The newly-elected Director General of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala will assume duties today.

The former Nigeria’s two-term Finance Minister was selected by the General Council of the WTO a fortnight ago, as the organisation’s seventh director-general.

With her emergence as the first African and first female to be the Director-General of the WTO, Okonjo-Iweala had unveiled her agenda, which included working with other members of the organisation in reforming and rebranding the global trade body.

Okonjo-Iweala, in her acceptance speech, had also highlighted the need for procedural reforms so that the WTO would better serve its members.

Her term which is renewable, will expire on August 31, 2025.

According to her, the rule book of the Geneva-based organisation is outdated, while its rules lag behind those of some regional and bilateral trade agreements, which are incorporating many innovations.

Okonjo-Iweala had stated that the WTO’s rulebook must be updated to take into account 21st century realities such as e-commerce and the digital economy.

She said: “It has been a long and tough road, full of uncertainty, but now it is the dawn of a new day and the real work can begin.

“Some WTO rules and procedures also need to be revisited, including the procedure for appointing director-general.”

According to her, the WTO secretariat should be strengthened, to enable it to provide cutting-edge services to members.

She had explained: “An important change would be to move away from the current silo way of working, to a more team-based and task-based approach.

“The secretariat has to be fit-for-purpose to take account of the changing dynamics of the global economy and priorities of members.

“The challenges facing the WTO are numerous and tricky, but they are not insurmountable. There is hope, there is light at the end of the tunnel if we work together in a transparent manner that builds trust, build bridges and diffuses political tension and encourages convergence.”

The stock market, which gained N1.124 trillion in January, lost N1.364 trillion in February.
This was as a result of profit-taking and gradual migration of investors to the fixed income market.
Consequently, the local bourse has suffered a year-to-date decline of 1.2 per cent compared to a growth in the first month of the year.

High demand for stocks had made the market to gain N1.124 trillion in January after a superlative performance in 2020 that saw the local bourse leading global returns on investments.
However, the growth was halted in February as some investors sold down to book profit, while others began to migrate to fixed income market following an uptick in yields in that investment space.

Market capitalisation of equities fell from N22.187 trillion at the end of January to N20.823 trillion, while the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) All-Share Index (ASI) declined from 42,412.66 to 39,799.89. The decline implies a loss of N1.364 trillion in market capitalisation and 6.16 per cent in the NSE ASI in February compared with N1.124 trillion and 5.3 per cent gain respectively in January.

Although the market was expected to sustain the growth recorded in January on the expectations of positive earnings season and better yields delayed dividend declarations and a sudden uptick in the yields fixed income market changed the minds of some investors who reduced their exposure to the equities market.

While profit-taking is expected to continue intermittently, the decline is seen as an entry opportunity for investors to position ahead of dividend declarations by more companies that would publish their audited full year 2020 financial results.

Analysts at Cordros Securities said on Friday that they expected the NSE floor to be flooded with corporate earnings as more companies publish their audited FY 2020 numbers, accompanied by dividend declarations.

“We believe this should provide respite for market performance. However, we expect intermittent profit-taking activities to continue due to lingering concerns about yield elevation in the FI market. As a result, we think the local bourse will likely exhibit a zig-zag pattern. Notwithstanding, we advise investors to take positions in only fundamentally justified stocks as the unimpressive macro story remains a significant headwind for corporate earnings,” they said.

Similarly, analysts at Investdata Consulting said players should be on the lookout, as more companies expectedly send in their 2020 financials, giving the market an upward push or downward pull, depending on the strength of these numbers.

According to them, with the pullbacks impacting positively on dividend yields, income investors should target ‘stocks with a dividend yield of 7.5 per cent and above in the short term, since the equity market remains the best window for hedging against the nation’s spiralling inflation.

“Despite, the seeming profit booking across many of the sectors, these corrections are creating ‘buy’ opportunities for players that understand the dynamics of the market,’ irrespective of what is happening on the fixed income side, especially with oil price selling now above $65 per barrel and breakthroughs in vaccines will help to drive global and domestic economic recovery,” they said.

Investdata advised that with the mixed macro-economic indices emanating from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) and Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), in the face of changing market trends and trading pattern, that is now of concern to retail and institutional investors, players in the equity market should invest wisely.

“One way of navigating the murky waters is to be guided by your set investment objectives, particularly entry and exit strategies, to survive and profit from the expected new trend. In that way, should the full-year earnings reports and dividend news fail to impact and support the current trend, a big rotation in sector trends would also guide you, going into the future,” Investdata said.

Goods worth millions of naira were last Saturday night destroyed by fire, which razed a section of the Ikpoba Hill market in Ikpoba Okha Local Government Area of Edo State.

It was learnt that the fire, which started at about 9p.m. last Saturday night, affected mainly makeshift shops made up of caravans.

It was also gathered that the owner of one of the electronic shops affected by the fired simply identified as Tony, was rushed to the hospital after he collapsed on hearing the news.

A witness identified as Peter said: “At about 9p.m., we saw smoke billowing from one of the shops, and before we knew what was happening, the whole place was engulfed in fire.”

He said the fire fighters, who came later, couldn’t salvage the goods, as the fire had already engulfed the shops and razed goods worth millions of naira.

The witness said the shop owners could not salvage their goods either, as the shops were already engulfed by fire before their arrival.

When THISDAY inquired about the incident from one of the shop owners who was at the scene, he managed to say that it was pointless talking about the incident because they will not get any help from the government or individual.

“Are you going to help me if I talk to you about it? Just leave me alone.”

A sympathiser, Mr. John Izu, said they were still wondering what must have caused the inferno, as there was no electricity in the area, blaming the fire service, which he said didn’t come on time to salvage the shops.

“This is an electronic shop, and the goods here worth over N10 million. I know the owner, and he is currently at the hospital because of the incident,” Izuh said.

A former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Prof. Charles Soludo, has said his family went into exile because of several threats to their lives when he introduced the banking consolidation policy in 2004.

Soludo added that he received 19 written threats to his life following that policy.

He stated this in an interactive session with some journalists in Awka, the Anambra State capital.

Soludo, who is contesting for the governorship of Anambra State on the platform of the All Progressive Grand Alliance, said a good leader must be adamant and revolutionary when embarking on progressive policies.

He said, “I am a very impatient person to see change happen and I am passionate in anything I focus on. At that time, no bank in Nigeria was in the top 1,000 banks in the world. If you needed to make an investment of $500m, you had to go through the then 39 banks and it was an impossible task.

“If you wanted to borrow abroad, there was no bank here to guarantee that. So, I came to the realisation that if we wanted to build a private sector-driven economy, it was not possible with the rickety ‘mama and papa’ banks, which could not guarantee even N3m loan. We, therefore, needed to pull down the house and rebuild it.

“There was nothing I did not see. I received 19 written threats to my life. Even there were attempts to kidnap my children at Offa in Kwara State. So, it was a very brutal revolution. I had to evacuate my family during the banking consolidation because when you want to uproot a system, it is usually a deadly routine.”

The Professor of Economics said his quest to govern the state was not for personal enrichment as God had blessed him all round, even before he became 30 years.