N’Assembly committee detects fresh flaws in 2016 budget

The Senate and House Joint Committee on Appropriation has detected fresh errors in the 2016 budget, investigations by The PUNCH have revealed.

It was gathered that the errors were responsible for the failure of the committee to present its report to the two chambers of the National Assembly on Wednesday as it had promised.

Investigations, however, showed that the errors would not affect the plan of the National Assembly to transmit the budget to President Muhammadu Buhari before Easter as efforts were being made to correct them.

It was learnt that one of the anomalies detected was in the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, where provisions had been made for procurement and installation of security systems every year since 2013.

For example, in 2013, the sum of N527,000,000 was budgeted for the item; in 2014, N1,161,356,582 was allocated to the same item; in 2015, N316,420,274 was budgeted for it; and N1,710,322,610 is to be spent on the procurement and installation of security system in the SGF office in 2016.

The committee also detected items without project locations in the Ministry of Works, Power and Housing (headquarters).

Such projects include the construction of a block of three classrooms at the cost of N85,592,483; construction of a maternity centre for N91,124,858; and the allocation of N172,623,767 for the building of skill acquisition centres.

The committee pointed out that oversight function would not be possible without project locations.

It was learnt that the committee also discovered anomalies in the allocation of large amounts of money for the rehabilitation and repair of office buildings as well as purchase of office items and fittings.

Not less than N21bn was allocated to such repairs and purchase at the Ministries, Departments and Agencies of the government.

The committee also detected duplication of items. For example, N2.3bn was earmarked for former heads of state in the service wide vote of the Ministry of Budget and Planning, while N400,190,000 was allocated to the affairs of the former heads of state in the SGF office.

Other examples of duplication include allocation of N256,920,000 for the purchase of equipment, vehicles and furniture for the National Bureau of Statistics and the N230,705,000 by the NBS for the same purpose.

It was also learnt that the committee discovered instances where allocations for the purchase of items were made without stating the quantities to be bought.

Such include the construction of solar boreholes at the cost of N140m in the Ministry of Works, Power and Housing and in the National Power Training Institute, N81m was budgeted for operational vehicles.

The committee described some items as curious. These include the allocation of N340m for wildlife conservation at the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria and N150m for growing girls and women project at the Federal Road Maintenance Agency.

Another curious budgetary item is the refund of N2,479,581,721 to states for federal roads, which was placed under the National Intelligence Agency.

When contacted, the Senate spokesperson, Senator Sabi Abdullahi, said the errors had been corrected at the committee stage.

He said that there were no fresh errors and challenged anyone with contrary information to publish the source.

Abdullahi said, “The errors in the budget were identified at the various committee levels. The Appropriation committees of both chambers had jointly scrutinised the document and had come up with an error-free copy.

“As a member of the Senate Committee on Appropriation, I can confirm to you that I am not aware of any fresh error discovered after the joint committee of the two chambers had worked on the budget.

“I challenge anyone with contrary information to publish it together with the source.”

But opposition party lawmakers told The PUNCH that the report was not submitted because there were still areas to be re-touched.

For example, the Minority Leader of the House, Mr. Leo Ogor, said the report was undergoing “finishing touches.”

Ogor added, “There are areas that require finishing touches. It will cut across several parts of the budget.

“But, I know it is something that will be quickly sorted out and the report will be laid by the grace of God tomorrow (today).”

Some candidates who sat for this year’s Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination, UTME, organised by the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board, JAMB, have rejected their scores to the examination being sent to their phones, saying the results are beyond their expectations. JAMB-LOGOSpeaking to Vanguard Learning, some candidates said JAMB is intentionally tampering with and failing candidates. For Anuoluwapo Oni, “I wrote the exam on March 5 but my result was tampered with as another person’s result was sent to me and posted on the JAMB website. Please note that I am not the only one with this problem, and we need a platform to voice our complaints.” For Joy Ezeani, “2016 UTME candidates, especially those that took their exams on 8th to10th of March 2016, are pleading with JAMB officials to stop scoring us too low. The systems we used were not good as they were always tripping off and we would have to wait for the server to come up. That really wasted our time.” In the same vein, Femi Adeoti said “JAMB is intentionally failing candidates and most of my friends and classmates are negatively affected. If you do very well, JAMB will score you 36 or less. I am really pained because I am a distinction student from Yaba College of Technology, so I wonder how I can score 184 in ordinary UTME. Please help us get our messages across.” Calling for the scrapping of JAMB as its objectives have been compromised, 22 years old Umar Ali from Kano State, said this year’s examinations show that JAMB can’t organise credible assessment of students for admission into tertiary institutions. He said: “The CBT mode of examination is a very good development if there is constant electricity, but this year’s exam was conducted at a time when electricity generation is below 1,570 MW. “

Read more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2016/03/candidates-reject-utme-scores-demand-scrapping-of-jamb/

Power generation drops by 759MW in 24 hours

Power generation fell by 759.1 megawatts in the 24 hours to Wednesday on the back of losses recorded by Egbin, Afam VI and other generation plants.

Electricity generation had on Tuesday risen to 4,368.5MW from 3,548.7MW on Monday. But it dropped to 3,629.4MW on Wednesday, industry data obtained by our correspondent showed.

Generation from Egbin, which is located in Lagos, was limited to 912MW on Wednesday, down from 1,085MW the previous day, due to gas constraints.

Shell’s Afam VI power plant in Rivers State, which generated 524MW on Tuesday, saw the level falling to zero on Wednesday. Its four units were said to be out due to defective gas compressors.

The Sapele power plant did not generate electricity on Wednesday, compared to the 40MW it produced the previous day.

Other plants whose generation fell included Omotosho, Olorunsogo, Geregu NIPP, Odukpani NIPP and the Ibom power plant.

Power generation in the country fell to a record low of 1,580.6MW last Wednesday, a development that threw many parts of the country into blackout for days on end.

The Federal Government had on Friday apologised to Nigerians for the poor power situation the country had been witnessing in the past few weeks.

The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, in a statement, blamed the situation on gas shortage, vandalism of critical infrastructure and sabotage.

The minister said the routine maintenance by the Nigeria Gas Company had affected the supply of gas to power stations, forcing down power supply from an all-time high of 5,074 MW to about 4,000MW.

FG empowers SON to jail substandard product dealers for 10yrs

The Standard Organization of Nigeria (SON) has given a 24-hour-ultimatum to all tyre dealers in Nigeria to destroy every fake tyre they have in their possession or face prosecution.

This ultimatum was given by the organization’s acting Director General, Dr Paul Angya, at a stakeholder’s forum for tyre dealers which held in Lagos, where he affirmed that the organization will not hesitate to jail anyone found in possession of substandard tyres since they now have the authority from the federal government to do that.

“Our new Act 2015 empowered us to jail promoters of substandard product up to 10 years and we will not relent to jail any culprit,” he said, adding that the era of seizure and destruction of sub-standard products was over.

He further stated that the organization was doing everything to prevent the importation of sub-standard products into the country, to improve the quality of tyres produced in the country and to stamp out corruption from SON with the introduction of e-invoice, e-payment and e-receipt.

Ne-Yo and wife Crystal Renay welcome baby boy just weeks after getting married

Fans are speculating that the couple may have named the tot Prince Shaffer Junior after the singer shared a Snapchat

 Congratulations to the happy couple

Ne-Yo and his new wife Crystal Renay have welcomed a baby boy together.
The couple, who only tied the knot last month, confirmed they were the proud parents of a healthy little lad on Tuesday.
As of right now Ne-Yo and Crystal are yet to spill any more details, but the singer did share a sweet picture of himself holding his son's hand on Snapchat.
Ne-Yo - real name Shaffer Chimere Smith - accompanied the image with a crown emoji and a banner which read: "Prince SJ has arrived."
It's led to speculation that the baby may have been named Prince Shaffer Junior, but as of yet the couple are yet to confirm if they've picked a name.

 He's already made his Snapchat debut

Another picture has since been posted on The Shade Room, featuring mum Crystal softly kissing the newborn's head.
Read more: Ne-Yo gets engaged and reveals he and his fiancée are expecting a first child
Ne-Yo, who is already dad to five-year-old daughter Madilyn and four-year-old son Mason from his relationship with Monyetta Shaw, has been on the edge of his seat waiting to meet the newest member of his brood.

 Earlier this week he shared a picture of himself reclining on a sofa with a heavily pregnant Crystal.

He captioned the image: "I hear Miles Davis playin' in the background #Blessed."

 

Police rescue three stolen Bauchi girls

Operatives of the Nigeria Police Force have rescued three teenage girls, who were abducted in Bauchi State and forcefully converted to Islam.

The Prison Inmate Development Initiative, a non-governmental organisation, handling the matter, told one of our correspondents that the girls were handed over to the Assistant Inspector-General of Police, Zone 12, Bauchi, Mr. Tunde Ogunsakin, on Tuesday, by the Shari’ah Commission in the state.

SUNDAY PUNCH had reported on March 6, 2016, that Blessing Gopep, 13, was abducted by two men identified as Iliya and Umaru, both living in Alkaleri, Bauchi State.

Blessing and her friend, Mary, were on their way back to Jos after spending their holidays with Blessing’s uncle in Bauchi in August, 2015.

Her father had said Blessing and Mary had gone to the Alkaleri motor park, and while they waited on the bus for other passengers, two men, identified as Iliya and Umaru, arrived at the park on a motorcycle and abducted Blessing.

On November 19, Linda Christopher was abducted by one Mallam Shagari in Tarsha Durumi village, while Progress Jacob, 13, was abducted by Mallam Musa in the Yelwa, Sabon Kaura area, both in Bauchi State, on her way back from church on January 3.

According to Ms. Gobet, Progress’ aunt, the teenager went to church on the morning of January 3, 2016 and did not return when the church was presumed to have closed at about 10.30am.

She was allegedly abducted in the Yelwa, Sabon Kaura Area of Bauchi State by one Mallam Musa on her way back from church, which is said to be a few metres away from her aunt’s residence.

READ MORE: We want our stolen girls freed like Ese Oruru –Parents

The distressed aunt said she reported the case to the traditional ruler (Seriki) of Sabon Kaura as well as the Yelwa Police Station, which only took her statement and directed her to inform them when she found Progress.

She added that all efforts to locate the ‘missing’ girl proved abortive until a letter was delivered to her from the Bauchi State Shari’ah Commission, informing her of Progress’ conversion to Islam.

Sixteen-year-old Linda, a secondary school pupil in Enugu, was seen with one Mallam Shagari at Tarsha Durumi village in Bauchi State on November 19, 2015.

It was learnt that Linda had left Enugu four days earlier to join her parents, who lived in the Katanga Giwa village of Bauchi.

Her parents were notified of her whereabouts by a kinsman, who knew the family.

Just like the Jacobs, her parents got a letter from the Shari’a commission, notifying them of their daughter’s custody and her conversion to Islam.

SUNDAY PUNCH had reported the failure of the Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Solomon Arase, to rescue the girls one week after the newspaper had reported the abduction.

READ MORE: IG fails to rescue stolen Bauchi girls

The Commissioner of Police, Bauchi State Police Command, Mr. Baba Tijjani, confirmed the release of the girls in an interview with The PUNCH on Tuesday.

Tijjani stated, “The girls have been released. They were not held by the Bauchi State Shari’ah Commission; they volunteered to become Muslims on their own and reported themselves to the Da’awah & Islamic Education Department, which took them to the Bauchi State Shari’ah Commission.

“Now, they have been produced. Progress Jacob and Linda Christopher have been released to their parents while Blessing Gopep’s parents have been told to come tomorrow (Wednesday) and they will go home with their daughter.”

When asked if the case would be treated as a criminal case and the culprits prosecuted, the police commissioner said, “We just released the girls to their parents. The investigations are still ongoing and we will come out with the details after the investigations.”

The Executive Director, PIDI, Mr. Mbami Sabka, who also confirmed the rescue to The PUNCH on the telephone on Tuesday, said he was glad that effort to rescue the girls was not wasted.

He added that this was the beginning of the release of more child brides.

Sabka said, “I am extremely grateful to PUNCH newspapers for their help. We hope that other perpetrators would learn from this. We, as an NGO, won’t stop at this; we will continue the fight for the release of child brides. An end must be put to this illegal act.

“The police have asked the Shari’ah Commission to bring the abductors involved because the girls didn’t walk to the commission by themselves; someone brought them.”

Blessing’s father, who couldn’t contain his excitement while speaking on the telephone, said he was very happy to have his daughter back.

He said, “I have waited so long for this day to come; it has been my only wish. I just want to thank God for bringing my daughter back to us. I am extremely happy; words fail me to express myself. I also want to thank PUNCH newspapers for their help.”

Blessing’s sister, Happiness, said since receiving the news, she had been restless.

“I’m boarding a bus first thing tomorrow to Bauchi. I can’t wait to see my sister,” she stated.

Jacob, who is Progress’ father, stated that he was happy to see his daughter again.

He thanked everyone that helped in his daughter’s release.

He added, “I have informed everyone in the village about her release; they are all expecting us. We are with the Commissioner of Police in Bauchi State. My daughter, Progress, is fine but we are a bit worried about her condition.

“She was asked to identify us as her parents and she did so by pointing at us but she did not speak to us. She only shook her head or nodded to questions.

She confirmed she was not sexually molested by anyone. The commissioner said she would be released to us when the medical examination has been concluded.”

Linda’s mother, Mrs. Onah, added, “She looks fine but we have not spoken to each other yet, although we sat together today. We were told the girls were released because they were not up to 18 years old and could not make decisions on their own.

“They are undergoing medical examinations as we speak and we heard the results will be released after three days. I am happy to see my daughter again.”

PIDI had written letters to the state Commissioner of Police and the National Human Rights Commission but got no response before taking the cases to Amnesty International.

Candidates, parents protest, demand cancellation of 2016 UTME

Hundreds of admission seekers to the nation’s tertiary institutions and their parents on Tuesday stormed the Lagos State Governor’s Office in Alausa, Ikeja, and the state Assembly complex to protest against alleged manipulation of the 2016 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination.
The protesters demanded the cancellation of the exams and the removal of the Registrar of the Joint Admissions Matriculation Board, Prof. Dibu Ojerinde.
The protesters, who faulted the conduct of the examination, described the exercise as a “big sham.”
The examination, conducted by JAMB, they alleged, was fraught with irregularities.

The examination, which started on February 27, will end on March 19.
While some of the candidates alleged that the board deliberately lowered their scores, some claimed that it arbitrarily awarded marks to many candidates.
The protesters, led by a group under the aegis of Concerned Parents and Education Stakeholders, displayed placards with inscriptions such as,  ‘All we are saying give us our mark’, ‘Dibu must go; the only stumbling block in education progress’, ‘The Joint Admission and Manipulation Board, give us our real results’, and ‘The professor of test and management has outlived his usefulness’, among others.
The protesters, who occupied the gate of the Lagos State House of Assembly complex for many hours, said JAMB and its registrar had “lost focus on how to conduct a successful Computer-Based Test in the 21st century.
A candidate, Maryam Animashaun, who expressed disappointment with the conduct of the examination, claimed that she received three different results from JAMB.
Animashaun, who sat for the examination at the College of Education, Oro, Kwara State, said, “I am confused. I do not know what to do now. The first alert I received on the telephone from the board with regard to the examination showed that I scored 218. The second alert read 186, while the third one read 286.
“The surprising thing now is that I cannot print any of the results. On the website, the board claimed that I did not sit for the examination. Meanwhile, I sat for English, Government, Economics and Literature-in-English.”
Another candidate, Kalasuwe Adeola, who claimed she scored 220, said she obtained the same score in 2015.
She  said, “I am sure JAMB did not mark this year’s UTME. If it did, why did they issue me the same result I obtained last year? In my printed result for this year, it was written 2015/2016 instead of 2016/2017. I sat for this year’s examination at the Bachel Model College, Lagos, on March 9. Unlike other candidates, I did not have any issue with my system during the examination.”
The National President of the Association of Tutorial Schools in Nigeria, Mr. Shodunke Olutodotun, lamented that over 10,000 candidates missed the UTME, while others had their marks deducted due to irregularities by JAMB.
“This year’s UTME will soon be concluded. We have a man called Prof. Dibu Ojerinde. This man has outlived his usefulness in JAMB. He seems to be more powerful than the country’s president.
“The protesters are the victims; their destinies are being finished by Dibu. Most of the protesters that had their exam in Delta State had the exam in a shrine. A lot of them got results before they sat for the exam.
“We are appealing to Governor Akinwunmi Ambode and the Speaker, Mudashiru Obasa, to send signal to Abuja to stop UTME. If they don’t do that, we will go to Abuja.
“How will someone sit for Physics, Chemistry, Biology and the next thing he sees are Economics, Commerce and Government?”
Describing the exam as a fraud, a parent, Mr. Bunmi Elujula, urged the Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu, to look into the complaints of the candidates urgently.
Apart from awarding arbitrary scores to candidates, Elujula said many candidates had problems with their systems.
He said, “Many candidates were allocated between 40 and 60 additional marks. What are the criteria for this arbitrariness? The strange thing is that JAMB started the CBT two years ago, why is this year’s exam a big flop? I have not seen candidates and parents complain this way about the exam in the past. I plead with the authorities to look into their grievances.”
But JAMB described the organisers of the protest as “blackmailers”.
In a statement by its Head of Public Relations, Dr Fabian Benajmin, the board said some proprietors, whose examination centres did not receive accreditation for the test, were behind the protest.
The statement read in part, “The board had approved centres provided by these individuals to be used for the 2016 exercise. Unfortunately, it could not approve those centres lacking in all the indices needed for a successful CBT.
“These same proprietors turned around to organise candidates to protest against our activities. We are not perfect as an organisation, but we are working hard to ensure that Nigerian education is better than it is. We have taken the risk to do the unthinkable so as to change the paradigm.
“We will continue to call on Nigerians to give us the benefits of doubt and with their collective support; we will give them one of the best CBT globally. It is no news that the worst CBT is far better than the best Paper and Pencil Test. At least, the era of candidates pouring acid on JAMB officials, bolting with question papers into the bush and all unthinkable embarrassing acts are gone.”

Power distribution firms reject supply from generating plants

 


Femi Asu

The rejection of load allocations from power generating plants by some electricity distribution companies is one of the factors preventing the country from fully benefitting from the 6,500 megawatts generation capacity of the existing power plants.

Our correspondent gathered that some power plant units were being shut due to high frequency occasioned by the inability of the distribution companies to pick their load allocations.

For instance, the nation lost about 2,821.5MW of electricity generation on Monday partly due to the rejection of loads by the Discos, it was exclusively gathered from top industry sources.


The nation’s electricity generation as of 6.00am on Monday stood at 3,548.7MW, while the combined generation capacity of the power plants was put at 6,370.2MW.

Some of the plants affected by the load rejection or low load demand were Shiroro, Jebba, Egbin, Okpai and Afam VI.

Others are plants under the National Integrated Power Project, including Alaoji, Odukpani and Ihovbor.

Shiroro and Jebba saw their generation levels reduce to 200MW and 260MW, compared to capacities of 300MW and 341MW, respectively. Odukpani generated 60.1MW instead of its capacity of 360MW; Egbin, 820MW (880MW); Alaoji, 51.5MW (117MW); Ihovbor, 78.4Mw (109MW); Okpai, 282MW (366MW); and Afam VI, 378MW (555MW).

The General Secretary, National Union of Electricity Employees, Mr. Joe Ajaero, had claimed in a statement on Monday that the real saboteurs of the power sector were those who refused allocations from the national grid for onward distribution to consumers.

A former top executive in one of the power firms explained to our correspondent that a distribution company could decide to reject load due to low revenue generation from a segment of its customer base.

The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Eko Electricity Distribution Company, Mr. Oladele Amoda, told our correspondent in a telephone interview that load rejection could be as a result of capacity issues between the transmission and distribution networks.

He said, “In some cases, there is no enough transmission equipment capacity to wheel power to the Discos. Sometimes, the Discos also do have issues; that is when there is powerful wind, which, sometimes, leads to tripping of the breaker. But it doesn’t take time before that is restored.

“Everybody knows that the weakest link in the power value chain is transmission. So, the blame cannot be put solely on the Discos.”

According to Amoda, the nation’s transmission network cannot wheel more than 6,000MW, while the distribution networks nationwide can take more than 10,000MW.

“At Eko Disco, we are not rejecting load. We are not even getting up to our allocated percentage because of constraints on the transmission equipment,” he said, adding that the company had spent more than N11bn on network rehabilitation and reinforcement, among others.

Amoda said the government was working on improving the transmission capacity, noting that the Transmission Company of Nigeria had been starved of funds for a very long time.

“The government is looking into how to quickly strengthen it financially and with all the provisions that it will require to quickly ramp up its capacity,” he stated.

The Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading Plc, Mr. Rumundaka Wonodi, said, “When the Discos reject load allocation, the question is why are they rejecting it? It could be that their system is weak, which is why we keep talking about the need for investment.

“When this (load rejection) happens, it has an effect all through the value chain because generation companies cannot generate power and maybe they have ‘take or pay’ obligation on their gas supply; so, they have to pay for gas that they did not utilise at that time.”

The Chairman, Egbin Power Plc, Mr. Kola Adesina, said the talk that the Discos were rejecting allocation was an indication that there was a major problem far more significant than frequency and pressure of gas.

“There is no justification for somebody to reject power. You need power to make money. You need money to be able to pay your loan, to be able to continue to service the system. So, nobody will naturally want to do that,” he said.

The spokesperson for the Kano Electricity Distribution Company, Mr. Muhammed Kandi, said, “In Kano Disco, we do not drop load. In fact, we don’t get enough allocation; so why should we even drop load in the first place?”

He explained that the company only received about 260MW on Tuesday morning, compared to a maximum energy demand of 600MW.

The Acting Chief Executive Officer, Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission, Mr. Anthony Akah, said, “Clearly, the issue of load rejection has been addressed by the commission. Under the new regime, that is the Transitional Electricity Market, the distribution companies can no longer reject load that is within the allocation level that they are supposed to get.

“If it is due to the constraint of the distribution companies, they will be penalised for that. If it is the transmission company, it will also have to be penalised. That essentially has been taken care of, unless there are other reasons behind why it happened.”

The Chief Executive Officer, Association of Nigerian Electricity Distributors, Mr. Azu Obiaya, said, “It is irrational that anyone of these Discos will reject load right now because they desperately need the power to, first of all, meet their revenue requirements as well as distribute to their customers.”