Economy

Sokoloan Set To Shutdown, After Paying ₦10 Million NITDA Fine
Economy, News, Nigeria

Sokoloan Set To Shutdown, After Paying ₦10 Million NITDA Fine

Soko Loan Lending company, a quick credit startup, in Nigeria is on the verge of a shutdown months after the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) sanctioned the firm for privacy invasion. On August 17, 2021, the agency had released a statement informing the public that Sokoloan will be fined N10 million for invading the privacy of Nigerians after accessing their details through the contact of the firm’s app users. Sokoloan is one of many online lending platforms that send blackmail messages to their users’ contacts, a system that has been penciled down as the major flaw of the loan app market. NITDA had stated then that the agency will also weigh criminal charges against the directors of Sokoloan, as it liaise with the Nigerian Police Command for advise. S...
Past Governments To Blame For Nigeria’s Economic Recession Under Buhari – Femi Adesina
Economy, Finance, News, Nigeria

Past Governments To Blame For Nigeria’s Economic Recession Under Buhari – Femi Adesina

The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, says the going of Nigerian economy into recession in 2016 was “inevitable” and past governments, not the Muhammadu Buhari-led government, should be blamed for it. Adesina stated this on Friday in a post, adding that the former governments did not have a will to save the country’s resources. He said, “At the economic front, of course, it came in 2015 when things were on a downward spiral. Nobody could have stopped that downward spiral because it was already set in motion. The recession that came in 2016 was inevitable. Nobody could have stopped it due to some actions and inactions of the government that left. The coordinating minister of the economy then even said that the government didn’t have the will to sav...
Enaira App Returns To Google Play Store
Economy, News, Nigeria

Enaira App Returns To Google Play Store

eNaira App has reappeared on the Google play store barely 24 hours after it was taken down by the Google team following a series of complaints by Nigerians that downloaded the newly unveiled digital currency Speed Wallet Application. It was earlier reported that eNaira app recorded over 100,000 downloads before it was pulled down when its ratings dropped to 2.0 within 24 hours of it being available for download. However, the app reappeared on the Google play store a few hours ago despite the nationwide criticism that trailed its poor implementation and sudden disappearance. The Director of Corporate Communications for the Central Bank of Nigeria, Osita Nwanisobi, who was in Abakaliki on Thursday, said the eNaira app's disappearance was temporary as it was pulled down for an import...
Rivers Not Fighting FG on VAT –Wike
Economy, Finance, News, Nigeria

Rivers Not Fighting FG on VAT –Wike

Against the backdrop of the legal tussle over Value Added Tax collection, the Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike, has said the state has no intention to fight the Federal Government. Wike said this during a public lecture on ‘Taxing powers in a federal system’, held on Saturday to mark the 60th birthday of a lawyer, Ahmed Raji (SAN). The governor, who was represented by Rivers State Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Prof. Zacchaeus Adangor (SAN), said, “I have heard a lot of comments been made that we are fighting Federal Government; there is no desire or any intention of the Rivers state government to fight the Federal Government. But you must remember that in a federal system, the states are not house boys of the Federal Government. Read Also: FG Considers Taking...
Naira Dips To Record Low At Official Market
Economy, Finance, News, Nigeria

Naira Dips To Record Low At Official Market

The value of the naira fell further by 1.68 per cent against the dollar at the official market on Thursday. At the Investor & Exporter foreign exchange window, the local currency opened at 413.15/$1 on Thursday but closed at 422.07/$1. Read Also: Nigeria Can’t Get New Dollars When Exchange Rate is Artificially Low -Osinbajo The naira had depreciated by 0.19 per cent to 415.10/$1 on Wednesday after closing at 414.30/$1 on Tuesday. At the parallel market, the dollar was bought at N565 and sold for N570, according to some operators in the black market. The Central Bank of Nigeria, however, maintained N410.91/$1 as its official rate on its website. In July, the CBN stopped forex sales to the Bureau de Change operators and assured that it would supply forex to legitima...
Nigeria Can’t Get New Dollars When Exchange Rate is Artificially Low -Osinbajo
Economy, Finance, News, Nigeria

Nigeria Can’t Get New Dollars When Exchange Rate is Artificially Low -Osinbajo

Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo says that Nigeria cannot get new dollars into the system when the exchange rate is “artificially low.” Osinbajo said this on Monday in Abuja at the opening of a two-day Mid-Term Ministerial Performance Review Retreat organised to assess progress made towards the achievement of the nine key priorities of the Buhari administration. Osinbajo, who said the artificially low exchange rate was a deterrence to investors from bringing foreign exchange into the country, noted that, “As for the exchange rate, I think we need to move our rates to be as reflective of the market as possible. This, in my own respective view, is the only way to improve supply. “We can’t get new dollars into the system where the exchange rate is artificially low. And everyone knows by ...
FG Allocates N5.9tn To Education, Health, Defence, Infrastructure
Economy, Nigeria, Security

FG Allocates N5.9tn To Education, Health, Defence, Infrastructure

The Federal Government has allocated the sum of N5.93tn to critical sectors of the economy including defence, health, education and infrastructure. According to the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, the Federal Government prioritised defence and infrastructure sectors in the 2022 budget by allocating N2.41tn and N1.45tn to these sectors respectively, which represent N15 per cent and N8.9 per cent of the total budget. Ahmed disclosed this at the “Public Presentation and Breakdown of the Highlights of the 2022 Appropriation Bill’’ held in Abuja on Friday. She noted that the N2.14tn allocated to the defence and security sectors includes recurrent and capital expenditure for the Military, Police, Intelligence and Para-Miltary. Some of the projects tha...
FG Saved One Million Jobs, Sustained 150,000 SMEs — Osinbajo
Economy, Finance, News, Nigeria

FG Saved One Million Jobs, Sustained 150,000 SMEs — Osinbajo

Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo has revealed that through the Economic Sustainability Plan, the present administration has saved over one million jobs and forestalled the closure of over 150,000 small businesses hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. This is as he said that social protection schemes can break the cycle of poverty, give real access to jobs, economic opportunities, and improve human capacity. Osinbajo said this on Tuesday in Abuja while speaking virtually during a United Nations High-Level Forum on Jobs and Social Protection. Senior Special Assistant to the Vice-President on Media and Publicity, Laolu Akande, disclosed this in a statement titled, ‘Why social protection schemes are crucial, by Osinbajo at UN high-level forum on jobs’. According to him, Nigeria’s response to t...
Why Nigeria’s Economy May Soon Collapse — Former CBN Governor, Sanusi
Economy, News, Nigeria, Uncategorized

Why Nigeria’s Economy May Soon Collapse — Former CBN Governor, Sanusi

A former Central Bank of Nigeria governor, Muhammad Sanusi, has said the country’s economy is on the brink of collapse. Sanusi disclosed this at the closing ceremony of the Kaduna Investment Summit, tagged KadInvest 6.0, which was held recently. According to him, aside from the fact that Nigeria is having difficulties in oil production, the product is now being rejected in the global market. The former Emir of Kano said the “goose laying the golden egg for Nigeria is about to die”. He said the future was in a knowledge-based economy, adding that Nigeria was behind many African countries in the innovation index. He lamented that, while Ghana with a smaller economy invests more in education, Nigeria spends only seven per cent of its budget in that direction. Read also: Band...
Why We Continue To Borrow – Lai Mohammed
Economy, News, Nigeria

Why We Continue To Borrow – Lai Mohammed

The Federal Government on Thursday descended on critics of its frequent request for fresh loans describing them as insincere. The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, spoke for the government during a town hall meeting in Maiduguri, Borno State to address vandalism of power and telecommunications infrastructure. Mohammed said the critics were members of previous administrations who ‘performed abysmally in terms of modernizing our infrastructure, even when they served at a time when our earnings were multiples of what we get today.” He said that the government was not borrowing for recurrent expenditure or to pay salaries but to build world-class infrastructure that would benefit generations of Nigerians. According to him, based on the two town hall meetings held i...