The President Bola Ahmed Tinubu-led administration on Thursday declared a state of emergency on food security.

Naija News reports that this was made known during a media briefing by the President’s special adviser on special duties, communications and strategy, Dele Alake.

President Tinubu also identified measures to check food inflation and guarantee price stability.

The president’s plans were conveyed in a speech delivered by Dele Alake, his special adviser on special duties, communications and strategy.

Read the full text from the press briefing below:

TEXT OF MEDIA BRIEFING BY MR. DELE ALAKE, SPECIAL ADVISER TO THE PRESIDENT ON SPECIAL DUTIES, COMMUNICATIONS AND STRATEGY ON THE DETAILS OF PRESIDENTIAL INTERVENTION ON FOOD SECURITY, FOOD PRICING & SUSTAINABILITY ON THURSDAY, JULY 13, 2023

Gentlemen of the press, I welcome you once again to this press conference to update the public on President Bola Tinubu-led administration’s immediate response to the current food inflation in the country.

As a hands-on- leader who follows developments across the country everyday, Mr. President is not unmindful of the rising cost of food and how it affects the citizens. While availability is not a problem, affordability has been a major issue to many Nigerians in all parts of the country. This has led a significant drop in demand thereby undermining the viability of the entire agriculture and food value chain.

Accordingly, in line with this administration’s position on ensuring that the most vulnerable are supported, Mr. President has declared, with immediate effect the following actions:

• That a state of emergency on food security be announced immediately, and

• That all matters pertaining to food & water availability and affordability, as essential livelihood items, be included within the purview of the National Security Council.

As a direct and immediate response to this crisis, a number of initiatives will be deployed in the coming weeks to reverse this inflationary trend and guarantee future uninterrupted supplies of affordable foods to ordinary Nigerians.

As with most emergencies, there are immediate, medium- and long-term interventions and solutions.

In the immediate term, we intend to deploy some savings from the fuel subsidy removal into the Agricultural sector focusing on revamping the agricultural sector.

In an earlier meeting with Agriculture Stakeholders (today), we drafted a memorandum of partnership between the government and the individual stakeholder representatives that encompasses the decisions taken and actions proposed from our engagements.

The immediate intervention strategies are as follows:

1. We will immediately release fertilizers and grains to farmers and households to mitigate the effects of the subsidy removal.

2. There must be an urgent synergy between the Ministry of Agriculture and the Ministry of Water Resources to ensure adequate irrigation of farmlands and to guarantee that food is produced all-year round.

As a country, Mr. President has made it clear that we can no be comfortable with seasonal farming. We can no longer afford to have farming down times.

3. We shall create and support a National Commodity Board that will review and continuously assess food prices as well as maintain a strategic food reserve that will be used as a price stabilisation mechanism for critical grains and other food items.
Through this board, government will moderate spikes and dips in food prices.
To achieve this, we have the following stakeholders on board to support the intervention effort of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu: The National Commodity Exchange (NCX), Seed Companies, National Seed Council and Research institutes, NIRSAL Microfinance Bank, Food Processing/ Agric Processing associations, private sector holders & Prime Anchors, small holder farmers, crop associations and Fertilizer producers, blenders and suppliers associations to mention a few.

4. We will engage our security architecture to protect the farms and the farmers so that farmers can return to the farmlands without fear of attacks.

5. The Central Bank will continue to play a major role of funding the agricultural value chain.

6. Activation of land banks. There is currently 500,000 hectares of already mapped land that will be used to increase availability of arable land for farming which will immediately impact food output.

– Mechanization and land clearing- The government will also collaborate with mechanization companies to clear more forests & make them available for farming

7. River basins- there are currently 11 rivers basins that will ensure planting of crops during the dry season with irrigation schemes that will guarantee continuous farming production all year round, to stem the seasonal glut and scarcity that we usually experience.

8. We will deploy concessionary capital/funding to the sector especially towards fertilizer, processing, mechanization, seeds, chemicals, equipment, feed, labour, etc.
The concessionary funds will ensure food is always available and affordable thereby having a direct impact on Nigeria’s Human Capital Index (HCI). This administration is focused on ensuring the HCI numbers, which currently ranks as the 3rd lowest in the world, are improved for increased productivity.

9. Transportation and Storage: The cost of transporting Agricultural products has been a major challenge (due to permits, toll gates, and other associated costs). When the costs of moving farm produce is significantly impacted- it will immediately be passed to the consumers, which will affect the price of food- the government will explore other means of transportation including rail and water transport, to reduce freight costs and in turn impact the food prices.

As for storage, existing warehouses and tanks will be revamped to cut waste & ensure efficient preservation of food items.

10. We will Increase revenue from food and agricultural exports. As we ensure there is sufficient, affordable food for the populace, we will concurrently work on stimulating the export capacity of the Agric sector.

11. Trade Facilitation: Transportation, storage and export will be improved by working with the Nigerian Customs, who have assured us that the bottlenecks experienced in exporting and importing food items as well as intra-city transportation through tolling will be removed.

These are some of the immediate interventions this government will put in place to tackle this crisis.
Principally, one of the major positive outcomes of these interventions will be a massive boost in employment and job creation.

Indeed, agriculture already accounts for about 35.21 percent of employment in Nigeria (as at 2021), the target is to double this percentage to about 70% in the long term.

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s mandate to create jobs for our teeming youth population will be achieved with between 5 to 10 million more jobs created within the value chain, working with the current 500,000 hectares of arable land and the several hundreds of thousands more farmlands to be developed in the medium term.

In closing, this administration understands that food and water are the bedrock of survival and therefore is calling on all Nigerians to partner us in ensuring the success of this strategic intervention. This administration is working assiduously to ensure that Nigerians do not struggle with their essential needs.

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu wishes to use this medium to continue to assure Nigerians that this administration will not relent in its efforts until all strategic interventions are deployed efficiently and effectively and until every household is positively impacted. Our president is the president of all Nigerians and the father of the nation. The renewed hope mandate remains alive and no one, absolutely no one, will be left behind.

I thank you all.

Air Peace CEO, Allen Onyema, firmly believes that the secondary school football teams of the 1980s would triumph over the present-day Super Eagles if they were to meet on the pitch, The PUNCH reports.

The Nigeria senior team has only won four of their nine games under new manager Jose Peseiro, losing the remaining five, with the side scoring 18 goals and conceding 15.

Perhaps, the recent results may have influenced Onyema’s assertion.

“Those days used to be very tough. In fact, secondary school games in those days used to be tough. I remember when I played for Government College, Ughelli, they even killed one of our school boys in Agbarho (Delta State). It used to be tough in those days,” Onyema told The PUNCH.

“Let me tell you, secondary school teams in the 70s will beat our national team of today. The present national team will be nowhere near the secondary school teams of yesteryear. I’m not talking about clubs, those days, secondary school teams were unlike these days,” he said.

“Today, secondary schools are now in two-storey buildings, no compound, no playground. Everybody is protective of their child, nobody allows the child to go out again to experience the street life,” Onyema added.

He advocated for the use of football as a means to generate employment opportunities and called on the government to prioritise sports.

“We should use football to create jobs. I call on this government to look into sports, if they can invest in it and make the place safe for people to go and recreate on weekends, we will bring back that followership. It will still happen again,” the entrepreneur said.

Contrary to a widespread belief, the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, has stated that its e-Naira was not introduced to compete with digital cash services of commercial banks.

Speaking yesterday at an e-Naira sensitization forum on the campus of the University of Abuja, Mr. Joseph Angaye, a Deputy Director of CBN stated: “e-Naira is not to replace the naira, it’s not to replace the existing payment system infrastructure we already have.

“It was introduced to deepen the financial system, especially the payment system, to address some challenges we saw in the payment system infrastructure and to complement what we already have.

“We are not introducing it to be a competitor to what the banks are doing or other service providers but to provide a platform they can leverage to provide more effective service am sure some of us have been experiencing some challenges from time to time using the payment system but e-Naira will help to promote financial inclusion, reduce congestion in the infrastructure so we are not brought down by downtime registering the number of interfaces that it takes to initiate and complete transaction and giving opportunity to provide additional services that are not even available in the Nigeria system like facilitating payment even when there’s no network.”

Meanwhile, Angaye informed that the apex bank was on the campus of the university as part of the bank’s efforts to promote the eNaira adoption in tertiary institutions across the nation and foster an environment where it would be the preferred option in transactions.

Mr. Angaye said, “Recently we have been engaging with number of universities, actually we should have started from Abuja we’ve been to virtually all the geo political zones of the country to talk to them about eNaira and to partner with them to ensure that eNaira is adopted as a means of financial transactions especially for revenues collection as we as payment”.

He added, “eNaira has really evolved from the inauguration of the eNaira by the former president almost two years ago, we’ve achieved a number of milestones, there have been further developments in terms of improving the functionality based on feedback we have been getting from various stakeholders”.

Prof. Aisha Maikudi, a Deputy Vice Chancellor of UniAbuja said that the university was ready to partner with the CBN to educate the students and other Nigerians on the initiative.

Former Lagos State Governor Akinwunmi Ambode will on Friday meet with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

Naija News recalls that both men, former Lagos State Governors, met at the state reception organized for Tinubu by Lagos State Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu on June 29.

Tinubu publicly acknowledged Ambode’s presence, saying,“ I’m glad to see Ambode. Thank you Akin!” during the meeting.

According to Western Post, the meeting at the Presidential Villa is believed to be the final reconciliation between both men after they reportedly fell out over Ambode’s inability to get a second-term ticket in 2019.

It was gathered that Tinubu is reportedly considering Ambode for an appointment in his government, with the Friday meeting believed to be an avenue to conclude discussions on that.

Ambode who was then Lagos governor lost the ticket of the All Progressives Congress to Sanwo-Olu in a direct primary election conducted across the state.

While Tinubu publicly insisted he had nothing against Ambode as the decision to remove him was that of the party members, many believed that the then governor’s failure to get the ticket of the APC was as a result of his falling out with his erstwhile mentor and political godfather.

Recall that Ambode’s reconciliation with Tinubu and return to mainstream politics was initiated by Governor Sanwo-Olu during a visit to the home of his predecessor.

A fine of N120 million has been slammed on Stanbic-IBTC Bank by the Competition and Consumer Protection Tribunal (CCPT) sitting in Abuja over two failed transactions by the bank.

Naija News understands that a bank customer identified as Clement Osuya had dragged the bank to court over its failure to complete transactions from his IBTC account to that of his Access on two different occasions.

In his narration to the tribunal, the claimant, Osuye, said on two occasions, one on September 8, 2022, he filled out a form under the NIS Instant Payment option for a transfer of the sum of N500,000 to his Access Bank account, but on both instances, while the money was debited from his IBTC account, his Access account wasn’t credited.

According to him, in the first instance, the money was reversed back into his IBTC account within 24 hours, while on the second occasion, it was changed after 72 hours.

Osuye, however, holds that due to the failed transactions by the bank, of which the money was meant for his children’s school fees, he was traumatised, embarrassed, humiliated, and was forced to access a loan to offset the fees.

The tribunal’s judgment of two to one slammed a fine of N120 million on Stanbic-IBTC Bank—the money to be paid into the tribunal’s remitta account.

The lead judgment delivered by Hon. Sola Salako-Ajulo also ordered the bank to pay the claimant, Mr. Clement Osuya, the sum of N1 million as the cost of filing the action.

Reading out its judgment, the tribunal convicted the bank for contravening the provisions of Section 130(1)(a) of the FCCP Act, 2018 and Section 5(2)(8) and (9) of the Central Bank of Nigeria Regulation on Instant Interbank Electronic Transfers.

The tribunal said the fine was imposed due to the bank’s failure to comply with the 10 minutes or, at most, a one-hour mandatory timeline for failed transfers to be reversed as provided by Sections 154 and 155 of the FCCP Act, 2018.

Salako-Ajulo said, “The tribunal holds that in as much as the defendant (IBTC) failed to comply with the two instructions of the claimant to transfer the sums of N500,000 to another account in Access Bank, as no transfer took place at both times, defines that the defendant breached the banker-customer contractual relationship between the two parties.”

However, the tribunal refused to award the sum of N5 million to Osuya as compensation because he failed to prove any injury he suffered as a result of the failure of service delivery by the bank.

Meanwhile, while Hon. Ibrahim Yakubu agreed with the verdict of Salako-Ajulo, the tribunal’s presiding judge, Hon. Chuma Mbonu, disagreed and gave a minority judgment.

The presiding judge, in his minority judgment, held that the tribunal lacked the jurisdiction to entertain the petition; instead, it has the powers of appellate jurisdiction and not of original jurisdiction. Therefore dismissed, the suit for lacking merit.

While counsel to the claimant, Ms. Deborah Solomon, applauded the tribunal for the well-served judgment, counsel to Stanbic-IBTC Bank, Marcel Osigbemhe, asked how his client could be convicted when no charges were brought against it.

Osigbemhe, who was not happy about the judgment, blamed the failure of the transaction on the third-party NIPS service.

Governor Charles Soludo of Anambra state has vowed that the state and its residents will not obey any illegal sit-at-home orders.

Soludo stated this following the state government’s directive that, henceforth, residents should ignore the sit-at-home order by unauthorised individuals or groups in the state.

The directive was contained in a statement issued by the Press Secretary to the governor, Mr Christian Aburime on Thursday.

According to the statement, the decision was necessitated by a recent order to sit at home given by Simon Ekpa.

The state government described the order as illegal, as it urged residents of the state not to comply with such directives from non-state actors or blame themselves for such compliance.

The statement partly reads, “Such directives should be completely ignored by the citizens of Anambra and, by extension, the entire South East.

“As for the imposition of sit-at-home orders by unauthorised individuals or groups, this is a clear violation of the law.

“Anambra State will never observe any sit-at-home order. Our markets, schools, businesses, and other social activities will remain open.

“Anambra State will never be a breeding ground for anarchy, fear, or lawlessness.”

Phrank Shaibu, the Special Assistant on Public Communications to the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, has described President Bola Tinubu’s plan to hand out N8,000 to 12 million households for six months as a brazen attempt to divert public funds.

Shaibu, in a statement on Thursday, noted that Tinubu’s plan to spend $800m on palliatives under an opaque arrangement was reminiscent of former President Muhammadu Buhari’s conditional cash transfer and COVID-19 intervention initiative which saw politicians keeping food items and provisions in their homes while the poor went hungry.

He said Buhari’s interventionist programmes only ended up making Nigerians poorer as shown in reports released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

Atiku’s aide stated, “After announcing the removal of petrol subsidy without proper planning, Tinubu has asked for the approval of $800m loan which he claims will be disbursed to 12 million households for six months at N8,000 for each household per month. This is a continuation of the scam of the All Progressives Congress.

“According to statistics, a Nigerian household as at 2019 counted on an average of 5.06 members. So, with Tinubu’s uninspiring plan, each individual in a household will get N1,600 per month or N53 per day. What should they do with it? Use the money to buy sachet (pure) water or a cup of boiled groundnut on a daily basis? And this is the man they claim transformed the economy of Lagos State? This must be a joke or a more sinister attempt to divert public funds.”

Shaibu argued that Tinubu lacked a clear economic policy apart from taxing Nigerians, adding that the former Lagos governor has been exposed as an economic illiterate.

“Tinubu boasted that he would ‘develop Nigeria’s economy’ like that of Lagos but this was all a scam. Statistics show that over 70% of Lagos revenue comes from income tax paid by private companies which had been in Lagos for decades due to its status as Nigeria’s former capital.

“His only plan is to tax Nigerians to death as he did in Lagos and that is why the people of Lagos rejected him in the last election. Tinubu promised to turn Nigeria’s economy into a $1 trillion economy but it is all a scam and can never be achieved with his brand of “agberonomics,” Atiku’s aide said.

Shaibu said Tinubu ought to have focused on putting money into the agricultural sector and subsidising production and working at attaining energy security that is the backbone of spurring desired economic growth from SMEs if he was really serious about reviving the economy.

He added, “Agriculture makes up about 30% of Nigeria’s GDP. He should have invested funds in the production aspect of agriculture and other issues affecting crop yields. The rural areas which are mostly agrarian are in the throes of insecurity. On Tinubu’s watch, over 200 people have so far been killed. However, he seems clueless on how to tackle this menace.

“The so-called palliatives that Tinubu seeks to share to the poor are just another avenue to divert public funds. For years, the Nigerian government has rejected calls to publish the list of the beneficiaries of the so-called palliatives but this has never been done because it is all a scam.

“Tinubu should stop trying to deceive Nigerians who are still suffering from the effect of his lackluster economic policies.”

Continuing, he noted that “There are also concerns that this plan is a reinvention of old tricks through which the APC uses public funds as subterfuge for vote buying.

“Let no one make any mistakes about it, the planned palliative is Trader Moni 2.0. The scheme is nothing but a means to use public funds to prosecute political campaigns and objectives. It is even more telling that the current imposter government is contemplating the initiative when there is high expectation that the presidential election tribunal is set to give judgement in the controversial election that brought Tinubu into government.

“The APC is a political party that has lost favour with a vast majority of Nigeria, and it is no coincidence that since 2019 when the party invented the charade of Trader Moni, it also incontrovertibly introduced the menace of vote buying into Nigeria’s body politic.

“A special investigation into the Trader Moni initiative by the administration of former President Muhammadu Buhari revealed that more than N20bn was wasted on corruption, kickbacks, fraud and partisanship,” Shaibu added.

Ekiti State Chief Judge, Justice Oyewole Adeyeye, escaped death on Wednesday, when a section of the state high court complex collapsed on him while in the office.

Justice Adeyeye is said to be currently receiving medical attention at an undisclosed hospital in the state.

The incident happened around close of work on Wednesday. The judge was still in his chamber at the time of the collapse.

The incident may not be unconnected with structural deficit worsened by the torrential rainfall.

No life was lost during the collapse but the Chief Judge reportedly sustained serious injury as a section of the office collapsed on him.

It took serious efforts from workers before the judge was rescued from the rubble.

A visit to the Registrar office to get further details did not yield result as the registrar through a staff member asked journalists to return later.

In a glaring display of contrasting priorities, the Bola Tinubu-led administration has allocated a mere N19 billion to address the devastating impact of flooding on farmlands across the nation, while approving a staggering N70 billion for lawmakers in the House of Representatives to purportedly improve their working conditions.

A breakdown of President Tinubu’s N500 billion planned palliative measure seen by THE WHISTLER on Thursday raises questions about the government’s commitment to the agricultural sector and its understanding of the urgent need to support farmers in times of crisis.

THE WHISTLER earlier reported that the House of Representatives hurriedly approved the request sent by President Tinubu on Wednesday, seeking an amendment to the N819 Supplementary Appropriation Act to enable his administration to “source for funds necessary to provide palliatives to mitigate the effect of the removal of fuel subsidy on Nigerians.”

With worsening flooding incidents wreaking havoc on agricultural lands and leaving farmers in extreme distress, the N19 billion allocation to the Federal Ministry of Agriculture to address farmers’ plights may seem grossly insufficient, especially considering the amount new lawmakers in the National Assembly would be getting.

The breakdown was given as follows: “1. N500 billion for palliatives and other capital expenditure to cushion the effect of recent subsidy removal policy.

“2. N185,236,937,815 to Ministry of Works and Housing to alleviate the impact of the severe flooding experienced in the country in 2022 on road infrastructure across the 6 geo-political zones.

“3. N19,200,000,000 to Federal Ministry of Agriculture to ameliorate the massive destruction to farmlands across the country during the severe flooding experienced last year.

“4. N35 billion to National Judicial Council/

“5. N10 billion to Federal Capital Territory Administration for critical projects

“6. N70 billion to National Assembly to support the working conditions of new members.”

Meanwhile, in a similar letter to the Senate on Thursday, President Tinubu disclosed how the Federal Government plans to disburse the $800 million borrowed from the World Bank to cushion the effect of the fuel subsidy removal on the masses.

According to him, N8,000 would be disbursed monthly to 12 million “poor and low-income households” for six months.

“You may also wish to note that the purpose of the facility is to expand coverage of shock-responsive safety net support among the poor and vulnerable Nigerians. This will assist them in coping with basic needs.

“You may further wish to note that under the conditional cash transfer window of the programme, the Federal Government of Nigeria will transfer the sum of N8,000 per month to 12 million poor and low-income households for a period of six months, with the multiplier effect on about 60 million individuals,” says part of the president’s letter read during the plenary on Thursday by the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio.

The Renewed Hope Initiative of the Office of the First Lady of the Federal Republic of Nigeria Sen. Oluremi Tinubu has assisted victims of the June 23, 2023 flood mishap which occurred at the TradeMore Estate, Lugbe, Abuja.

While speaking, the First Lady through her representative, wife of the Vice President, Hajiya Nana Shettima, expressed her sympathy over the unfortunate incident.

Mrs Tinubu, in a statement issued on Thursday by her spokesperson, Busola Kukoyi, said though there was no assurance that this kind of incident would not reoccur since the rains were not yet over, she hoped the outreach and intervention of the Renewed Hpoe Initiative would go a long way in reducing their pains at this time.

The First Lady said, though the Initiative is still in the process of registration by the CAC, she cannot turn the other eye under the present circumstances of the TradeMore Estate which is in her domain.

In his response on behalf of the beneficiaries, Chairman of the Resident Association Dr Adewale Adenaike thanked Senator Tinubu and the renewed Hope Initiative for the hand of kindness and support extended to them especially at this trying times.

The beneficiaries were given Two Hundred and Fifty Thousand Naira ( N250,000.00) per affected household.
A total of 57 households benefited from this outreach by the Renewed Hope Initiative.