News extra 6th December 2017

Ø  Petrol Queues Return, Baru Rushes Back from London

Long queues of vehicles waiting to buy petrol from service stations on Tuesday resurfaced in some parts of the country, forcing the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Dr. Maikanti Baru, to cut short his official trip to London.

 As at 1p.m. yesterday when THISDAY concluded its round of visits to service stations in Maitama, Wuse, Jabi, along Kubwa Expressway and Nyanya axis, vehicular queues had built up, but the stations were dispensing at the official pump price of N143 to N145 per litre.

Thisday

Ø  Court unfrezees Patience Jonathan’s 16 accounts

Justice Binta Nyako of the Federal High Court in Abuja has lifted an order made on May 30, freezing 16 bank accounts linked to wife of former President Goodluck Jonathan, Patience.

Justice Nyako in a ruling yesterday ordered the lifting of the freezing order that barred Mrs. Jonathan and 10 organizations linked to her from accessing the accounts containing aggregate sums of $5.8million and N3.5billion.

Thenation

Ø  Buhari names Ojukwu’s son as NHRC boss

President Muhammadu Buhari has written to the Senate to request the confirmation of the  appointment of Mr. Anthony Ojukwu as executive secretary of the National Human Rights Commission.

The Senate President, Bukola Saraki, read the letter to senators at the plenary on Tuesday.

Punch

Ø  SEC to Resume Oando Forensic Audit from Wednesday

In a nod to the U-turn made by the Minister of Finance, Mrs Kemi Adeosun, to allow the forensic audit into the activities of Oando Plc to go ahead, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Tuesday said that the audit will resume from Wednesday in the company’s office.

SEC in a terse statement reiterated its commitment to go ahead with the forensic audit, saying: “This commitment is contained in a letter dated December 5, 2017, addressed to Oando Plc.”

The commission also assured the general public of its zero tolerance to infractions in the Nigerian capital market.

Thisday

Ø  Varsity unions and the earned allowances strike

On December 4, 2017 the Non-Teaching Staff Unions (National Association of Academic Technologists; Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities; and Non Academic Staff Union of Educational and Associated Institutions) in public universities resumed their suspended strike. This time, it is about the failure of the Federal Government to explain how and why it ‘shared’ the N23billion disbursed earned allowances disproportionately. Rationally so, it may be strange to have heard as Nigerians that out of the said amount, academic staff earned allowances for 22 ‘verified varsities’ by the FG were allocated N18,389,698,674.04 while non-teaching earned allowances for 24 varsities amounted to N4, 610,301, 325.96.

Punch

Ø  Dangote Emerges Only African on Bloomberg’s List of 50 Most Influential People

President of Dangote Group Aliko Dangote has emerged the only African to make the Bloomberg list of 50 most influential people in the world this year.

Bloomberg on Monday announced The Bloomberg 50, a new annual, multi-platform initiative that honours 50 icons and innovators who have changed the global business landscape in measurable ways over the past year.

Thisday