A group of Nigerians in the Diaspora have concluded plans to establish N9bn automobile assembly plants in the country under the patent called Zhope Automobiles.

The group is led by a professor of engineering systems and Director, Machining Research Centre, Faculty of Engineering Science and the Built Environment, London South Bank University, Prof. Emmanuel Ezugwu.

Displaying a model of a 15-seater air-conditioned bus at the premises of the National Automotive Council in Abuja, on Wednesday, Ezugwu said that the plants would manufacture and assemble made in Nigeria automobiles in the six geopolitical zones of the country.

He said, “This innovative project incorporates over 25 years, research and development experience in the area of advanced manufacturing technology for sustainable development.

“We are working with local resources on the ground to put forward a technology road map that will serve as a hub for vehicle export to other parts of West Arica.”

Speaking during the event, the Chairman, Zhope Automobiles, Mr. Marcel Ezenwoye, noted that the project would commence by the first quarter of 2011, adding that the plants had been structured to create about 14, 000 jobs in Nigeria.

He said, “There is a projection that not less than 4,000 jobs will be created on the line function and over 10,000 in ancillary related services centres.”

“The training policy of Zhope envisages the training of local engineers like the roadside mechanics, who will in turn train other middle level operators in Zhope automobile technology. For this reason, Zhope’s technical partners from Europe and China will come to Nigeria for the training and technical support.”

He noted that discussions were currently going on with the National Automotive Council for the domestication of Zhope brand in Nigeria.

Ezenwoye said, “We have a forecast of an average monthly sales of 100 number of buses and an annual gross of 1,200 number of buses. Zhope intends to initiate the KDK strategy with a view to reducing overall production cost per unit of the buses. Our target is to get up to 40-50 per cent local content to minimise importation by 2020 if we have the enabling environment for manufacturing.”

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Pam Patsley, Chairman &Chief Executive Officer of Moneygram International, visited Nigeria recently as part of  efforts to gain a better understanding of the market, customers and different cultural practices.
In a chat with Princewill Ekwujuru and Moses Nosike,  she posits that money transaction volume has increased six times in the first quarter. Read on.

How long has MoneyGram been operating in Nigeria?

MoneyGram started operating in Nigeria in 1998 and has steadily expanded its network of well established and respectable banks.

Pam Patsley

What is your assessment of the Nigeria Remittance Market?

Information we have indicates that the Nigeria Remittance Market is worth over $10bn annually. We believe the market shrank a little in 2009, as a result of the global economic crisis and its effects on employment statistics for migrant workers in key corridors. With the easing of the financial crisis, especially in the US, we expect remittances to Nigeria will experience positive growth.

Our business has experienced good growth both in terms of number of transactions, value and our network. We have been able to achieve this modest growth thanks to the support of our agent banks. With new agents and additional network, we expect our business in Nigeria to grow tremendously in the coming years.

How significant is the First Bank launch of MoneyGram service? Will MoneyGram be signing any more agents in Nigeria?

We are happy to have signed on First Bank and to have the MoneyGram service delivered through an additional 500 First Bank locations nationwide. This will make the MoneyGram service more accessible and convenient to many more customers.

In many markets where we operate, any new agent brings in its wake increased transaction growth and we expect this to be the case with First Bank.

MoneyGram will continue to forge alliances with credible financial institutions as the laws of Nigeria allow to bring our services even closer to our customers. They are a few more agreements in the pipeline which should be concluded over the next couple of months.

What is MoneyGram doing in the area of fraud prevention in Nigeria?

MoneyGram has initiated key actions to combat fraud in Nigeria; Key amongst them are;
Successfully implemented the locking down of a transaction to the location that first viewed

Have added as compulsory a receiver questions for all our transactions in Nigeria to provide additional security
We continue to provide periodic compliance training for the compliance officers and product managers of all our agents.

MoneyGram’s Director of fraud from the U.S. visited Nigeria in April this year,, organizing workshops for all our agents in Nigeria and also meeting with enforcement agencies to presents MoneyGram’s anti-money laundering and compliance efforts

The Regional Compliance Manager for Africa  also visited Nigeria to meet with the EFCC (law enforcement agency) and the agents and present MoneyGram’s efforts on anti-money laundering and compliance generally. The feedback from both events has been very positive.

MoneyGram is also working with agents to restrict locations that pay out fraud induced transactions.
We continue to collaborate with key regulatory authorities i.e. Central Bank of Nigeria, Economic and Financial crimes commission (EFCC) and Special Fraud Unit (SFU).

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Written by Henry Kester Ewruje

Ninety minutes on a football pitch can make a world of a difference. That the Super Eagles did not qualify from the group stage of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa is like a nightmare for most Nigerians. Football fans that have been looking over their shoulders since the match against Greece in Bloemfontein are now depressed as Nigeria ended the group matches with a 2 – 2 draw with South Korea in Durban and did not qualify for the knockout stages.

What is wrong with the Super Eagles? Many things are wrong with football in Nigeria. In truth, the Super Eagles team has never been at its best in recent years. Not all the matches played by the team in the past four years have been vintage performance. The squad only exhibited a steely determination to prevent a massacre in their 0 – 1 loss to Argentina in Johannesburg with an outstanding performance from goalkeeper Vincent Enyeama.

I talked to a hell of a lot of people. Managers, coaches, scouts, players and friends and what came back was uninanimous. They all felt that most of the players and Coach Lars Lagerback made mistakes in all their group matches. The technical ability of the Gaffer was tested in South Africa. He had to prove that his appointment was not a mistake. Personally, I doubted Lagerback’s ability to lead the Super Eagles to South Africa. He had nothing to offer because he was a spent force. He had not upgraded his coaching career in Sweden and failed to lead the Swedish national team to the world cup finals in South Africa which led to his resignation from the job showed that he was not the right coach and did not have the pedigree to take the Eagles to the next level in the world cup and beyond.

The gaffer failed technically and he adopted wrong tactics and formations in the three matches played. His starting line-ups were not the best. Not only that, in an apparent display of insufficient knowledge of the Nigerian players, he played some of the players out of their positions which affected the performance of the team. Most of the players had the reputation for shirking the grittier aspects of the game. The coach and the team made lots of mistakes. Even in the Pro Zone age of football where the coach’s team selections are influenced by the distance a player completes each game, there will always be no place for majority of the forwards he took to the world cup.

Nigeria is a country with a proud tradition of outstanding right wingers like Segun Odegbami, John Chidozie, Sam Okpodu, Tarila Okorowanta, Clement Temile, Dimeji Lawal, Pius Ikedia, Tijani Babaginda, Julius Aghahowa and Finidi George. However, the coach decided to field a player in the right wing whose lackadaisical style and a moment’s exhibition of madness earned him the red card and cost the team the match against Greece. Even the most creative elements of Lagerback’s side did not show any willingness to sacrifice themselves for the team. They could not ally graft to their craft.

.Now, the players are talking and complaining about Lagerback and his tactics as well as the playing time given to them. They are also complaining about the quality of players Largerback picked for the world cup. These same players had praised the coach after they played three friendly matches before the world cup. These players failed the nation and they are masters of the dark arts of media manipulation. These players are the delight of journalists. They are open mouths in search of a microphone. This a joke but nobody is laughing. The players to the South Africa 2010 world cup were not the best Nigeria can provide. Only the best players should don the nation’s colours in future competitions

So what is the way forward before the next world cup in Brazil in 2014?

I suggest that all the senior professionals in the Super Eagles who have been talking about throwing in the towel, should quit international football now. Most people might think that some of the senior pros are playing too well to retire from the national team. They might say this decision is a bit too hasty. But the players are big enough to be aware that they are taking a risk with football supporters because a few average performances will raise questions about their retirement from the national team.

The older players are the standard bearers. They are the ones that set the standard. The senior pros have to be the ones to show what it is all about and there is no better example than to quit now. The next world cup is in 2014. The younger players in the team should be groomed with new invitees to the Super Eagles to play in the next Nations Cup Competitions and then the world cup.

While people are taking the mickey out of some players, it is the Nigeria Football Federation, (NFF) that is mainly responsible for the problems of football and it needs a total overhaul. Every association has its values and at the moment, the NFF miss that. I think it is important for the nation’s football that the NFF should be overhauled because with the present players and coaches in the national team, we will never be a leading football country in the world in the coming years. Criticisms of the game are good for Nigerian football.

Presently, the NFF secretariat in Abuja must be littered with e-mails, faxes and letters from supporters who cover every generation. The message to the NFF is that they have failed the nation. The new chants on the streets are “give us a new NFF in the next elections”. Surely, the NFF cannot overlook the stream of correspondence. They should resign immediately and not wait until their elections in August, 2010. The NFF has failed to launch a bold plan to revolutionise the country’s football since they came to office. They have been unable to draw a strategic plan with enough concrete proposals to tackle the nation’s underachievement head-on. The plans of the NFF if any sound bland and boring. Their strategy lack obligatory buzzwords such as vision, purpose and values.

There is nothing uplifting and positive about the NFF with all its lies, deceits, crooked agents and absurd financial structure. The conduct and utterances of the NFF always send people laughing. While the zany twittering of the NFF is sending people into fits of giggles, I am not amused at the amateurishness that is rife in football coaching in Nigeria.

Amodu Shuaibu was sacked by the NFF as the coach of the Super Eagles for doing a commendable job by qualifying the team for the 2010 world cup and for winning bronze at the Nation’s Cup in Angola. He was accused of getting the results but not performing. This excuse was the cruellest joke. It will be recalled that millions of Nigerian football fans and other stake holders called for the removal of Coach Amodu. It would be remembered that the Presidential Task Force (PTF) recommended for Amodu’s sack and a sound foreign technical adviser to be employed. When Amodu was fired, the NFF sent people into reels of laughter by concluding the second-coming of former Super Eagles technical adviser, Frenchman Phillipe Troussier, whose most famous television documentary was how he spilled the blood of a hapless chicken in a bowl for his Burkina Faso players to lick ahead of a match.

The NFF is guilty of epitomizing triumph of style over substance. The NFF should be overhauled immediately. The new NFF should have an approved coaching qualification. Nigeria is the only major football country that does not have it. The new professionalism will spell the extinction of dinosaurs that prefer big talk to tactical awareness. They should launch a school for managers as part of plans to overhaul the game. Aspiring bosses should not be allowed to manage their clubs unless they have an NFF approved qualification. The important thing is to raise standards. Every other country has a mandatory coaching qualification. This scheme backed by the league managers association will also help the coaches get jobs abroad. Only Samson Siasia and Augustine Eguavon improve themselves by attending coaching courses and seminars abroad at their own expense.

Christian Chukwu failed technically during the France 1998 world cup qualifiers that the then captain of the team, Austin Okocha had to arrange coaching lessons for him under Sam Allardyce at Bolton Wanderers football club in England.

The new NFF should clamp down on agents by overseeing all transfer negotiations. Clubs should have their finances reviewed annually to make sure that all deals are above suspicion. Agents who cream millions of naira from the game should come under a bung-busting unit. Clubs should be required to tell the NFF where all the money in a transfer has gone and which agent is involved. Teams often get less than foreign clubs pay. But making all international and domestic transfers to go through the NFF will thwart such dodgy practices.

The new NFF should plan a radical shake-up of the games in the grassroots. A national football center should be opened. The quality of coaching in the soccer academies should be attacked and a professional women’s league set-up. Super clubs should be nurtured. A non-league club should have lots of sides of all ages under his wing. This will improve football at the community level and produce fantastic young players. The aim is to give the various national teams, the raw materials to be more successful. The hows, whys and wherefores should not be vague. Stakeholders should organize seminars and meetings for the NFF to go to, people to talk to and a new football culture to be introduced. The country’s youth development should be the envy of Africa. We already see the benefits of soccer academies and the youth teams of some organizations and clubs in the country.

This should be a wake-up call for an association that has been standing still. The NFF should not rest until there is a fundamental overhaul of the game. Nigerians are waiting.

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A total of N3 billion will be required for every policeman to get two pairs of the new uniform, Police Force Public Relations Officer ACP Emmanuel Ojukwu has said.

Ojukwu told Daily Trust in Abuja that the new uniforms comprising of light blue shirts worn on black trousers mainly used by senior police officers now are pricey.

There are over 370,000 policemen in the country.

He said the black uniforms currently in use can only be changed when the police authorities accept the new uniforms being used by senior offers for assessment.

“It has been assessed initially that the new uniforms are difficult to maintain especially by officers that often mix together and struggle with suspects. Police authorities will determine whether or not the new uniforms will be adopted to replace the dark grey ones being used which people regard as black,” he said.

Inspector General of Police Ogbonna Onovo had said that the black uniforms are not comfortable in hot humid weather even though they are easy to maintain. “We are testing the new light blue shirts and it is unlikely if they will be adopted because they are difficult to maintain,” he said.

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Amid all the media frenzy around the Nigerian underwear bomber and how America should have stopped him before he tried to blow up a passenger plane on Christmas Day, a critical piece to the counter-terrorism puzzle seems to have been missed:  where in the world is the Nigerian President? Normally, after such a horrific incident, President Obama would be on the phone with his counterpart, discussing what went wrong and agreeing on ways to work better in the future to prevent such attacks.  But this couldn’t happen because Nigeria’s President Umaru Yar’Adua left his country for medical treatment in Saudi Arabia on November 23rd and hasn’t been seen or heard from since.

Yes, you read that right:  the whereabouts of the leader of Nigeria—America’s most important strategic ally in Africa, the fifth largest source of U.S. oil imports, and home to 150 million people—are unknown.  It is also not clear if he is alive or dead.

The situation is so uncertain that Nigeria’s parliament is openly considering sending a delegation to Saudi Arabia to find out the truth.  A major opposition party yesterday demanded, quite reasonably, some “proof of life”.

 The mystery over Yar’Adua is so bizarre as to be comical—if the consequences weren’t so severe.  His absence has thrust the country into an immediate constitutional crisis.   The President failed to delegate authority to his deputy before travelling, effectively leaving no one in charge.  This 43-days-and-counting power vacuum is being swiftly filled by an insular cabal bent on exploiting the situation for their own gain.  

Complicating matters, the vice president—ironically named Goodluck Jonathan—is a Christian and an Ijaw, part of a minority group from the southern Niger Delta region and far from the power centers of the northern Muslim elites who expect one of their own to run the country.  There is much speculation that insiders are scheming now of ways to keep Jonathan from ever assuming power.   In an ominous sign, a new chief justice was quickly (and possibly illegally) sworn in last week.

These developments all put Nigeria’s future at great risk.  A decade of constitutional democracy is threatened by the specter of mass violence and a possible military coup.

The failed terrorist attack by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab on Northwest Flight 253 highlights that Nigeria’s power void is dangerous for the U.S. as well.  The foundation of a counter-terrorism strategy is to build cooperative partnerships with friendly nations.  This means sharing information and helping to build security capacity in places like Yemen, Afghanistan, and Nigeria.

But we cannot have a partnership if there is no one on the other end of the line.  Nigeria cannot be a reliable ally if it is consumed by its own corruption and political machinations.  In this way, Nigeria is rapidly becoming more like Somalia—a failed state with no real government to cooperate with—than a real partner.

What can the United States do?  First, it should insist on an immediate public declaration of President Yar’Adua’s health and fitness to govern.  If the President’s staff refuse to oblige, then the U.S. should encourage the national assembly to assert its constitutional responsibilities when it reconvenes on January 12.

Second, if, as seems likely, Yar’Adua is in fact incapacitated, the U.S. must demand that the constitution be followed and power transferred to the vice president.  The long-term security of Nigeria depends on entrenching the rule of law and this must supersede any palace intrigue or political bargaining.

Third, it is clear that whatever the outcome over the next few weeks, Nigeria will remain on a knife’s edge until elections in 2011.  Any hope for a more stable country hinges on a credible election next year.  Yar’Adua came to power in a deeply flawed poll in April 2007 and almost no steps have since been taken to fix the broken system.   The U.S. is in a unique position to push for and help deliver a better election that would strengthen the authority and legitimacy of the next government.

Last, the U.S. can support Nigeria’s vibrant civil society that is clearly fed up and is increasingly demanding change.

The case of the missing Nigerian President is a wake up call to the United States about the vulnerability of many of our global partners.  How we respond is not only crucial to the future of an important ally, but a critical test of our strategy for building partnerships in troubled places to combat the global ills of our time. 

Written by Todd Moss

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The efforts of the Nation’s foremost anti-graft agency, the economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) are beginning to yield results.
Nigeria has recorded an improvement in corruption rating, moving from 147th position to 121st out of 180 countries.
In the latest Transparency International 2009 Global Corruption Report, Nigeria had a 10point rating for 180 countries with Denmark, New Zealand and Sweden tied at 9.3 each to emerge as the least corrupt nations.
The United Kingdom and the United States occupied 16th and 18th positions with 7.7 points and 7.3 points respectively. The most corrupt countries are Haiti 1.4, Iraq 1.3 and Somalia 1.0.
Analysis of the report shows that Nigeria gained 26 more points in its fight against corruption by moving up from 147th to 121st.
The transparency international report described legal and institutional changes against corruption under President Umaru Yar ‘Adua as appreciable. It acknowledges such legal frameworks as the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative act 2007, the Public Procurement Act 2007, Investments and securities Act 2007, the Fiscal Responsibility Act 2007.
The report is good and an indication that if the EFCC and relevant agencies are given needed support and cooperation by all stakeholders, things will get better.
In a related development, the United States of America has once again given Nigeria a clean bill of health as a drug free country out of a list of countries determined as a major drug-transit and producing country for the ninth consecutive time.
A statement issued in the White House by Ian Kelly, Department Spokesman, said: The United States released its 2009 narcotics clarification report in which Nigeria was certified for the ninth consecutive time’. The statement entitled Presidential Department for Major Drug-Transit and Major illicit Drug producing countries said the United States gave Nigeria a clean bill f health as a free-drug country.
All Nigerians should be congratulated for this remarkable feat which is a major advancement in our national image. The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) should be commended for its resilience and determination which earned Nigeria, the prestigious certification.

Article written by Henry Kester Ewruje

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 Written By HENRY KESTER EWRUJE

The nation’s image has been dented by the recent film and advert of Sony Corporation.

 Of late, Nigerians have attracted bad press in Europe, America and other foreign countries because of mistruths, half truths and deliberate distortion of the truth.

 This might partly explain why the government embarked on the rebranding project.

 President Umaru Yar’ Adua’s administration efforts to rebrand Nigeria were unveiled early this year by the Minister of Information and Communications, Professor Dora Akunyili in Abuja.

 A blockbuster Sci-fi movie which caricatures Nigerians as gangsters and cannibals and a Sony Play station advert which implies that Nigerians are fraudsters have infuriated a government battling to improve the country’s image.

 South African film “District 9” which has topped the UK box office for two straight weeks and ranked in the top 10 in North America is an allegory on segregation and xenophobia, with alien life forms in a township set in Johannesburg.

 None of the groups shown comes out particularly well, but the Nigerians are portrayed as gangsters, cannibals, pimps, and prostitutes while their leader’s name is pronounced Obasanjo – the same as that of Nigeria’s former President.  Nigeria has banned cinemas from showing it.

 When somebody calls you a bad name, and you do nothing about it, others will join and it will stick.

 The sociological diagnosis of Nigerians by Sony Corporation is provocative, deplorable and unacceptable.

 Professor Akunyili reacted immediately, requesting that the advert be taken out of circulation and demanded an apology that will gather the kind of prominence the advert had.

 To add insult to injury, and as contempt for the great nation of Nigeria and her good people, Sony apologized on its website, “to some members of the Nigerian community”.

 Professor Akunyili quickly responded and told Sony to rewrite the apology to the government and the good people of Nigeria.

 There is no doubt that Sony disrespects Nigeria and does not care about the Nigerian market or why will it refer to the people as uneducated, less human and pathologically backwards as depicted in their latest movie called ‘District 9” – another misrepresentation by Sony.

 Sony has been making huge sales of its products in Nigeria since independence.  Infact, Nigeria is the largest consumer of Sony products in Africa, south of the Sahara, north of river Limpopo.

 Sony probably thinks that Nigeria is a small insignificant African country, where people are illiterates and cannibals as ignorantly and wrongly portrayed in the film.

 Rather strangely, Nigerians all over the world don’t see anything wrong with the insult of the country and embarrassment of her citizens by Sony.  It is regrettable that they are not reacting and responding angrily to Sony’s advert.

 Sony Corporation in the advertisement to promote its play station 3 (PS3) game, shows a man talking about the PS3 and how it can be gotten from the internet at a cheap price and that “you cant believe everything you read on the Internet otherwise, I’d be a Nigerian millionaire by now.”

 I am neither amused nor amazed by the daring temerity with which Sony vilified Nigerians with impunity.  If anything, I am enraged.

 Consequently, I call on all Nigerians to rise and join the government in resisting those who do not mean well for the country.

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