The House of Representatives has directed the Nigerian Navy to provide comprehensive details of vessels that imported petrol and exported crude oil from 2017 till date.

The lawmakers also urged the Navy to provide details of the owners of such vessels, the importers, exporters, delivery ports, as well as the quantity of products taken our or brought in.

The Adhoc Committee probing petroleum products subsidy regime from 2017 to 2022, headed by Hon. Ibrahim Almustapha Aliyu, made the demands at its resumed investigative hearing on Thursday.

It further directed the Navy to provide details on vessels that were arrested, details of the ownership of such vessels, the agencies the vessels were handed over to, the contents of the vessels, their current locations, as well as the status of the contents of the vessels.

The Director of Lesson Learnt of the Nigerian Navy, Rear Admiral E Ogaula, who represented the Chief of the Naval Staff, Vice Admiral Awwal Gambo, earlier told Committee that it is only information passed to them by the Nigeria National Petroleum Company (NNPC) that they record in their file.

“The Navy only assists the NNPC in ensuring that things work the way it is supposed to. It is not the lead in terms of tanker nominations and all these issues of oil lifting and so. It is information passed to the Nigerian Navy by the NNPC that we record in our file. Sometime NNPC might pass information and we record it and at the end of the day some of them are cancelled, some are not. The information we have which we have passed to you are the information sent by NNPC,” he said.

Members of the committee expressed disgust that the Navy should rely on the NNPC for such information.

House Spokesman, Benjamin Kalu, said:“We leave waterways under your care, therefore independent of what NNPC does, it is your mandate. To say you only rely on what is coming from NNPC does not inspire confidence in Nigerians who allow you to monitor what comes into the country. I know the Navy has a record of every tanker coming or going out that has products that have to do with oil and gas.”

Another member, Mark Gbillah, said they surprised by the response of the Navy.

He said: “On behalf of Nigerians, we are taken aback by your response on such a monumental issue. Is the Navy telling us today with regards to the inflow of vessels and vessels leaving this country, with regards to specific issues that pertains to the NNPC, you rely only on NNPC’s information? So where then is the role of the Navy?”

The Federal Government will sanction the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and Daily Trust over their documentaries on terrorism and banditry in Nigeria, the country’s Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammad, said this in Abuja on Thursday.

He said the two prominent media outlets would not be spared the rod for promoting terrorism in the documentary in Nigeria

He added:“Let me assure you, they will not get away with this naked glorification of terrorism and banditry in Nigeria.When otherwise reputable platforms like BBC give their platform to terrorists, showing their faces as if they’re Nollywood stars… I want to assure them that they won’t get away with it, the appropriate sanctions will be meted.”

In a 50-minute documentary titled ‘The Bandit Warlords of Zamfara’, published on Monday, the BBC Africa Eye provided insight into the mindset of bandit kingpins, the booming kidnap-for-ransom industry, and how Zamfara’s insecurity may have been brought on by the ethnic conflict between Hausa and Fulani groups.

Besides,in March, Daily Trust TV, an arm of Daily Trust Newspaper, published a special report and documentary which exposed major issues around banditry in Nigeria. Non-state actors like Bello Turji was interviewed in the documentary.

Bello Kachalla, better known as Turji, is a notorious bandit leader who operates in northern Nigeria, particularly Zamfara, Sokoto and Niger state.

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“All I can say is that there is a regulatory body, the Nigerian Broadcasting Commission (NBC) and they are also aware of these incidents and are looking at which part of the broadcasting codes have been violated by both the BBC and the Daily Trust,” the minister said.

He added:“But I can assure you that there will be consequences. For those who will argue that BBC is a foreign broadcaster and as such, it is not licensed by NBC, let me assure you, they will not get away with this naked glorification of terrorism and banditry in Nigeria.

“I have said it many times here that the media is the oxygen that the terrorists and bandits need to breathe. When other reputable platforms like BBC now give their platform to terrorists, showing their faces as if they are Nollywood stars, what does that means? I want to assure them they won’t get away with it. There are sanctions to be meted on both the BBC and the Daily Trust.”

Governor Dapo Abiodun of Ogun State Ogun State, has declared tomorrow, Friday, 29th July, work free to allow workers register and collect their Permanent Voters Cards.

He had earlier declared Tuesday, 26th July, 2022 as a work-free day throughout the state.

The announcement was sequel to the large turnout of eligible voters to register on Tuesday and more people still rushing to registration centres as the exercise will end on Sunday, 31st July.

A statement issued in Abeokuta by his Chief Press Secretary to the Governor, Kunle Somorin, the Governor said “another public holiday has become expedient to provide another window of opportunity for all workers in the state, who were unable to complete their exercise as a result of the large turnout of prospective eligible voters since its commencement.

“The work free day is to enable those who have either lost their cards, not registered or who might need to travel to their wards, local government areas and constituencies to perfect their Permanent Voters Registration or transfer their cards, where necessary, to enable them participate in the next general elections.We all need this last weekend to get our PVCs. Nobody should be disenfranchised on account of being too busy at work,” the statement emphasized.

The governor urged all eligible adults to seize the opportunity of the holiday to go home to their different wards and constituencies to get their Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs)

Twenty-three states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) have received N24,450,000,000.00 from the Conditional Grant Schemes as incentive to invest more of their resources into areas of national development priorities and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The Senior Special Assistant (SSA) to the President on Sustainable Development Goals (MDGs) Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire, revealed this in Abuja on Thursday

The fund, according to the SDG boss, disbursed from 2015 till date, was introduced in 2007 with a 50 percent marching grant from the federal government and 50 percent from the participating states.

She gave the figures during the Ministerial Media Briefing organized by the Presidential Communications Team at the Presidential Villa, Abuja,where she also explained that the grants were targeted at education, health, water and sanitation projects “and aimed at executing pro-poor projects in a consultative manner with the beneficiaries.”

According to her,the money was spent on the implementation of 732 water and sanitation facilities; 494 health facilities (new facilities and renovation/rehabilitation); 616 education facilities (new construction, renovation/rehabilitation of block of classrooms; 1,150 women and men were empowered/trained in vocational skills, such as sewing, knitting, detergent & pomade making etc.)

There were special intervention projects across the geo-political zones, an initiative, she affirmed, was aimed at strategic investment to fast-track the achievement of the SDGs in Nigeria, she said.

Mrs. Orelope-Adefulire: “Between 2016 and 2021, a record number of projects have been implemented, aimed at providing essential services to accelerate the achievement of the SDGs, by ensuring no Nigerian is left behind.

“In the education sector, 8,008 classrooms constructed and 305 renovated with furnishing to strengthen basic education across the country.A total of 4,845 Desktop and Laptop Computers have also been supplied to schools across the country for Information and Communication Technology (ICT) training.

“In the health sector, 195 Health Centres, comprising Primary Healthcare Centres (PHC) and Mother and Child Centres (MCC) were constructed, complemented with the supply of 199 Intensive Care and Rural ambulances. About 257 incubators and 7,464 regular and automated hospital beds were supplied across tour health facilities.In other cross-cutting sectors, OSSAP-SDGs constructed 66 Vocational and Skills Acquisition Centres; supplied 1,294 transformers; provision of 19,266 solar-powered streetlights; 300 Housing units for internally displaced persons (IDP) in Borno State; and 925 Solar Boreholes, in addition to several other interventions.”

She also spoke on some findings from 2020 voluntarily national review, indicating that from Nigeria’s 2nd Voluntary National Review (VNR) 2020 on SDG-3, while the country faces challenges on health outcomes, such as high rates of maternal mortality, there have been significant reduction in the under-five mortality rates (from 157 to 132).