₦airaland Forum

U

rolams:
If he likes, he can wear only elastic pant to the court. That is his problem. The ruling on hijab has been stamped and sealed. Are these lawyers not good enough to defeat the Muslims lawyers at the court?

These people shouting now are the cause of the case. Why were those ladies harassed with their hijabs? At least only few of them were using it then. Why can't they be ignored? But your hatred for Islam led you to this level.

You are a ram

That is the equivalent of room self container in Nigeria

Aeronautical engineer . Now small business owner and still trying to find another side hustle while that one grows grin grin.

arixona:
Here in abuja

With this price 760 , customers will be short change

My vulcanizer will swear for this people

shuttox:
May God help us to choose the Messiah next year

Stop the using the word messiah . Naso na talk wey messiah buhari turn devil advocate .

The manutd I no will prefer to bench him

W

Babatunde Irukera is the Executive Vice-Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, formerly known as the Consumer Protection Council. A lawyer by training, Irukera became the FCCPC helmsman in 2019 when the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Act was enacted. In this interview with Odinaka Anudu, he disclosed that the agency had taken strong actions against loan apps and other firms violating the rights of Nigerian consumers.

Some Nigerians would say that you are late to the party regarding your recent intervention in the activities of digital loan firms which harass and threaten Nigerians who took loans from them. In one of your public comments, you promised to take them to court. Have you taken anyone of them to court?

In reality, we are not late to the party. The robustness of your action is what determines whether or not you are late to the party. This is happening across the continent. We are the leading regulator on the continent; others are looking to learn from us on how we are succeeding. It is not likely you are late to the party when others in the party are asking you the dance steps.

We have so far frozen 50 accounts. We have taken over 12 applications off the Google Play Store and we are in discussions with more than 10 companies right now. The rate of defamatory messages has dropped by at least 60 per cent. I am not saying they have stopped but they have dropped by at least 60 per cent. More than half of the companies that are currently before us have agreed that they will have to modify their behaviour. Many of them have changed some of their systems, including sacking some employees who sent defamatory messages. We are developing a regulatory framework that will involve other regulators, and we are prosecuting at least one company right now.

Just one company?

Well, money lending itself is not a criminal conduct. So, you have to determine there has been a crime. And even defamation, when civil, is not something a regulator can enforce. It is an injury to reputation that is only enforceable by the injured party and through the judicial process. What we are doing as a regulator includes things that the law gives us power to do. Some of these things are still happening, but we will continue the work to eradicate them.

How do you determine companies to prosecute?


It is from investigations. It is basically from what we get from our investigations.

How many companies are you investigating at the moment?

I just told you that at least 10 companies are engaged with us in one way or the other. They are even more than 10 at the moment.

Some people tend to think that certain individuals and companies are dominant in the Nigerian economy. How do you ensure that one company does not fraudulently push away a competitor in the same industry?

We have at least three major investigations opened into companies which we think are abusing their market dominance in a manner that will frustrate smaller players. When we look at the market and consider it inefficient, whether it is a monopoly or market dominance, the first thing we do is to unlock the barriers for others to enter. It is when you do that that you see the market correct itself. It needs the regulator to address certain behaviour in the market. Don’t forget that the competition law was introduced in Nigeria only in 2019. We lost the whole of 2020 to COVID-19. So, the amount of market intervention that the FCCPC has succeeded in doing is actually commendable and commended widely. One of the ways that you may not know that we have addressed monopolies is in the area of mergers and acquisitions. We are refusing to approve mergers which we think will lead to dominance and possible monopolies and disruption to the market.

Can you give examples?

For instance, the big mergers that occurred in key food industries recently, we had to put some conditions in place.


Can you disclose their identities?

Some of those mergers are evolving. So, disclosing their identities will potentially and materially affect the situation and put certain parties in those transactions in disadvantaged positions.

How many mergers and acquisitions would you say you have failed to approve since you became the Executive Vice Chairman?

The statistics is not about what you have turned down or not because the regulator should not have a badge of honour or pride for denying transactions that move commerce. It is all about how many we have analysed and ensured that the market operates well. The sheer number that we have made, including conditions to divest, conditions for behavioural scrutiny, conditions for monitoring well is quite commendable. We have mergers and conditions, including where there are conditions not to change prices for X period of time or not to reduce the number of X products over a period of time. We have given conditions in many situations to ensure that the market continues to operate well.

What about the electricity sector where you have a monopolist exploiting Nigerian consumers, refusing to provide meters but revelling in estimated billing?

Absolutely. I have said repeatedly that privatisation of the electricity sector itself created natural monopolies. We know monopolies, especially in terms of transition of public utilities to private utilities. So, what we are doing is to manage the situation based on the structure of the market. There are things that we need to change for the electricity market to change. Some of them include legislations. Some of them include contracts that the Federal Government entered into for a period of time, for which any modification could be considered a breach and potential penalties on the Federal Government. So here we are, we find the sector the way it is, we are struggling in that sector and we are working as hard as we can to resolve complaints in it. We are trying to hold the Discos accountable and work closely with the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, NERC. One of the things we believe is that we must find a way to make metering more aggressive and estimated billing less attractive. And we are working with the NERC to come up with estimated billing cap regulations. We have signed a Memorandum of Understanding with them and we are looking forward to stronger enforcements of those gaps.

You issued a press statement last month saying that it was not the job of your agency to regulate prices. Yet, one of your mandates is to prevent monopolies and market dominance. How will you be able to discharge this responsibility if you cannot regulate prices?

https://www.google.com/amp/s/punchng.com/why-accounts-of-50-firms-operating-loan-apps-are-frozen-fccpc-boss/%3famp

E

abbey621:
Have you ever been outside of Nigeria? Many Nigerians visit Dubai and Malaysia, guess what? These countries are majority Muslims, why don't they act like the Northern ignoramus in Nigeria? Abi Islam get different versions?

What about Saudi Arabia , pakistain , Iran , Lebanon ... Islam is a religion of peace to make there opposition rest in peace

Religion of piss

shogsman:
Here we go again with the superstitious mumbojumbo

It real bros . Nothing superstitious I have witness it live

Since we can't join the world cup in Qatar , let us participate in the coming ww3 .

ThankGodFriday:
Why don't these people report killings in Nigeria

Nigeria as a nation contribute zero to world economy ..

These won't pass the page of the paper . Nigeria is a gonner so help me God .

4. The Info War

President Zelensky has spoken via video to a series of international meetings and foreign parliaments
And then there is the information war. Ukraine is winning this hands-down in most of the world - although not in Russia where the Kremlin still controls access to most of the media.

"Ukraine has mobilised the information sphere to tremendous domestic and international advantage", says Justin Crump. "This has come from the top down, aided by (President) Zelensky's formidable media savvy."

It's a view echoed by Dr Ruth Deyermond, senior lecturer in post-Soviet security at Kings College London. "Clearly the Ukrainian government has been very successful in controlling the narrative about the war, certainly for the wider world," she says. "What the conflict has done for Ukraine's international reputation is absolutely remarkable."

But right now, one month into this desperate life-and-death struggle on Europe's eastern borders, that may still not be enough to salvage Ukraine.

The numerical might of the Russian army, for all its shortcomings, is not in Ukraine's favour. If somehow the supply of defensive weapons systems from the West dries up then there could only be so much longer this beleaguered nation can hold out.

itubaba001:
3. Sound tactics
Ukraine has had access to tools of modern warfare such as the Javelin missile
Ukraine's forces are heavily outnumbered and yet they have made much better use of the ground and their weapons than the invading Russians.

Whereas the Russians have tended to concentrate their forces in slow, heavy armoured columns, often with vehicles bunched up close together, the Ukrainians have successfully conducted finely-tuned hit-and-run raids, sneaking up and firing off an anti-tank missile, then vanishing before the Russians can return fire.

Prior to the invasion, Nato trainers from the US, UK and Canada spent long periods in Ukraine, bringing its forces up to speed in defensive warfare and instructing them on how to make best use of state-of-the-art missile systems such as the Javelin or the Swedish-designed NLAW anti-tank weapon or the latest version of the Stinger anti-aircraft missile.

"The Ukrainians have been much cleverer than the Russians", says Prof Clarke, "because they've fought something much closer to a combined arms operation which the Russians haven't". By this he means they have made full use of all the military tools at their disposal, such as drones, artillery, infantry, tanks and electronic warfare.

When combined together, the sum of all these different aspects of warfare can create an exponential effect greater than the sum of its parts.

Another military strategist, Justin Crump, who runs the intelligence consultancy Sibylline, says Ukrainians have been particularly adept at seeking out the vulnerable points in Russian formations and hitting them hard. "Ukraine has made use of highly effective tactics", he says, including targeting Russian weak points such as supply convoys, using Nato-supplied weapon systems to good effect against precision targets and improvising where required.

While it is hard to get an accurate picture of casualty figures, even the more conservative estimates made by the Pentagon put Russian combat deaths at more than 7,000. That is nearly half as many men as the Soviets lost in 10 years of fighting in Afghanistan and we are only a month into this war.

Brig Tom Foulkes also has an explanation as to why so many Russian generals are getting killed on the front line: "This sounds to me like a deliberate and highly successful sniper campaign which could degrade the Russian command structures."

There never was a good war or a bad peace

War does not determine who is right - only who is left. ...

3. Sound tactics
Ukraine has had access to tools of modern warfare such as the Javelin missile
Ukraine's forces are heavily outnumbered and yet they have made much better use of the ground and their weapons than the invading Russians.

Whereas the Russians have tended to concentrate their forces in slow, heavy armoured columns, often with vehicles bunched up close together, the Ukrainians have successfully conducted finely-tuned hit-and-run raids, sneaking up and firing off an anti-tank missile, then vanishing before the Russians can return fire.

Prior to the invasion, Nato trainers from the US, UK and Canada spent long periods in Ukraine, bringing its forces up to speed in defensive warfare and instructing them on how to make best use of state-of-the-art missile systems such as the Javelin or the Swedish-designed NLAW anti-tank weapon or the latest version of the Stinger anti-aircraft missile.

"The Ukrainians have been much cleverer than the Russians", says Prof Clarke, "because they've fought something much closer to a combined arms operation which the Russians haven't". By this he means they have made full use of all the military tools at their disposal, such as drones, artillery, infantry, tanks and electronic warfare.

2. Command and control
Early expectations of a devastating Russian cyber attack, knocking out Ukraine's communications, did not materialise. Instead, Ukraine has somehow managed to maintain effective co-ordination over several battlefronts, even where it has lost ground.

Its government has stayed put in Kyiv and remained highly visible, with even the deputy prime minister dressed in a utilitarian khaki T-shirt as she addresses the nation against a backdrop of government insignia.

The Russian army, by contrast, does not appear to have any kind of unified leadership, with little co-ordination between its separate battlefronts.

This is likely to have had a negative effect on Russian military morale. It has been suggested the reported deaths of at least five Russian generals is partly a result of their having to get close to the fighting to dislodge their troops from getting bogged down.

At the level of Non-Commissioned Officers (NCOs), ie the corporals and the sergeants, Russian military doctrine allows for almost no initiative, with these junior ranks always waiting for orders from above.

Prof Michael Clarke, a military expert at King's College London, says Russian NCOs are beset with corruption and inefficiency and are deeply unpopular with those they command.

1. Highly motivated
There is a wealth of difference between the morale of the two armies. Ukrainians are fighting for the very survival of their country as a sovereign nation, appalled at President Putin's eve-of-war speech in which he said Ukraine was basically just an artificial Russian creation.

Ukrainians have rallied behind their government and their president. This has resulted in citizens with no prior military experience readily taking up arms to defend their towns and cities despite the overwhelming Russian firepower facing them.

"This is how people fight for their very existence," says Brigadier Tom Foulkes, who spent 35 years as a British Army officer in Germany during the Cold War. "This is how they defend their homeland and their families. Their courage is both shocking and splendid."

In practice this has freed up Ukrainian soldiers to go and fight on the front line, knowing their cities have defence in depth.

By contrast, many of the Russian soldiers sent to fight in Ukraine are conscripts just out of school, bewildered and confused at finding themselves in a war zone when they thought they were just going on an exercise.

Most had little or no battle preparation for the ferocity of the fighting they have encountered. There have been reports of desertions, food shortages and looting.

One month into this invasion and so far, Ukraine has defied the odds. Outnumbered on almost every metric - in tanks, in troops, in aircraft - Ukraine's forces, reinforced by citizen volunteers, have in many places fought the Russian army to a standstill.

They have lost territory, especially in the south around Crimea, which was already occupied and annexed by Russia in 2014. But Moscow's original aim of quickly seizing the capital Kyiv and other major cities, forcing the government to resign, has manifestly failed.

The tide could still turn against Ukraine. Its forces are running dangerously low on the vital western-supplied anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles needed to fend off the advancing Russians.

Many of Ukraine's most battle-hardened regular forces in the east of the country are at risk of being surrounded, cut off and annihilated. And with a quarter of the nation's population having fled their homes, those that stay put risk seeing their cities turned into a dystopian wasteland by relentless Russian artillery and rocket fire.

Yet despite these factors, Ukraine's forces are outperforming Russia's in this war, on several levels. This week the Pentagon spokesman John Kirby praised them as defending parts of their country "very smartly, very nimbly, very creatively". So what exactly have been the secrets of their success?

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-60867202

Even your Russian master is regretting he started a war with Ukraine .

In spite of all these , Boko Haram cannot be crush

ManirBK:
Good one how I wish the ban may cripple UK Government, I hate them a lot because of their hypocrisy to Russia.

Invading a sovereign state is the worst crime and the penalty is death to Putin.

Op it benzema 3

OP is business finish ? All you can think is snake farming

anambraamaka:
Why NATO dey fear Russia like this?

NATO isn't afraid or shy of any Russian troop . They are only calculating the castrophic effect of the after war . it will take less than 3week for Nato to clear Putin men . It very clear with the way it playing out in Ukraine .

Let him go and let see the best of combo. Even we as man u fans are wishing our darling club relegation.