Michael Ojuroye Initiative (Ngo)

CBN governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, Sunday installed his wife, Sadiya Lamido as Giwar Danmaje to commemorate the silver jubilee of their marriage. 

BY LAGBAJA Dear Okey Ndibe: Thank you for sounding the alarm in a way that should make us reflect deeper. Mumu is not a condition I proudly proclaim. It was with a heavy heart that I came to this shocking realization that we are indeed a country of mumus. Harsh as it might sound, no other explanation would suffice. It is apparent that the "leaders" know that they would always get away with whatever incredible schemes they concoct because, amongst other reasons, (a) the mumu people they "lead" are no different from their mumu "leaders" in character (b) the mumu people are gullible, superstitious and naive (c) there are no consequences for criminal acts if you belong to the right group (d) these mumus never demand accountability from their "leaders" (e) the mumus expect their rulers to loot or would otherwise consider them foolish Apologies for the seeming overgeneralization but the vast majority runs with this mumu mindset. There is a ...

BY: FUNMI OJUROYE Abuja – The Association of Vice Chancellors of Nigerian Universities on Sunday urged the Federal Government to establish a Ministry of Higher Education in the country. The Secretary-General of the association, Prof. Michael Faborode, said that the proposed ministry would give the needed attention to the challenges facing the sector. Faborode said the call was part of the resolutions at its conference on “Consultative Higher Education Policy Dialogue’’, held in Abuja recently. “At that particular conference we said there is need for a ministry of higher education to look at problems of higher education different from what it has always been. “Ministry of Education is so large, that we can divide it to tertiary education and other levels of education, Universal Basic Education (UBE) secondary education, there is enough challenges there, everywhere needs attention. “But for a country to have left the gains of modern development, a knowledge society, y...

BY: FUNMI  OJUROYE Kano – Flood on Friday killed one person and destroyed 434 houses  following a heavy rainfall in Kano metropolis. The Executive Secretary of the State Emergency Relief and Rehabilitation Agency (SERERA), Alhaji Ali Bashir, confirmed the incident after assessing the situation in Kano on Saturday. He said the deceased died on Friday night after he fell in Katsaiki River at Darmanawa in Kumbotso local Government area of the state. He said out of the number of affected houses, 408 were destroyed in Kano metropolis while the remaining 26 houses were located in Dawakin-Tofa local government area. He said the state Deputy Governor, Dr Abdullahi Ganduje, had directed the agency to take all the pictures of the affected houses and assess the extent of damage caused to property. He said Ganduje told the agency to forward the report to his office for immediate assistance to the victims of the disaster. Bashir, however, called on the people of the s...

BY: FUNMI OJUROYE Abuja – The Presidency on Saturday faulted the African Development Bank (AfDB)’s report on Nigeria’s poverty reduction efforts. Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Dr Reuben Abati, said that the report was “devoid of truth and political’’. Abati said that it was inconceivable that AfDB’s report came barely a month after the UN gave an award to Nigeria for its efforts at reducing poverty significantly in the country. He recalled that the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), a UN body, at its 38th Session in Rome in late June gave an award to Nigeria as one of the nations that made significant progress in reducing hunger. The Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, represented President Goodluck Jonathan in receiving the award on behalf of the government, he stated. Adeshina presented the award to the president during a Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting. Abati said that such a negative report from the AfDB so...

BY: FUNMI OJUROYE Dear Sir, We have created and employed over 3.5m job seekers since May 29th, 2011′’ say government representatives at various fora, but the statistics and specifics are kept in the vault of imagination. World all over, maritime is the greatest employer of labour, and nations of the world protect and exclusively allocat that sector to their nationals, or at best to those that have naturalized. In the sub-region of West Africa, no non-indigene enters the sea/airports as well as the boarder stations to do the transactions of clearing, forwarding or transportation. Such issues must be handled by the indigenes  who are authorized by their agencies to execute the jobs. Those nations base their reasons on provisions of employment to their citizens, as well as ensuring the protection of their gateways (security-wise) as well as insulating their officials from corrupt tendencies. But reverse is the case in Nigeria. Our senior Those affected corruption virus...

By Funmi Ojuroye in Lagos                       The Interim National Chairman of the newly-registered All Progressives Congress, Chief Bisi Akande, saturday cautioned President Goodluck Jonathan on his 2015 ambition, claiming the president is seeking a ‘third term’ in office. Fielding questions from journalists on the state of the nation in his Ila-Orangun country home, Osun State, Akande also accused President Jonathan of treating some serious national issues with levity. The APC chairman, who is a former governor of Osun State, said: “I do not see President Jonathan as a serious-minded person. Nigeria's problem today is Jonathan. I had written him twice when I was in office as National Chairman of ACN on issues bordering on the nation and till date he has not acknowledged the letters. “He takes national issues with levity. All he is concerned about is his ‘third term’ ambition. He has reduced the totality of Nigeria to k...

BY: FUNMI OJUROYE There is anxiety within the money market following the sterilization of 50 percent of public sector deposits in banks by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), which some bank chief executives claim has resulted in a sharp rise in interest rates. But Coordinating Minister of the Economy and Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, urged banks to relook their cost structure and interest rate spread. THISDAY checks over the weekend revealed that the rate of interest charged on short-term loans by banks climbed to an average of 21 per cent by last Wednesday as the CBN enforced its monetary policy decision to raise the Cash Reserve Requirement (CRR) for public sector funds to 50 per cent. The new monetary policy mandates banks to keep 50 per cent of public sector deposits, which comprise deposits of all tiers of government as well as ministries, departments, agencies and companies in their coffers at the CBN and not lent out. CBN intends to use the move ...

FROM FUNMI OJUROYE, Lagos ■ Asks why the killers used too much bullets on her P ublic Relations Manager of the Transcorp Hilton Hotel Abuja, Shola Adeyemo has opened up to  Sunday Sun  on the circumstances surrounding the death of his 39 year old wife, Margaret. He disclosed that she was shot and killed by armed men who had robbed a house near his Wuye residence at about 9pm on Tuesday. Last Friday,  Daily Sun  had exclusively reported that the late Mrs. Adeyemo was shot and killed by armed assailants with the police recovering 24 gun pallets in the Hyundai SUV she drove in. Adeyemo narrated that his late wife left their children in the sitting room of their home to make a quick purchase at a nearby shopping plaza. She promised to return soon but that was the last time she was seen alive. “Apparently she (Margaret) ran into them on her way back from the plaza”, said Adeyemo who discovered what had happened to his late wife on his way home from work. “...

BY: FUNMI OJUROYE The confirmation of the All Progressives Congress as a political party in Nigeria by the Independent National Electoral Commission, the country’s electoral umpire, is a significant development for the nation’s democracy and politics. While the merger process was on, political analysts had argued that the country had never recorded a successful merger of political parties. Apparently, this was why one of the founders of the APC and former governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, described the coming together of the Action Congress of Nigeria, the Congress for Progressive Change, the All Nigeria Peoples Party, and a part of the All Progressive Peoples Party as not just a merger. He said, “This is the first ever merger in the history of Nigeria and it represents a paradigm shift in our politics.” With the formation of the APC, it has become clear that the 2015 general elections will be a battle between two titans. The underlying benefits from the...

Article  By Kayode Samuel Three fashionable fallacies lie at the root of prevailing Igbo outlook to Lagos, the former federal capital. The first is that Lagos is a no-man’s land with no indigenous population. The second is that Federal Government money was used to build Lagos into the huge metropolis that it has now become. This argument goes further to claim that since the “federal money” allegedly belonged to all Nigerians, the political control of Lagos should, willy-nilly, be open to just about anyone and everyone who claims to be a Nigerian. The third fallacy is that Lagos is a hunting ground, a jungle city where all being “joiners”, the predatory instinct must rule. By this pernicious thesis, Lagos is a place in which regardless of one’s roots – or the lack of it – one can seize the trophy. It is an el-Dorado where anything goes and in which everything, including political authority, is up for grabs since the place does not belong to anyone anyway! These are erroneo...