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In a bid to cut costs in the face of dwindling revenue, the Federal Government yesterday banned Ministers and permanent secretaries from traveling first class on any airline. The ban also affected chairmen of federal government committees, as well as chairmen and chief executives of parastatals and agencies. The directive was contained in a statement issued by the Efficiency Unit of the Federal Ministry of Finance and signed by Media Adviser to the Minister, Mr. Festus Akanbi. According to the statement, all the affected officials would now be limited to the business class for their local and international travels as against what obtained in the past. It was learnt that some government officials, who should have been on business class while traveling at government’s expense, flew first class while many others flew business class, instead of the economy ticket. The Efficiency Unit, which is the initiative of the Finance Minister, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, set up to engen...

As part of efforts to improve the educational sector in Ondo State, the Olusegun Mimiko-led administration has commenced a pilot scheme by introducing free shuttle buses for students in public schools. Also, many school across the state have been renovated to make learning enjoyable for pupils and students. The state governor made these known while speaking at the public presentation of two books in Akure by John Mafo, titled Echoes of the Waves and Wazobian Resolution. He said, “For you to access the level of development in any state or country you need to check what the government is spending on education and health, then you will be able to know if the government is progressing or not. For us as a state, this is a challenge. Inequality is not good for a nation, as growth does not translate to poverty reduction. The best way to stimulate equality is to invest heavily in education and health. We shall continue to invest in these two major sectors to eradicate inequalities” Also...

• Says ‘N50b is merely part payment’ The Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN) has said that the N50 billion collected from MTN Nigeria is merely a part payment to the government. In a letter in which he questioned the integrity of the Senate Committee on Communications in getting to the root of the controversy surrounding the N780 billion reduced fine slammed on MTN by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Malami took exception to some of the accusations allegedly levelled against him by the panel. The committee, some weeks ago, had lamented the role the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Office of the Attorney-general played and had observed that they were less than transparent in their roles in the negotiations and payment made by MTN. But the minister yesterday said that the former US Attorney General and counsel to the MTN, Eric Holder, wouldn’t have entered into the meeting with him if he was not sure he was the most appro...

The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) is seeking investors for its Renewable Energy Division (RED) to implement Nigeria’s automotive biofuels industry programme through a series of planned Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs). The automotive biofuels industry programme, according to NNPC, is aimed at leveraging the vast agricultural potentials with abundant skilled and unskilled labour in the country. It added that it is also geared towards the synergy of NNPC downstream assets, capabilities, and infrastructural facilities. NNPC said that the rationale for the automotive biofuels industry programme is to develop low-carbon energy for the transportation sector with significant financial returns, mitigate climate change, create wealth and employment and attain sustainable development across the country. It stated: “NNPC has secured suitable land portions to develop fuel ethanol and biodiesel project from local and state authorities and has completed site-specific, ba...

• NNPC discharges 320m litres of petrol • Govt may adjust fuel price next month • Presidency dissolves task force on power sector reform “Hopefully by tomorrow (today) and Thursday, the fuel queues in Abuja should be over. Hopefully, the same thing will happen in Lagos, and thereafter by the weekend, we should see Kano, Katsina, Sokoto, Port Harcourt and Warri get off the queue list.” With these words yesterday, the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, reassured the nation that the lingering fuel scarcity would be a forgotten hardship by the end of the week. An indication that the minister’s promise may come to pass was that a stock of 320 million litres of petrol was being distributed across the country yesterday. Meanwhile, the Federal Government has dissolved the presidential task force set up by the Goodluck Jonathan administration to drive the implementation of the reform in the nation’s electricity sector. But the reasons for this move we...

Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo on Tuesday said the government and other stakeholders had spoken enough on the need for Nigerians to patronise made in Nigeria products. He said there was the need to embrace the campaign which he said could contribute to the revival of the cotton, textile and garment industries which is one of the goals of the present administration. According to a statement by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Mr. Laolu Akande, the Vice President spoke during a meeting he had with industry stakeholders and members of the Implementation Committee on the National Cotton, Textile and Garment Policy at the Presidential Villa, Abuja. While noting that the challenge of smuggling of foreign textile materials into the country had to be tackled, Osinbajo reportedly said overall “it is up to all of us to see that this particular initiative works, we have talked enough.” While stressing the benefits inherent in patronising locally-made produc...

Nigeria's fuel crisis worsens with motorists sleeping at petrol stations and generators joining the queues for fuel. What are your tips for surviving the fuel crisis?  More on BBC Africa Live Page-->  http://bbc.in/1q1GLXN