Slump
Nigerian lawmakers approve $2.4 bn funds for security, coronavirus vaccines
Nigerian lawmakers on Wednesday approved some 982.7 billion naira ($2.4 billon) additional budget funds to help the government buy COVID-19 vaccines, and equipment for its security forces. Africa’s top oil producer, Nigeria is struggling with the economic impact of the pandemic and a slump in crude prices as well as surging violence from criminal gangs and its grinding jihadist insurgency. The approved amount is $216.8 million higher than President Muhammadu Buhari’s request made to the lawmakers in June and is expected to be sourced through international and local borrowing. Most of the funds – around 722 billion naira ($1.8 billion) would go towards the procurement of additional equipment for security forces, Senator Barau Jibrin, chair of the senate appropriation committee, said. Around...
2,700 Akwa Ibom women benefit from federal government’s special grant
The minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, Sadiya Umar Farouq, has advised Nigerian women not to regard the N20, 000 special grant given to the rural woman by the federal government as the fabled national cake. She has rather charged the beneficiaries to judiciously use the grant to improve their living standard by utilizing it as seed capital do boost their trades and businesses for greater income. Speaking through Bashir Nura Alkali, the permanent secretary of the ministry, at the flag off of the Grant for Rural Women Project and the symbolic disbursement of the grant to 2700 women of Akwa Ibom state, in Uyo, on Thursday, Farouq explained that the Grant for Rural Women Programme was introduced in 2020 to sustain the social inclusion agenda of Presid...
Energy firms’ bank debts rise to N5.94 trillion
The debts owed to Nigerian banks by oil and gas operators as well as power companies in the country rose to N5.94tn at the end of 2020 from N5.25tn in December 2019. The N5.94tn represents 29.16 per cent of the N20.37tn loans advanced to the private sector by the banks as of December, according to the sectoral analysis of banks’ credit by the Central Bank of Nigeria. Oil and gas firms, which received the biggest share of the credit from the banks, increased their debt by N600bn to N5.18tn in December 2020 from N4.58tn in December 2019. The debt owed by power firms to the banks rose to N763.22bn in December 2020 from N671.45bn in December 2019, the CBN data showed. Oil firms operating in the downstream, natural gas and crude oil refining subsectors owed N393tn as of December, up from N3.42t...
RB Leipzig boss emerges as Tottenham’s ‘top target’ to replace Jose Mourinho
RB Leipzig boss Julian Nagelsmann has emerged as the likely candidate to replace Jose Mourinho, should Tottenham’s current slump continue. Spurs began the season in excellent form and even topped the table as recently as early December, yet just a few months later, Mourinho’s men find themselves 23 points behind leaders Manchester City and with a real job to do to secure a top-four spot. Their defeat to London rivals West Ham United on Sunday means they are now nine points behind the Hammers in fourth, albeit with a game in hand on David Moyes’ side. Despite a late rally in that game, inspired by half-time substitute Gareth Bale, Tottenham’s defensive woes once again came to the fore, the centre-back pairing of Eric Dier and Davinson Sanchez looking particularly shaky in recent weeks. With...
RB Leipzig boss emerges as Tottenham’s ‘top target’ to replace Jose Mourinho
RB Leipzig boss Julian Nagelsmann has emerged as the likely candidate to replace Jose Mourinho, should Tottenham’s current slump continue. Spurs began the season in excellent form and even topped the table as recently as early December, yet just a few months later, Mourinho’s men find themselves 23 points behind leaders Manchester City and with a real job to do to secure a top-four spot. Their defeat to London rivals West Ham United on Sunday means they are now nine points behind the Hammers in fourth, albeit with a game in hand on David Moyes’ side. Despite a late rally in that game, inspired by half-time substitute Gareth Bale, Tottenham’s defensive woes once again came to the fore, the centre-back pairing of Eric Dier and Davinson Sanchez looking particularly shaky in recent weeks. With...
Mikel Arteta wants Arsenal transfer European form into Premier League
Mikel Arteta has demanded Arsenal transfer their Europa League form into the Premier League, where he says his side need to start winning matches “immediately”. Goals from Eddie Nketiah, Mohamed Elneny, Joe Willock and Folarin Balogun helped the Gunners ease past Irish side Dundalk 4-2 in Dublin on Thursday to finish top of Group B with a 100 per cent record – the first time they have won six successive European matches since 2005. That fine European form is in sharp contrast to their domestic struggles, where the club have lost six out of their last nine matches to slump to 15th in the table. With the Europa League now finished with until February, Arsenal can focus all their attention on domestic competition, with Arteta stressing the urgent need to pick up positive results, starting wit...
