A 37-year-old artist from Nigeria has figured out the most innovative way to create art with a sustainable approach toward it. Chibuike Ifedilichukwu collects and recycles aluminium cans to design bigger-than-life portraits of famous personalities to raise awareness in his nation.

A photographer, curator, graphic designer, printmaker by passion, and an artist at heart, Chibuike has created over 40 upcycled artworks from waste materials that would otherwise end up in landfills. He exhibits his recycled aluminium items on domestic and international platforms, having sold some pieces at $1,000 each.

The artist’s success should not be measured by the amount of money he makes but by the idea with which he appeals to the masses. Chibuike’s intense thoughtfulness for nature has led him to recycle as many aluminium cans for his artwork. He aspires to initialise a community-based art gallery that would inspire artists to engage in environmental drives.

“I wanted to find a unique way to express myself, and I researched. I found that nobody does this pattern of art,” Ifedilichukwu told the press.

He uses materials like wood, plastic, copper wire, rope, injection bottles and aluminium discarded by local pharmaceutical companies to create interesting abstracts and portraits.

Ifedilichukwu talks about his hometown, Akwa and jocularly says that there is no shortage of supplies for his artwork in the region. “When I go scavenging, people see me as a mad person,” he added.

“But I’m making a living out of it … and I’m creating awareness to make our environment safe,” Ifedilichukwu proudly said.

AL Circle is amazed to see such a noble initiative, and we congratulate the silent hero, Chibuike Ifedilichukwu, on his amazing accomplishments. May we have more artists like him who believe in recycled art.

[alcircle]

Minister of Sports Development, Senator John Owan Enoh, has congratulated athletics sensation, Oluwatobiloba Amusan for qualifying for the Women’s 100m hurdles final, at the ongoing World Athletics Championships in Budapest.

The world record holder won the second semifinal with a time of 12.56 seconds to defeat all comers in the tightly contested race.

Enoh said “Tobi embodies the resilient spirit of Nigeria and we are glad she’s flying beyond all hurdles to do us proud in Budapest.”

“I have no doubt that Tobi can produce her magic again and clinch gold in the final. She has done it before and she can do it again. She has our support now and always”.

Tobi will file out on Thursday night, flying Nigeria’s flag in the final, as she hopes to defend her 2022 title against other top athletes.

She currently holds the world record in the event with a time of 12.12 seconds, which she set in Eugene, Oregon, to slam Gold at the last World Championships.

The inability of cargo to be freighted through air is causing a lot of havoc to the aviation industry’s contribution to the Gross Domestic Products (GDPs) of Nigeria.

Its failure is however, having a negative effect on the Yakubu Gowon International Airport, Jos as its revenue generation has continued to dwindle.

Mr. Rindap Nantim, the General Manager, Jos Airport, Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) told the Avia-Cargo Committee set up by the agency that the airport is now a shadow of itself.

According to him, in the 1980s and 1990s, Jos Airport was reputable for exportation of cargo from all North Central Zone of the country to cities in Nigeria and outside the nation.

He emphasised that in the past, flowers, mangoes, meat and other agricultural produce from the farms were exported through the airport, saying that while the products were available in the farms, they are no longer exported through the aerodrome.

He explained that the plan of the management was to make Jos Airport a hub for the North Central Zone, hoping that this would be realised with the renewed vigour of FAAN.

He said: “Our dream is becoming a reality with this Avia-Cargo Committee. One of the things I discussed with the management of FAAN at a retreat organised for staff in 2022 in Kano was cargo development for our airports, especially the Jos airport.

“In the 1980s and 1990s, fresh flowers, meat and other agricultural produce were airlifted from this airport to several other cities and countries, but now, the airport is a ghost of its former self. This is not because the facilities are not there, but no one is encouraging investors to come here.”

In his speech, Mr. Ikechi Uko, the Coordinator, Avia-Cargo Committee, said the essence of the committee was to know why the airport failed to be a leading exporter of aviation cargo and to proffer solutions.

Uko explained that Nigeria would not be number one exporter of cargo produce on the continent without Plateau State, which is known as the ‘Food Basket’ of Nigeria.

According to him, the Federal Government was relying on the committee’s report to set a policy for cargo rebirth in Nigeria and assured that the committee would not fail the nation.

Uko told Nantim that the committee comprised experts from various sectors, including the Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON), Nigeria Quarantine Service, Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) and National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), among other agencies.

“We are here to know how Jos became number one and how we ruined it. What are the lessons that we can learn from the past and how can we make Nigeria the number one in Africa? Was it lack of airlines, logistics or capacity that made us failed?” he said.

On his part, Mr. James Shalangwa, a member of the committee, explained that Jos airport was a beehive of activities in the past with at least 24 flights daily.

Shalangwa emphasised that airlines like the former Nigeria Airways, Okada Air and Kabo Air were competing for cargo exports from the airport, but regretted that all these had collapsed in recent times.

Shalangwa blamed the consolidators like cargo clearing agents for the current challenges, but expressed delight that the Federal Government through the management of FAAN had shown the commitment to make Nigeria an exporting nation.

Patricia, a Nigerian cryptocurrency exchange, has revealed the introduction of its own native token named Patricia Token (PTK). However, the launch has generated more doubt than applause within the local cryptocurrency community.

Native tokens are digital assets that are specific to a particular blockchain platform or cryptocurrency exchange. They are created and issued directly by the platform or exchange itself. Examples of native tokens include BNB 

BNB

$219

 on the Binance exchange, Ether 

ETH

$1,665

 on the Ethereum network, and Solana 

SOL

$22

In the official communication on X (formerly Twitter), the company stated its intention to transition exchange operations to the Patricia Plus app. The newly introduced native token, which the company asserts is a stablecoin with a 1:1 peg to the United States dollar, is expected to take the place of customers’ existing Bitcoin 

BTC

$26,379

 and naira balances.

This development follows the company’s previous disclosure of a security breach resulting in fund losses in May 2023. Despite asserting that customer funds remained unaffected, platform users have faced ongoing difficulties in accessing their funds since April.

The response to Patricia’s announcement has led to speculation around fears of a potential exit scam, which could leave customers who have funds stuck on the platform in a precarious situation.

Highlighted in posts by members of the local crypto community, there are a few indicators of concern surrounding Patricia’s introduction of PTK. The token is absent from major cryptocurrency aggregators like CoinMarketCap and CoinGecko. These platforms offer comprehensive details about tokens, including their real value, issued quantity, contract address and launch blockchain.

PTK does not exist on widely adopted blockchains used by exchanges for launching their native tokens. To illustrate, PayPal’s newly introduced stablecoin,

 is accessible on the Ethereum blockchain, the platform on which it was introduced.

In its statement on X, Patricia disclosed its plan to convert outstanding balances to PTK without obtaining customer consent. This unilateral action has raised concerns, as many worry about their ability to exchange the token for fiat currency or alternate cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin.

If customers initiate withdrawals in large numbers, a surge of withdrawals could lead to PTK losing its peg, potentially leaving those who couldn’t withdraw stranded.

[cointelegraph]

Chief Bode George, one time PDP deputy national chairman (South) was perhaps one of the few honest PDP elders that saw the party’s defeat in the last February presidential election coming. He had before the election warned against breaching of PDP constitutional rotational provision conceived by its founding fathers to promote harmony and sense of belonging. His warning was however ignored by those driven by greed for power with dire consequences including the fractionalization of the party into PDP, NNPP and Labour. Bode George who has continued to blame the defeat of the party on mismanagement by its leaders knew a house divided against it would not stand.

After their self-inflicted tragedy, there were newspaper reports of discussion of possible merger between Labour Party, PDP and NNPP ahead of 2027. The truth is that the three are one and the same. As Bode George asked a while ago: Where is Obi of Labour Party coming from?” Obi after serving his two terms as Anambra governor on the platform of APGA joined PDP and became Atiku’s running mate in the 2019 election.

But Atiku Abubakar, leveraging on voting population of the north, in breach of PDP constitution came out for the 2023 election. Peter Obi equally driven by greed like Atiku Abubakar resigned from PDP, relocated back home to also exploit the ethnic sentiments of his own aggrieved Igbo people who felt betrayed after faithfully serving PDP for about 24 years. Beyond vehicle for political power, both have no abiding faith in PDP.

But the fault is neither in Obi nor in Atiku since  PDP was neither a political party driven by ideological orientation nor a political faction with interest or opinion different from that of the party. To John Campbell, a former American envoy to Nigeria, PDP was “an elite cartel at the centre of power in Nigeria with no ideological or programmatic basis, but simply as essentially a club of elites for sharing of oil rents and political spoils”.  PDP did everything including periodic ‘family quarrel’ over sharing of Nigerian resources” during its 16 years reign to validate Campbell’s thesis.

At the onset of the 4th republic, contract for the refurbishment of Nigerian ailing refineries secured by PDP members was not implemented. Instead, they created artificial fuel scarcity to justify setting up of PPPRA, an instrument with which PDP leaders and their children defrauded the nation to the tune of about N1.7trillion under the fuel subsidy scam.

They also came up with self-serving monetization policy through which public servants immorally bought their official residences. Two stood out like sore fingers: Dimeji Bankole, a former Speaker of the House of representative  and David Mark, a former Senate President  who bought the Senate president mansion, built on 1.6 hectares of land, a national monument that was not meant to be acquired by an individual and was never reflected in the federal government’s gazette as required”.

There was also the power sector reform.  It was launched by President Jonathan in Lagos on August 26, 2010. Then in August 2013, 15 companies made up of 10 Distribution Companies (DISCOs) and five Generation Companies (GENCOs)  paid $2.238b to  take over 60% of unbundled PHCN after federal government  injection of between $8.2-$15b of taxpayers money.  But who were these new investors and Disco owners? Records show they were mostly PDP stalwarts led by Professor Jerry Ghana.

As Bola Tinubu, former governor of Lagos State and now Nigeria’s president observed during the 11th Bola Tinubu Colloquium: “The PDP administration shared our generation, distribution and transmission to their friends and cronies without very deep and thoughtful research and evaluation. It has now become pork chops”.

The whole privatization effort between 1999-2014 was abused forcing the 7th Senate report of November 30,  2011 to direct the National Council on Privatization to “rescind the sale of Abuja International Hotels Limited (NICON) Luxury Hotel) as well as Sheraton Hotel and Towers;  investigation of the sales of assets of Daily Times Nigeria PLC  to Folio Communications Limited and its directors by anti-graft agencies and the sold assets recovered; that the Share Purchase Agreement of Volkswagen Nigeria Limited now (VON)  be rescinded while the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) was to investigate the economic crimes perpetrated against the nation by Barbedos Ventures Limited; that NICON Insurance PLC  and Nigeria Re-insurance PLC should refund N900 million and one billion Naira respectively back to the federal government; that  the former Directors-General, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, Dr. Julius Bala and Mrs. Irene Nkechi Chigbue should be reprimanded by the National Council on Privatization; while the then Director-General, BPE, Ms Bolanle Onagoruwa be relieved of her appointment.

 But Nigerians have short memories. In any case, by 2023, Buhari had done enough to alienate those who gave him landslide victory in 2015. While those in government lived in denial, there was massive insecurity especially in the northern states where helpless Nigerians were kidnapped for ransom, killed or driven into IDP camps by terrorists who confiscated their homes and farm lands.

There was also a reign of impunity. Godwin Emefiele, a CBN governor appointed by President Jonathan because of his sympathy for PDP wanted to contest for  Nigerian presidency on the platform of APC even as a sitting CBN governor. When he lost out, he unleashed violence on Nigerians. He disobeyed Supreme Court order that attempted to bring relief to Nigerians who had no access to their confiscated life savings. Frustrated Nigerians were up in arms against APC and its presidential candidate.

The presidency was therefore just there for the picking by PDP. But PDP, haunted by its past and driven only by greed, frittered away the opportunity. While their total votes and those of their two family members almost doubled that of victorious APC, it was APC that scored the highest votes and met the constitutional spread requirement.

Let the talk and regrouping begin, but not with the current PDP leading light who have always behaved like prostitutes. Atiku Abubakar has been running from one party to the other in search of a platform since 2007: Action Congress 2011; APC 2014 and PDP 2017.

Aminu Tambuwal also once rallied round his supporters to breach his party (PDP) zoning formula ceding the speakership to the Southwest geo-political zone. He was elected speaker with 252 votes compared to government and PDP-backed Mulikat Akande-Adeola’s 90 votes

Bukola Saraki is as audacious as he is venomous on the political battle field. He punished PDP by pulling it down for claiming he was part of N1.7 fuel subsidy scam. In APC, he traded off the victory of his party for senate presidency in what Itse Sagay back then described as ‘a victory for impunity, a victory for fraud and a victory for political desperation and indiscipline”.

We have Obi, diminished not only by his opportunism, appeal to religion and ethnic sentiments, but also damaged beyond repairs by his unthinking ‘obidients’ who terrorize those who refuse to swallow their prejudices.

Besides the struggle for 2027, the nation todays needs a viable opposition that can keep the ruling party on its toes. That task does not belong to those who brought PDP to this sorry path but to those who understand that political parties promote ideological or policy goals and also serve as modernization agents.

It was another week of anti-dollar vituperations as developing and emerging economies under the BRICS group met in Johannesburg South Africa.

Former Nigerian President Chief Olusegun questioned the need for the dollar as the international reserve currency and medium of global trade.

Bloomberg reports the ex-Nigeria leader saying “I want to buy from India. Why should I use dollars? which received a loud cheer in response. Nigeria earns most of its dollars from crude oil sales but in recent times has been facing FX scarcity as a result of rising imports.

Opinions of other leaders

But it was not only the former Nigerian leader who voiced his discontent with the greenback, leaders from Brazil and Russia promoted calls for a move away from the USD and advocated for a new medium of international trade. Russia’s Vladimir Putin said in a recorded speech “The objective, irreversible process of de-dollarization of our economic ties is gaining momentum”

He went further saying the BRICS group would work to achieve the aspirations of the majority of the world’s population.

• He said “We cooperate on the principles of equality, partnership support, and respect for each other’s interests, and this is the essence of the future-oriented strategic course of our association, a course that meets the aspirations of the main part of the world community, the so-called global majority”

Brazil’s Lula Da Silva called for an alternative currency for international trade that doesn’t jeopardize national currencies. He said,

• “I have defended the idea of adopting a reference unit of account for trade, which will not replace our national currencies”

Why anti-dollar rhetoric is getting louder

Experts opined that the revitalized advocacy for a move away from the US dollar was necessitated by the sanctions by the United States government against Russia. Some of the sanctions include freezing Russia’s central bank assets and banning Russian banks from the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT), the international financial communication system, in February 2022. Hence there is a fear among nations that if they fall out with the West, the fate of Russia will befall them.

Long walk away from the dollar

However, creating an equitable alternative currency for international trade is not an easy task as there are many contentious questions with no easy answers.

• Last month, the Chief financial officer of the New Development Bank (NDB)- a financial institution created by the BRICS group said “The development of anything alternative is more a medium to long term ambition. There is no suggestion right now to create a BRICS currency,”

It was not meant to be this way. But like a good number of things Nigerian, the story is hardly complete without a twist in the tale. And so it has been for at least three years now with the story of the gas car that was supposed to lessen, if not end, Nigerians’ petrol misery.

Sometime in 2020, state oil company, Nigerian National Petroleum Company (now NNPC Limited), launched what it advertised as the National Gas Expansion Programme (NGEP). The major objective of the programme, according to NNPC Group CEO, Mele Kyari, was to harvest gas for car fuel. This was in addition to expanding its use for domestic cooking.

At the official launch of the programme on December 1, 2020, Kyari said given how important the project was for the government’s pursuit of cleaner, safer and cheaper energy, NNPC would provide the conversion free of charge to car owners and transporters.

“You bring your car to a location,” he said, “and then we fit in the things you need to call the gas and also to receive the gas into your car. All the one million cars that we promised will be done through a structure that the Ministry of Petroleum Resources will put in place to ensure that any Nigerian who has to convert his car will get it done for free.”

Kyari said at the time that outside Abuja, the retrofitting and service centres would be available in 12 other states, adding that the Ministry of Petroleum Resources would bear the burden “until the private sector can come in.”

To demonstrate how serious the government was about the programme, NNPC promised the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) 100 gas-powered buses, out of which I think 50 or so were delivered.

As surely as big money never fails to follow big talk in conspiracies that often end in heart-breaking scandals, the Central Bank offered N250 billion to “support” the NNPC’s gas car value chain. This “support” fund was announced at least four months before the programme was officially launched. 

A statement by the Bank in August 2020 said each beneficiary would get a maximum of N10 billion at between five and nine percent with a one-year/18-month moratorium for 10 years disbursable in the case of small and medium scale enterprises, through the NIRSAL Microfinance Bank.

All of this was nearly three years ago. As you read this piece, no one is sure how many of the estimated 12million registered cars in Nigeria are gas-powered or how many of the estimated 6.7million of registered commercial vehicles out of the 12m are on gas. The best guess is on the website of NIPCO, a private limited oil and gas company, with a strong Indian presence.

NIPCO claims that it has converted 5600 cars to gas, but the data does not say whether this is the total number of cars converted in the last 19 years since NIPCO started LPG delivery. Or just what type of gas conversions took place – whether LPG-type (liquified petroleum gas, more commonly available); or CNG-type (compressed natural gas, with very few plants available in Nigeria). We also don’t know how many of the 13 service and retrofitting stations which Kyari announced three years ago are ready.

Was the CBN’s N250 billion gas value chain support fund disbursed? If so, how much and what is left of it? Who were the beneficiaries and what have they done with the money? I tried in vain to get the answers. Perhaps the bank or the Ministry of Petroleum Resources can help. 

Two years after the NGEP was announced, Businessday published a story entitled, “FG’s autogas policy falls short,” in which the newspaper reported that, “A combination of infrastructure, high cost of gas, lack of proper planning and prevailing harsh economic realities have affected the implementation of the autogas policy.”

It’s on top of this mess that Ajuri Ngelale, the Special Adviser on Media and Publicity to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, announced last week the establishment of the Presidential Compressed Natural Gas Initiative (PCNGI) “to revolutionise the transportation landscape in the country, targeting over 11,500 new CNG-enabled vehicles and 55,000 CNG conversion kits for existing PMS-dependent vehicles.”

Ngelale sounded like a repurposed version of CBN’s August 2020 memo, with the warmed-over promises of NNPC. But I’ll come to that.

Again, just as it happened when Kyari promised that one million cars will run on gas and that, for a start, over one dozen service stations across the country will be available to provide support, NNPC has promised that in the short run the new gas project would be supported by NIPCO. Kyari did not say how NIPCO’s infrastructure would meet the demand. 

Information on NIPCO’s website as of today claims that Nipcogas – a JV project in which NNPC’s subsidiary Nigerian Gas Company (NGC) owns majority shares – has 15 CNG stations in Benin and is contemplating expansion both in Benin, Edo State; and in Ibafon, Ogun State. But insiders told me that there are only 12 stations in the country as of now, out of which Nipcogas owns 11. How the current infrastructure will convert 11,500 petrol cars to LPG and CNG, much less provide 55,000 conversion kits remains to be seen.

The demons are, however, in plain sight. The same demons that haunted Kyari’s grandiose plan to convert one million cars to autogas, and also turned the CBN’s N250 billion to pork barrel, will return to haunt the “PCNGI revolutionary initiative” enthusiastically announced by Ngelale.

It’s not hard to see why. The things Businessday cited as impediments to the execution of NGEP after its launch have not changed – not the system or the people behind it. If anything, thanks to corruption, they have metastasized, with concerns that at least N90 billion of the N250 billion set aside by the CBN to “support” the gas value chain may have been diverted.  

It is also surprising that the government will prioritise CNG over LPG when the latter is not only more readily available, but is also relatively cheaper to convert and maintain. Can we even talk about conversion without data of car owners’ attitude and readiness?

And then there’s the supply problem. A viable gas car service without steady gas supply is a pipedream.  Africaoilgasreport.com reported on August 18 that in spite of huge oil and gas assets owned 100 percent by NNPC, which could significantly improve its oil and gas production and evacuation potential, the company prefers to play “the politics of financial engineering.” NNPC has become the successor of the Central Bank in the business of everything.  

Also, while the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) said it was still producing in spite of declaring a force majeure in October last year as a result of flooding in the Niger Delta, the company has not vacated the force majeure, raising serious concerns about viable supply. 

And why, in any case, does CNG have to become a “presidential initiative?” Are we going to have a presidential initiative on LPG, a presidential initiative on LNG and perhaps a presidential initiative on presidential initiative? The system is broken not because of an absence of a presidential initiative, but because NNPC, its subsidiary NGC, and the refineries that should lead the gas pathway have failed. 

If in nearly 50 years of NNPC only about 10.5 percent or roughly four million Nigerian households use cooking gas, how can the government prioritise car gas over households through a presidential initiative salvation army, a purely ad hoc arrangement? 

Which serious investors will put down their money in an arrangement that completely ignores the history of past failures and present concerns about mind boggling corruption? And how, by the way, can key institutions such as the National Automotive Design and Development Council (NADDC) and the National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure (NASENI) be left out in any sustainable plan for autogas?

Tinubu has enough problems on his plate. Hugging a special purpose initiative to nowhere will not do him much good. If the government is really keen on gas cars, then he must return to where the rain started beating us.

The Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, Dr. Betta Edu, has said that her office will probe the activities of the former Minister of Humani­tarian Affairs, Disaster Manage­ment and Social Development, Hajia Sadiya Umar Farouq.

According to Edu in an inter­view on Wednesday, the ministry will operate on transparency and so it’ll start by reviewing the so­cial register.

She said, “We’ll look at all the programmes that were done by the previous administration. What their achievements and challenges were, how money was spent and we’ll do our best to see that these challenges are over­come as we go into improving and expanding on the social safety net of our country.

“History is important. It’ll help direct, help in­form our decisions for the present and for the future. It’s important for us to look into the books.”

On the social register, she said, “We’ll go back to it and look at it in detail and verify that these people are truly the ones we intend to reach. It’s a new adminis­tration and we don’t un­derestimate the work done by the World Bank and the Office of the National Safe­ty Net.

“However, we need to be very critical of what we’re doing because Nigerians are watching and people will be held accountable”, Edu said.

She added, “President Bola Tinubu truly wants these interventions to get to those who sincerely need it. Some governors have raised concerns and this is just the right way to go about it.

“The register must be verified and updated. The people who don’t deserve to be there based on criteria will be taken off the regis­ter.

“Those who are truly poor by the criteria, and deserve to be on the social register will be included. No one will be left behind. The most important is that we must work with the state and local governments to be able to get a true social reg­ister for our country.

“I listened to some of the presentations just started at the different depart­ments, units and agencies and some of the things I could pick out was the fact that some of the registra­tions were done truly and however, the involvement of the state government and in some cases local gov­ernments was not robust as it should be.

“We’ll ensure that we have the right register that we can implement properly and hold people account­able so that truly poor peo­ple are lifted out of pover­ty,” she said.

Yet-to-be determined number of people were feared dead and many others trapped in a multi-storey building, which collapsed amidst heavy downpour on Wednesday night in Abuja.

The building is located at the ever-busy Lagos Street in Garki village area of Garki II district of Abuja.

An eyewitness, Tanko Dabo, who was at the scene after the incident, said the building was housing many apartments, while the ground floor was full of shops.

He said the building collapsed during the heavy downpour, which started around 11:50pm late Wednesday night.

“There was wailing all over the place after the building collapsed. Dozens of people are either dead or trapped as the building was fully occupied.

“It was a scene of helplessness with people screaming and running helter-skelter, while the heavy rain continued,” he said.

Meanwhile, a Facebook user and former aide to the immediate-past Minister of the FCT, Ikharo Attah, who took to his Facebook page to post the incident in the wee hours of Thursday, said seven persons had so far been rescued and evacuated to hospital, while others were still trapped.

He confirmed that a rescue team and other first responders were on ground at about 2am carrying out rescue operations.

He lamented that the rescue operation was, however, slow due to the ongoing rain at the time.

“They are making frantic efforts at getting an excavator to remove people from the rubble,” Attah wrote.

The current prices of calls, data, and other telecommunication services are no longer sustainable, telecom companies have stated.

This, according to them, is because of the current market realities such as increases in energy costs, inability to access foreign exchange, and more. This concern was voiced by the Chairman, Association of Licensed Telecommunication Operators of Nigeria, Gbenga Adebayo, during his industry address speech on Wednesday, at the second edition of the Nigerian Communications Commission’s Nigerian Telecommunications Indigenous Content Expo in Lagos.

He explained that even though the conversation to review prices is hard, it must be had for the industry to continue to deliver communication service in the country.

Adebayo said, “We also must have one hard conversation, I know it is difficult, but it is one we must have. The current pricing regime of the industry is not sustainable. We are basically selling below cost. It is not easy to talk about, but we cannot continue like this. We must allow market forces to determine prices. On our end, we must look at a more realistic pricing offering because today’s pricing regime is not sustainable.”

Telcos have been insisting on increasing the prices of their services following the increase in the cost of operation caused by rises in the cost of diesel and the devaluation of the naira.

In his address, the ALTON chairman congratulated the new minister of communications, Bosun Tijani, on his appointment and wished him well. However, he noted that the independence of the NCC is sacrosanct to the success of the ICT sector in Nigeria.

Adebayo opined that the politicisation of the industry has been responsible for most of the current issues besieging it. He explained that the USSD debt with banks would have cleared if political agendas had not prevailed.

He stated, “We must not subject our regulator to political agendas. The biggest problems that we have today, that we are dealing with as an industry, are some simple policy issues that have subjected to politics.

“Let me speak for a bit about the issue of USSD debt. That was a simple commercial agreement that entered into political intervention and has led us to these points. The people dealing with the problems today, both at the level of the NCC, the ministry, CBN did not create the problem.

“USSD is a provided service under a willing-buying pattern. We provide the service, and get paid for the service that was rendered. We provide the service, we don’t get paid, then we follow the rules. But when that time comes, and the policy makers intervenes, then it becomes a problem.”

He urged that the NCC must be allowed to remain independent under the new administration.

Also at the event, the Executive Vice Chairman/ Chief Executive Officer, NCC, Prof. Umar Danbatta, stated that the sector is home to two of the most valuable listed companies in Nigeria with a collective market capitalisation in excess of N10.45tn.

He also stated that the commission in 2021 and 2022, generated revenue in excess of $820m from the auction and grant of 3.5GHz Spectrum band licences to three operators for the deployment of Fifth Generation (5G) services in the country.

The EVC, who was represented by the Executive Commissioner (Technical Services), Ubale Maska, noted, “In order to sustain and further improve Quality of Service and Quality of Experience in telecommunications services in Nigeria, we must embrace indigenous content and value creation within the telecoms value chain, otherwise, increase in telecoms tariff will be inevitable.”

The EVC further added that the local SIM card industry is now worth N55bn following the ban on foreign SIM cards last year.