuming his salary has not increased - is that he is now paying 9% more for the same things compared to a year ago. There might have been a Ponmo glut in the market in June 2012 which caused the prices to drop to N20 but Faye didn't stock up then, so in January 2013 that is irrelevant to him.

Undoubtedly, a single digit inflation rate is much better than a double digit one. There is no debate about this. But the NBS also remind us of what happened in January 2012 - fuel subsidy was removed and in the confusion, prices went up arbitrarily as everyone from bus drivers to market women tried to protect themselves from the price shock. There was also a strike which paralysed businesses meaning that scarcity would have also caused prices to go up. The most important thing to note here is that what happened last January was not normal. In fact January is generally known to be a 'broke' month - everyone is coming down from the high of Christmas and New Year spending and the IJGBs (I Just Got Backs aka returnees) would also have left the country with their inflationary pounds and dollars. So we would expect prices in January to be restrained in a normal January.

Unfortunately, as impressive as they are, this is where the NBS numbers stop making sense at least to me.

According to them, prices in January 2010 were 12.6% higher compared to January 2009. In January 2011, prices were 12.1% higher compared to January 2010. In January 2012 - this is the crucial one - prices were 10.9% higher than January 2011 and of course in January 2013 they were 9%.

Let's go back to what NBS said in their report yesterday;

The relative moderation of the Headline index from 12.0 in December to 9.0 in January could be largely attributed to base effects- These are as a result of higher price levels in the previous year, which imply that the year-on-year changes exhibited this year will be muted. In particular, the Nigerian economy exhibited several shocks in January 2012. The partial repeal of the Premium Motor Spirit (Petrol) subsidy led to increases in transportation costs as well as secondary effects, as the transportation costs affected both food and non-food prices. There were also the civil protests which followed, and the man-made price gouging during the month, as merchants tried to take advantage of temporary shortages.

The NBS are telling us that the reason for the 9% rise - the first single digit rise we have seen in 5 years - was that January 2012 prices were already very high due to those abnormal shocks the economy witnessed. Fair enough. But why is this shock not reflected in January 2012? From the figures I quoted above, you can see that when January 2012 was compared to January 2011, the increase was only 10.9%, certainly not the sign of a shocked economy anywhere. Or were the January 2012 numbers wrong? Did the methodology change? (I suspect this is the answer). You cannot say on the one hand that inflation in January 2013 was single digit because a lot of pain was frontloaded in January 2012 and then present figures that do not show the slightest hint of any pain for January 2012.

Interestingly, prices in December 2012 were 12% higher when compared to December 2011. In turn, December 2011 was 10.8% higher when compared to December 2010. This even makes more sense as a 'shocked' economy than the January figures and we know for a fact that fuel subsidy didn't go until January. Was the economy 'shocking' in anticipation?

It is possible that the economy is now more stable. It is possible that this stability has allowed people to worry less about the future and as a result, the kind of anxiety that might normally cause prices to go up in Nigeria is now reduced. This is a good enough reason for inflation to slow down and in fairness to the NBS they do use the word 'could' implying that there were other factors at play.

As I stated earlier, I also strongly believe that the methodology or weighting of the basket has been changed in the last year which is probably responsible for the fall in the CPI. Regardless, these figures will be useless if there is no consistency over time. And if the NBS are telling us one thing and the numbers are saying another, then it would be hard to place any confidence in their numbers which is the entire point of the whole exercise.

They say statistics are like a bikini, what they reveal is very suggestive but what they conceal is even more vital.

FF

Source:http://aguntasolo.com/2013/02/19/9-inflation-and-bikini-statistics/

Thanks, boss.

Really appreciate this. The car checks out after all. Thanks again.

Hi there...

Could you kindly look up this VIN?

Thank you so much.

Best regards.

WDBRF61J15F578708

Hello! Kindly help look up this VIN...

WDBRF61J15F578708

Email is freezeyo@yahoo.com

Thank you.