₦airaland Forum

ugoonuoha:
Hi House,

For someone who's working in central London (Zone 1). What's the most cost-effective place to live currently?
I know there's a lot of options but here are some factors to consider:
- 3 days onsite / 2 days remote
- Safe family oriented area
- 2 bedroom / 2 bathroom ideally (new build preferably)
- willingness to travel approx. 1hr to work. (2hrs to/fro)

Some areas being considered;
- Reading (benefiting from new Elizabeth line)
- Maidenhead
- St Neots
- Luton
- Watford etc.

I have already done some research but looking for more "qualitative" inputs based on personal experience.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated! Thanks

You didn’t mention your budget. In addition to other suggestions, you might also want to consider East London and Essex towns on the C2C line. Barking, Dagenham, Rainham, Purfleet, Grays Tilbury, South Ockendon, Chafford hundred, Aveley, Basildon etc. You should get an apartment to your spec for £1.1 to £1.3 per month in some of these areas. Travel time to central London is 35 mins on this line from Grays of course excluding. time from your house to the train station.

Thamesmead, Erith, Dartford, Gravesend, Greenhithe, SevenOaks are also very good options in Kent with good transport links into central London.

Lastly, if you have kids you’ll want to also consider an area with good schools more strongly than your transit time.

Reference:
Exactly what I have been saying for years and shouting from the roof tops when we they were flying Mr. Buhari's anti corruption toga like a kite. We told them that corruption was not the problem of Nigeria but STRUCTURE, one not attuned to productivity.

Can you remember the infamous Obi's debate with Mr. Osinbajo and the tale of the rats in the shop....
I bet Mr. VP will be gobsmacked at what has befallen Nigeria after their anti-corruption crusade and the 'wealth' it has brought Nigeria....

And where will revenue come from if not productivity, the productivity primarily anchored in the roots of industrialization from which all other branches of the economy spring forth.

And where will industrialization come from, what will trigger it, yes, big budget infrastructural expenditure and here lies the twin follies of poverty that has crashed our economy today.

Our industrialization drive and infrastructural spending failed to meet our biggest wasteful expenditure, we did not invest in petroleum refining insisting on railways instead and after borrowing heavily for that, we gave everything over to the chinese to build robbing us of the industrial trigger required to build a productive economy.

This is where intelligent, visionary leadership is critical. Leaders who know INDEED how to create wealth, how to build economies from scratch, how to wean this country from consumerism, rent-seeking and round tripping....

100% agree. One aspect of our problem stems from a lack of identity. Are we a socialist economy or a capitalist one? On one hand we seem to want to run things from a socialist perspective, for example, keeping refineries that haven’t generated income in decades, or operating our health and education system strictly on Government funding, petrol subsidies and the likes. Challenge is we don’t have revenues to support these things at a decent level and it further discourages productivity as you’ve rightly said.

Also, the citizens themselves seem to want intellectual leaders but we don’t end up voting for any. Without becoming political, we’ve never had a truly intellectual President in my opinion. This is a problem as politicians will only make decisions that serve their interests even if it is against the greater good. Putting in a productivity based structure means vested interests can no longer induce votes with money, garri and rice. It makes power/elective positions less attractive to individuals who want to enjoy the largesse of power, rather than work for the good of the nation.

We need to wake up as a people and begin to make the tough decisions needed to move forward.

NOwazobia:
Then first eradicate corruption before talking of taxes.

Well yes. The lower corruption there is the more confidence citizens have towards taxes. However, it’s a bit of a chicken and egg as eradicating corruption will always be an ongoing activity.

The government needs to be very very intentional around both and do them simultaneously.

mrvitalis:
Nigeria makes less than 25 billion dollars a year from oil .......for a country of 150 million that's nothing ...that should be Lagos revenue

Until every Nigerian pay average of 150,000 naira in tax its impossible to develop this country

You’ve hit the nail in the head. We are too many for the revenue being generated by the government. I do think the fallacy of oil money means the average Nigerian think we are rich.

Even if we eradicate corruption 100%, Nigeria will not turn to Dubai until the government increases revenues significantly.

Zonefree:
The complete table shows 9ja no try at all. A country of over 200 million people struggling with just 35 medals. Scotland with just 5 million people got 49 medals.

What of India with over 1 billion people?

Good suggestions all round. Sadly we have a dead FG led by a disinterested president. These Governors must have gotten a consultant to come up with these ideas. No way those men thought of all these ideas on their own.

Leads to regrets 99.99% of the time.

Here’s an old nairaland post with evidence they are long time business partners in Intel. They are actually good friends in real life (or atleast they used to be).

https://www.nairaland.com/4797308/atiku-sold-part-intel-tinubu

samint1:
Una good morning o. For those that have booked and written the Provisional Driving Licence test how did you get a closer or desired date for the test?
Provisional just arrived within a week of posting the form back and I have been trying to get test date but no available slots months away.
I need guidance pls �

What I did was to Download an app - Driving Test Cancellations Now. There’s many apps but this has a red icon. The app will try to find a cancellation appointment for you and book it automatically.

It is more effective outside London in my experience as there’s less struggle for dates / less people using these sort of apps. Also, the app can help book in a different test center so you can choose up to 3 test centers for it to search for cancellation test appointments. For example, you book in a far location for a far away date (if no closer test center is available on DVSA website when making the original booking) and the app moves it to a closer test center and date for you based on your preference.

Lastly, the app is not free. Good luck !

Famoustemmy:
From what I heard from people that has been to that country called morocco, he said, Moroccan doesn't like other Africa country, they wished they are not in Africa at all.

Strange cause Morocco has been trying to join ECOWAS for years unsuccessfully.

https://mipa.institute/7323

INEC can’t register fictitious names as each registration is tied to a biometric id.

The north takes elections very seriously. Even more than the WAEC some of us are quoting. They will gladly mobilize their people to come out enmass to vote, whilst the southerners continue to think votes don’t count.

Lots of Eastern European countries are worse off in my view: Moldova, Belarus, Georgia, Northern Cyprus

Nice analysis OP.

I do think the political parties are raising these fees because a grass root based fund raising mechanism for parties in Nigeria is non-existent so parties can only rely on sales of forms for revenue generation.

In the states most people who belong to a party will make contributions as little as $1 towards their preferred candidates and this adds up when millions are genuinely donating for the campaign of their preferred candidate.

The parties need to be innovative. Once they can crack fund raising at scale, then our politics will be unshackled from Godfatherism and money bags who sponsor candidates in expectation of favors to a large extent.

Someone claiming to be a forensics expert should be wise enough to provide facts backing up her 75% claim. Sad tale of pot calling kettle black in this country. People who don’t know anything just open their mouths and are given audience by journalists.

kode12:
House, people with all electric houses, how is your billing like? I'm looking at a property that uses electricity for heating with a storage heater. EPC rating is C, with no reasonable options to upgrade it.

Averaging £120-£160 per month. All electric 2bedroom, prepaid meter on economy 7 with storage heaters - Though those don’t work anymore and landlord switched to panel heaters etc.

aragbaboy:
I am about insuring my car in the UK. Please which UK insurance company accept a No Claims Discount from an insurance company in Nigeria?

Marshmallow does.

ibk5891:
Thank you for this info bro. i will surely apply asap then.

can i get more coroboration on this? Is it true i can apply right away without waiting for the 183 days?

i no won waste money oh!

You can apply right away. The DVLA has a huge backlog at the moment so do it online and it’ll come with a few weeks, much faster than paper applications.

The USA can do some annoying things.

Will the UK or a European country create such a website in the USA? The USA has enough problems of their own that they haven’t resolved. Institutional racism, police brutality, corruption (though theirs is very very coded).

We should be mature enough to be left to resolve our problems rather than this condescending approach. How does the US plan to act on the reports? Seeing as they have no jurisdiction to try anybody or any crime in Nigeria.

They should rather support our security agencies than these gimmicks. But no, they will cry human rights abuses and all what not.

babranancy:
Hi everyone, please I am looking for an accommodation that is close to central London. Probably 1 hour drive to central London, please it’s urgent as I will be moving out of the hospital provided accommodation next month, thanks.

Check Rightmove, Zoopla or OpenRent. Your budget and family size will determine the areas in greater London you should go for, but check for Zone 6 or places just outside of zone 6.

It's basically that being polite increases your chances of getting your request to a complete stranger granted. In English one will say something like the following to a stranger:

- If you don't mind, could you please point me in the direction of the nearest bus stop"?

Nigeria’s problems runs deep. The comments from some of us here is no different to Sheik Gumi asking FG to grant amnesty to bandits.

Nigerians tend to celebrate criminality and offer forgiveness to them once they are from the same tribe and the impact of their actions don’t affect us directly.

Uzonma:
Hello house
Can I spend dollars or exchange it to pounds in the UK?
Looks like banks hardly give pounds for PTA

Fidelity Bank does Pounds. The HQ branch at Kofo Abayomi.

Conrod:
I want you to start thinking seriously about it cus it will happen,....must happen.

The river Niger is already being dredged by the FG to accommodate current and future planned ships going to the ports along its banks. The Onitsha Port and Baro Port in Minna are along the river Niger. The problem as someone as explained earlier on is dredging a river downstream has to be a continuous exercise otherwise it gets back to its original state with sentiments washed from the upstream after some years.

The only benefits of dredging that I’m aware of are to make the river deeper in other to allow larger sized ships pass through. This means ships can more easily get to Onitsha and Baro ports respectively, so in this case it actually also benefits the north to dredge the river Niger.

SEGLIZ:
forgive my ignorance, does Nigeria export frozen food?
I know we do import them but exporting I don't.

We export frozen shrimps and prawns and import most of our frozen fish.

Relocation Sales

Sold!!!

[s]1. 65 inch Samsung Smart TV - 2020 model - 300k (bought September 2020 from SIMs Nigeria)

2. 6x6 Vitafoam mattress plus Bed frame, side stools and dressing mirror - 100k. Mattress bought July 2021 from Vitafoam. [/s]

Contact: xxxxxx

Location:

The senseless and tactless way this government has gone about banning Twitter is ridiculous, even if there is a slight (1 in a billion) that it had good intentions with the ban. A ban should be the last option. They could have written to Twitter, taken them to court for non-compliance etc.

Thinking about it deeply the reaction of the west though. I often wonder if the west uses human rights as a means to exert indirect control over developing countries. The west gets away when they do the very same things in which they will castigate a developing nation.

Sadly, Nigeria hasn’t gotten to a point where it’s government or citizens can read between the lines of the politics going on.

There’s the valid example of Tik Tok being banned in the USA due to national security interests. There’s Australia implementing new laws to make Google and Facebook pay content creators, which they are vehemently fighting against. I could imagine such a law being enacted in Nigeria will attract all sorts of freedom of … allegations the west can bring up to make us cow to their social media companies.

The simplest way I will put it is We are not a nation. We don’t have a common vision for what we want to be and where we want to go as a people.

To help answer your question, what we have in Nigeria is termed Geo-political zones as against strictly geographical zones.

For example, Kwara is geographically south west but geo-politically North central. Cross rivers should be south east geographical but is termed part of the South South. All the South Eastern states are geographically South Central or South South.

Afikoo:
.

I am 32. I have been working for 7 years here. Also working while in school. Just finished last year and got a pay rise to 80k as security administrator.

Baba, my issue isn't the marriage. My issue is the money. I am desperately asking on how best improve my income. Concrete suggestions on what I need to lay my hands on now to get started. I am tire of submitting applications

Here’s my candid suggestion for you:

1. Have a plan: I’m not sure what you meant by security administrator but you need to ask yourself if this is what you want to continue doing? What career path does it fit into? How have others moved upwards from earning 80k to higher earnings?

It is often a tough pill to swallow but I personally believe that it is often better to work for “free” in a job with food prospects of upward mobility vs a job where you’ll be stagnant for years.

2. Will your current employer miss you when you leave? You need to answer this as honestly as possible. The goal here is to find out introspectively if you’re really good at your job as you think. If your employer will not really miss you, is it because you lack a certain skill they want? Are there any specific skills your employer sees in you and likes about you? If you asked your employer for a raise today will they say bye bye or ask your to reconsider. Seeing as you’ve spent 8 years in your current role I have the feeling that you should be able to answer this question easily.

2. Pick a career with higher chances of getting a job: it’s sad to say it but life doesn’t deal the same hand to everyone. If being a security administrator isn’t something that can earn you 500k monthly in any company over the next 3 to 5 years you probably want to change your career path quickly. If yes, ask yourself and others who have made it in the profession what it takes to get there. If no, you need to start thinking of changing course:

- get really good at using a computer if you aren’t already. It pays in today’s world to have your own laptop
- learn a skill in a profession like Software Design, Engineering, Data Science, Web Developer, Digital Marketing etc. these are career paths that are in demand where employers don’t necessary worry about what you studied in school.
- once you’ve identified what you’re passionate about and you have a computer with internet access there are many online platforms that can teach you skills for free.

3. Keep applying: I’ve noticed that people tend to underestimate how much work it is to get a job. I will suggest you adopt the mindset of aiming to apply for at least 50-100 jobs - in Nigeria you have to apply and apply and keep applying. Ensure you apply for a job you have a chance at. Update your resume and add skills that are complimentary to what the employer is looking for.

Don’t just send the same CV to every employer. You need like two or three versions of your resume where you tweak your resume to highlight certain aspects of your strengths as a security professional. Have a resume for example that speaks to working in a school. Have another that speaks to how your skills can be applied in a bank. Include your achievements in your resume too.

Like I said earlier on. Have the mindset that you need to apply for 50 jobs to get an interview. You will likely need to attend 4 or 5 interviews to seal a job that fits what you want pay wise. Overall you might end up applying for 200 jobs to get a job.

Where the hard work is is in applying for these jobs on a shorter period of time as against over years. Expose yourself to online platforms where you can upload your cv and applying doesn’t take much time. If you’re sending an email to apply for every job you will find it stressful. If you have to drop your cv physically same time as well. You need to balance these things but online applications make it easier.

If you aren’t already on LinkedIn for example, go there and create an account. Same thing with Jobberman and any other jobs portal you can find. Keep “Bombing” employers till they hear you. Keep updating your cv and in each interview try to know what you did right or wrong so you can improve your interviewing skills.


4. Ask your partner to go through these steps above. It’s important for husband and wife to have an income these days. I won’t say more here.

5. So your marriage postponement doesn’t become unending. Find out if money is the real issue here. If money is ask yourself how much you need to earn to get married. The amount you arrive at should be based on your expenses now and your future expenses when you get married. It’s also possible that you guys get married and plan to avoid having kids till you’re more stable. This Doesn’t sound “Nigerian” thing to do with the womb watchers that are abound but it’s an option for you to consider.

For example, taking care of a baby costs about 15-20k monthly depending. Some ppl spend much more others spend way less (I.e. use napkin instead of pampers, give the baby Ogi and stuff)

Lastly, be prayerful. There’s nothing God can’t do. He will expose you to the right path and you will see opportunities and clarity in whatever it is you decide to do.

Quite long but I hope this helps.

@OP, quite the opposite. unfortunately the electoral college is one of the huge downsides of US elections. No other constitutional democracy that I know of runs this model.

California for example has 55 electoral votes, Texas and New York have almost 30 each. A president needs only 270 votes. This has led to the emergence of so-called swing votes / states. A democratic presidential candidate will only focus on areas where he is sure of winning rather than campaign to the entire country. I.e. places like Wyoming and Alaska have little electoral value (only 3 electoral votes) so there’s no point campaigning there.

So imagine a Nigeria where the presidential candidate only visits some states to campaign. States like Bayelsa, Taraba, Jigawa don’t get any attention cause they have little electoral votes.

This will result in far less representation in Nigeria as a candidate only needs to win the most populated states to cross the line. It also means you can win an election without achieving the majority vote in 2/3 of the states which will it constitution requires for fairness.