₦airaland Forum

The revitalized Lagos-Kano intercity train services will complement the existing Lagos- Ilorin and Minna-Kano intercity train services.

Umar said that the Federal Government had also awarded contracts for feasibility studies to open up other railway routes.

He explained that the government was also rehabilitating the Eastern Railway Line from Port Harcourt –Maiduguri with spur lines from Kuru-Kafanchan –Kaduna and Kuru-Jos.

The Minister also said that government was repairing the Zaria-Gusau-Kauran Namoda Rail Line.

He added that the government was modernizing the Project Phase I, Addendum 1, Abuja-Kaduna (Idu) Standard Gauge Rail Line (187km)

The minister further said that the government was repairing the existing 254km and completing the remaining 22km Standard Gauge Rail Line of the Central Rail Line from Ajaokuta-Warri with station buildings.

Billyonaire: CPC the mouthpiece of Boko Haram has spoken and the boys have heard/

coded guy: The quality of your ignorance is top notch. Firstly the meaning of LPG is LIQUEFIED PETROLEUM GAS and not LIQUEFIED GAS as you defined. So if the P in LPG means petroleum, ask yourself again "what's the relationship btw LPG and refineries" and who then is the ignorant kid?

Walexz02: See mumu talk.... Try and make the LPG cheaper and affordable to the poor by building and repairing refineries and wait and see, wether pple wil start using it or not..

CFCfan: The $16billion would have to be provided by both the private sector and governments (federal and state). I think the private sector will provide the bulk of the funds, since they will be in charge of transmission and distribution of electricity. The FG will only handle the generation aspect.

A major medical breakthrough has been recorded in the nation’s capital, Abuja, as a team of Nigerian doctors have successfully carried out a kidney transplant operation on a 20-year-old patient, Gabriel Onogu.

The landmark operation took place last Friday at Viewpoint Hospital in Gwarimpa Estate, Abuja by a team of surgeons led by Mr. Elijah Maina and his partner, Prof. Hakeem. Three more patients are on the list for transplant which the hospital believes will also be successful.

Maina, a consultant, trauma-vascular and general surgeon, had worked in the UK before he came back to Nigeria.

He initially worked with the State House Clinic and National Hospital, Abuja but is now working with various hospitals in Abuja.

Viewpoint Medical Director, Dr. Hauwa’u Bello Gambari described the successful operation as a remarkable feat and major breakthrough and expressed optimism over the three remaining patients.

Giving insight into the transplant, Gambari said the lucky patient is doing well and even started “making” urine on the operating table. She said Onogu has been out of school because he was on dialysis. The young man’s condition has been a huge burden on his family since his father is late.

“He should be getting dialysis three times a week but because his father is late, his mother is an unemployed widow and his brother Stephen Onogu, the donor, is also an unemployed graduate. They couldn’t even pay for the dialysis and for this reason, he was having his dialysis once in a week which wasn’t good for him,” said Dr. Gambari.

She said getting a donor is not a problem but at the same time not easy since the organ has to be compatible with the patient

“One cannot just request for another’s kidney. Even when there is a donor, the kidney has to be screened for compatibility. Drugs have to be given that will prevent rejection for life. Chances of succeeding are higher if the compatibility supersedes”, she explained.

She said the hospital will embark on the next surgery by January next year and called on people suffering from the ailment to come out and solicit for help. She also stressed that the operation can be done in any government hospital, depending on the government’s commitment.

“Whoever has the disease should not cover it up and die in silence, they should come out and for those that have the means, they should support them even by paying for their dialysis,” she stated.

Gambari said the other patients on the line will have their transplant after they get the right donor and after necessary tests have been done

The lucky patient, Gabriel Onogu, told our reporter that he is happy over his treatment and was proud to be the first to benefit in the first transplant in the hospital.

“I thank the kidney foundation and my brother who donated his kidney for me. Also I thank the doctors that performed the operation. Due to my health, I couldn’t pursue my admission further since I had to be on dialysis every week, but by the grace of God, I should be back in school next year”, he said.

- Airport officials swiftly cut off power supply to the arrival and departure terminals, in order to forestall any untoward development and isolated the scene of the spark.

- Fire fighters were also deployed in the affected area and were able to put the situation under control.

- Securitymen also erected a metal barricade around the site.

- Power supply was restored to the airport terminal within a few minutes.

- Flight operations were, however, not affected while the incident lasted.

honeric01: Fire everywhere

Plane
Helicopter
Pipeline
Airport
E.t.c

Where next?

The sin in Nigeria is just too much.

Jarus: Adesina is doing a quiet job in agric. He is it for me.

Omen100: y are nigerians still deceiving themselves, who told u that our population is up 170million citizens? subtract the total amount of people has died as a result of boko haram bombing, road accidents, various planes crash(including naval choppers, police that killed deputy I.G), armed robbery attacks, illness, natural death, AIDS, those that died as a results of old age & e.t.c. you will be surprised to that the Nigerian total population has reduced by 25%, which will bring us to total of 127.8millions. yes you will be quick to say, children are being deliver everyday, but how many of these children will survive the harsh conditions that they are being exposed to?

Chairman, National Committee, National Council on Privatisation, Mr. Atedo Peterside, in a paper on power reform at a recent workshop organised by the Chartered Institute of Stockbrokers (CIS) described the current reform process in the power sector in the country as irreversible. He also spoke with Eromosele Abiodun to buttress his argument. Excerpts:

What are the critical updates on the power sector reform?
I can speak about the efforts to privatise the companies in the power sector and things that have to do with the Economic Management Team because I am a member and it is where things are tabled for discussion.

The power sector is a critical element in the whole overall National Transformation Agenda but there are also other elements apart from power and power is part of physical infrastructure. So one has to move beyond just the power sector to transportation and this is where we talk about roads and rail and it is very important because the things that hinder business in Nigeria is that the business man has to provide his own infrastructure and that’s what we want to correct because it should not be.

If you have to provide your own infrastructure then you cannot compete with the outside world because they don’t have to do the same. The government should focus at Federal and State Level in helping you to meet your infrastructural need; be it power or water or giving you motorable roads, rail routes to move your goods to the ports and get your goods out of the ports efficiently, be it your imports or your exports, which is what government owes you, getting the infrastructure moving efficiently.

The whole Agenda to transform also embraces all of the above and you are not going to transform some of those sectors relying only on government resources; you also have to open up the sectors so that the private sector can invest. That’s why when I gave example on the power sector. I said it is even more important we have cost reflective tariffs. We had a regulator that was serious and credible and then we had arrangements like the bulk trader that would make it possible for people to come in, establish their own IPPs, have an agreement with the bulk trader, provide power to him, they deliver and get paid. Because when you have that kind of arrangement that are transparent and people have confidence in you, then you can get massive inflow of funds from the private sector to invest in this same power sector.

If you don’t have that kind of clarity, you can make all the noise in the world, no private sector person is going to put his money into a sector when he thinks that he is going to walk into a trap or where there is going to be an obvious failure. So then the arrangements must make business sense. I think the arrangements we have for power, if they are allowed to function, make business sense.

Could you shed more light on all these companies you have dealt with that you think will be coming for listing on the Nigerian Stock Exchange and how soon would that be?

Yes, I explained that for the distribution companies in particular which is where the focus is concentrated, we are not selling 100 per cent to the Core Investors; it is only 60 per cent, the balance of 40 per cent would be held by the Federal Government, State Government and Staff and there is nothing wrong with that like we did once we make quick arrangements to sell those shares to the public and even if that fails or if it does not happen in some cases, it is possible that the Core Investor himself in due course may want to raise revenue to service his needs to expand his business.


Sometimes, when you are trying to raise money to grow the business then you want to take money from outside so that some of the current investors may opt eventually through raising more capital or dilute their share holding from 60 per cent to 51 per cent that would still give them control, so it’s a possibility. What I am saying is that we are making remarkable progress.

Your presentation gives so much hope on what to expect from the power reform. Can you shed more light?

Let me explain. I don’t know how old you are but from the day I was born till date, in fact especially the last forty years in particular, the power sector in Nigeria was going nowhere. Even a blind man knew that and this was so because the only sources of funding it were two; one, the tariffs you and I paid which were much too low; and two, Federal Government budgetary allocations; the sum of those two was never going to be able to provide enough money to finance the sector to grow and expand like telecoms has done in the last ten years.

Therefore, you had low funding which was going to lead to a low level equilibrium; the second thing was that the arrangements for the Sector were such that they did not make sense for the private person to bring his money in so we have to do two things: first, we have to increase the availability of funds for the sector, make the value chain healthy by raising the tariffs which has been done effective June 1, this year.

[b]Then secondly and simultaneously, we have to change the arrangements for the sector so that the private companies can come and invest massively like they have done in telecoms. And I mention seven critical steps in the power sectors of the Federal Government and each of those seven were vital towards creating an environment that would ensure that you would move from a low equilibrium trap to what I call the high growth trajectory.

The seven steps were as follows: to empower the regulator NERC and that has been done; to bring in place a bulk trader; introduce cost reflective tariffs that were done on the 1st of June; management contractor for transmission; to privatise generating companies (gencos); to privatise distributional companies (discos); and to strengthen the fuel to power arrangements.


The interesting thing is that, as soon as you have even done the first three, you would have covered a great deal of work. If you get those steps right and don’t get me wrong if you leave out any of those seven you have a problem because if you do the first six and there are no arrangements for bringing fuel to power there is a problem.[/b]

You need those seven to work in unison and am saying that what I see and what some of us were brought in to do was to help to ensure that some of the critical steps in those seven were taken care of and that’s why I have been involved in the last fifteen months in helping to privatise transformation in terms of management contractor, distribution and also the gencos.

But let me explain this, if you have a value chain where the consumer alone is paying very low tariffs because the tariffs are too low there is not enough money flowing from the consumer to distribution through transmission to gencos and back to the supplier of fuel. Whereas if the consumer is paying enough money upfront, the money he is paying pays for distribution, transmission, generation and the fuel as well so if the price is right and you pay the right price which we are doing now there is enough money to finance every budget in the value chain all the way to the value supplier.

In telecoms some of us don’t understand why there is growth in telecoms and it’s because the tariffs you are paying are enough to finance the entire value chain so even up to the people that supply fuel to MTN or Globacom for the cell sites are paid for everything. And what we have in Power is not just to have the single tariffs that are cost reflective on June 1 this year, we have in place the multi layer tariff order, so there is a formula which will adjust naturally already built into it. There are things like the cost of fuel, inflation and others in it so that it would adjust naturally so that your tariff is not set once forever and ever and then a fight would ensue when it’s been changed. It’s something that would be changed constantly. The tariffs would reflect other realities. For instance, if the price of fuel comes down your tariff comes down naturally, and that’s why investors are buying into that formula which they see as satisfactory.

Some say your independent approach to issues could be a critical factor in making the reform process to work…

I don’t want us to personalise anything because a tree cannot make the forest as there are many people who are involved in this process right from the President all the way down to the lowest level employee so it is not good to personalise it.
I was brought in to add value which is what I have been doing but some of the things am talking about here are almost irreversible.

For instance I mentioned seven things, if you have cost reflective tariffs and you put in place a formula for the Multiyear Tariff, whether am here or not or you are here or not if a formula is in place the formula stands. Somebody would have to come and destroy it for it not to be effective anymore. And I tell you one thing, there are some things that as soon as you put them in place they are so logical everybody gets the benefits, and they are difficult to destroy.

That’s why I wanted all of you to be the advocates because if all of you understand how the seven steps are important, as soon as somebody gets up to destroy it, you will be the one shouting, stop this man, he is a nuisance. That is why you have to sell the reform programme to a wider audience which is why I came today. Let all these people in the capital market join in understanding this reform and then defending, and protecting it making sure they hold on to the gains because it’s only these reforms, the seven steps that would bring light to your house and my house forever and ever. So if you are convinced about these you on your own, you will start shouting when anybody takes any step to reverse the reforms.

For the winners of gencos is there a possibility of fast-tracking delivery of power even before that target period given to them?

[b]If you look at the documentation carefully when I put the next steps on the board, the next steps said after they negotiate and pay 25 per cent, within six months they pay the balance. They didn’t say after six months. They said within so that somebody that has sorted out everything can pay earlier than the six months and take possession and move on. Then and again some of them are eager to move as fast as possible. Why would you want to pay for something partially and allow it drag because once you take money out you take money out, you only begin to get money in after you step in there and take possession.

Like I explained, the beauty of this for me, why this should succeed is because there is now a proper alignment of goals which we never had between those in charge of the power sector and you and I as the consumers that want light in our houses. I explained earlier that inside the old arrangement the government employee in PHCN whether he gives you light or not, gets his salary which is assured even if you are in darkness he collects his money and goes home. Now the union is fighting for their entitlements nobody is asking if they gave you light or not they are just demanding whatever they think they were promised.

And when you move to this arrangement that is privatised then there is alignment of goals in the sense that the only time a distribution company gets money is when there is power supply in individuals houses and the meter is running. So he is the one that is more interested than even myself to keep the meter running same as with telecoms if the system is down they would put it back up because they want to charge you and they cannot charge you when things are down, they can only charge you when you can make a phone call.

So we are moving into a system that is market oriented but there is a regulator to ensure discipline and there are rules that would make it possible for the private sector to come in and invest massively because we need massive investment from the private sector to leap forward and for once for all break out of these vicious circle and then allow the power situation in Nigeria to improve dramatically in the next 2/3 years and forever.
[/b]
Just how important can stabilised power be to the economy?
Whatever you say, I believe that the single most important incubator to economic growth in Nigeria in terms of people’s businesses and why people have not been able to compete has to be power. Power has to be number one; you can talk about number two transportation or something else. But don’t forget that when you don’t give people power from the national grid, they have to get power by themselves; they buy generators, fuel them on diesel or petrol. Look, the most efficient generator you can buy for yourself is about four/five/six times more expensive than power from the grid.

If you are a business man, doing any kind of business, if you can move away from wasting your money on generators, maintain them and fueling them to just paying your bills to a disco and bring your cost down there are possibilities that you can compete and create more jobs etc. So when the cost of generating electricity personally is out of the way, a business man can expand his business because he has brought his cost down and has been able to compete more and grow his business. So when he grows his business, he employs more people so it’s all linked.

fistonme: yes accepted as an "unconfirmed" report. If a neighbour reads it in the daily and he happens to be sitting with my dad at the time maybe discussing the state of the nation. I guess you already know what would be his reaction(a big laugh as opposed to when he is far of). The reason being that he has confirmed and know it is to the contrary. Same thing goes when a rational reader reads a story tagged "unconfirmed". It all boils down to the fact that-i am responsible for 'what i say' and not 'what you deduce from what i say'.

fistonme: my dear all i have seen in your statement so far is mere irrationality and inferiority complex in display. Professionalism has no restriction neither does freedom of speech(because news reporting is based on truth and facts on ground as at the time of reproting). I for one viewed the article in question. I saw nothing wrong in it if it later turned out that chime is still alive because what was reported was "uncomfired" death of chime. So a learned reader would read and interprete rationally. A proof for you to know the professionalism employed in the caption for the news is this; The reporter and punch newspaper would have been entangled in various litigations for libel on the contrary by now.

shymexx: Tense..

honeric01: And you see a one man one vote by 2015? if we can have a one man one vote by 2015, then Buhari wouldn't need a merger to become our president.

jaybee: SHOW ME A PRESIDENT WHO CAN NOT STOP A WRONG PRACTICE BECAUSE IT HAS BEEN THERE BEFORE HE ASSUMED OFFICE AND I WILL TELL YOU HE IS NOT WORTH BEING A PRESIDENT

skyfall: I think the 40-laptop crew is on the loose again. Maybe they've been paid their Xmas allowances. Their handwriting is all over the wall.

cheksbry: I know the young lad personally,he usually came around with his brothers to play with my siblings!,he has an igbo mom though!,he was born in aba,and has virtually spent most of his life in the city.
Young people should be encouraged to take on such competitons.
My alma mater too..living word. Academy rocks!!!best school in Abia state!!!

freecitizn: Its symbolic. They want y'all to have a sweet xmas

fagin1982: My dear u are just bereaved of latest happenings in the Industry..I advice you just google or source for information...Google Konja Integrated Farms in Niger State ..Stanbic , Zenith re funding several sugar farms of high breed..Several Sugar cane farms of such...This sugar cane project started with Yaradua Govt...its taking full shape now ...Funds have been made available to Institute of Tropical Agriculture ABU for research on higher improved varieties of Sugar cane .GM species have already been palnted and harvested ..Golden Sugar just did the first test run of the Sugar Plant , Dangote is already waxing stronger , Bachita BUA and several Sugar plants re gona benefit from it ...They spend heavily on foreign exchange ...Its a landmark project for Nigeria as a whole ...Over 1million NiGerians wld benefit from it ..Here you re criticizing....why not set up a farm and apply for loan ...
Well keep talk is free ...so go ahead

jamace: Other countries recruit men of integrity, Nigerian Police is looking for men of certificates and proven corruption. Na wa o.

gibits: The problem in nigeria is too much value on paper qualification and grades.Dats why blocking can never end is schools, most student now hav d orientation of dis grade discrimation after graduation and dats why dey use every arsenal @ their disposal to get good grades. Girls sleep around with lecturers while d guys pay their hard earned money and some even go into crime to earn money to settle such bills. Until we begin to give room for merit n skills this country will never move farward cos i see nigeria as a movie script dat is been acted, to be candid nothing is real in dis country, we,re just faking frm FG to state govt and even LG. I know some friends who are practically sound academically ok but cos dey graduated wit 2:2 dey,re hardly called for interviews. These are guys gave priority to their profession by going outside handouts n txtbooks to make wilder research so as to become a complete engineer n not paper engineers, today dey hav all d skills n experience but cannot find their way into a multinational firm cos dey graduated wit 2:2, and those who made 2:1 who were "crammers'' those days are doing well in various oil and gas firms. God help nigeria!

samfibby: The same way hey destroyed the fabrics of our nation, they have continued to fabricate policies that rather massages their ego and makes them look like great achievers. We are not fooled by their antics. Somebody tell those senior police officers that educational qualification isn't the bane of the NPF, but self aggrandizing policies like these are responsible for our woes in this country.

samfibby: The same way hey destroyed the fabrics of our nation, they have continued to fabricate policies that rather massages their ego and makes them look like great achievers. We are not fooled by their antics. Somebody tell those senior police officers that educational qualification isn't the bane of the NPF, but self aggrandizing policies like these are responsible for our woes in this country.

uihebom: i think sey them sey jonathan go university.its like he doesn't know what to say to the masses, b4 nko, 25th and 1st no be public holiday? even a 1year old know that 25th and 1st are holidays.dis guy wicked throughout the year, and he wan still dey wicked for jesus birthday.no think sey your brother don replace una,cos God know sey all of una for that aso rock do ojoro. Patience for don delete,she run go abroad,una come replace am with chairman wey no follow dey chop money. 2015 nova dey reach.