The House had placed Lawan on suspension since June last year, following his involvement in the controversial $620,000 bribery saga.

While on suspension, the Deputy Chairman of the committee, Dr. Rose Oko, was asked by the Speaker, Mr. Aminu Tambuwal, to chair the committee in acting capacity.

The suspension, instead of being removed as chairman, initially left a window of possibility that Lawan could be returned to the headship of the committee.

But, on Thursday, Tambuwal named a replacement for Lawan, indicating that the four-time (1999 till date) legislator had been removed permanently as chairman.

In his place, the speaker named Lawan’s kinsman from Kano State, Mr. Aminu Suleiman.

It was unclear whether the House had confirmed the indictment of Lawan over the bribery allegation, as the speaker did not give reasons for his removal.

The sacking took place while the House is yet to receive the report of its Committee on Ethics and Privileges, which investigated the bribery saga.

However, Lawan and his erstwhile secretary, Mr. Boniface Emenalor, are currently standing trial for the bribery allegation.

It will be recalled that Lawan headed the ad-hoc committee of the House, which investigated the fuel subsidy regime between January and April 2012.

The panel had uncovered how government officials allegedly connived with fuel importers to defraud the nation of N2.07 trillion in the guise of funding subsidy.

But, as the House celebrated the finding, an oil businessman, Mr. Femi Otedola , accused Lawan of demanding $620,000 bribe from him.

He claimed that the bribe, in Lawan’s explanation, was to clear two of his firms indicted by his committee for subsidy fraud.

Otedola argued that the demand shocked him because none of his firms participated in the subsidy regime.

Source: Punch

Maina has reportedly gone into hiding for fear that the “pension cabal” will attack him.

PRTF officials have vacated their office, apparently for fear of arrest.

The resolution of the Senate which asked the Executive to choose between it and Maina, led to the fresh manhunt.

But President Goodluck Jonathan, who denied shielding Maina, was scheduled to meet Senate President David Mark over the matter last night.

A highly-placed source, who spoke in confidence, said: “All security agencies have been mandated to watch-list Maina and bring him to justice as directed by the Senate.

“As I am talking to you, all police aides, police escort and other security detail attached to Maina have been withdrawn.

“We gave him adequate security because of the sensitive nature of the assignment given to him. But since he has problems with the Senate, we have withdrawn the guards deployed in his office and home.

“The last set of three operatives attached to Maina was recalled last week.

“The renewed search for the chairman of PRTF started on Wednesday after the Senate passed the resolution.”

The source went on: “We will surely get him; he cannot escape. Already, all banks have been mandated not to honour any cheque or clearance relating to pension funds from Maina’s office, until he respects the law of the land.”

Asked why it is difficult to get Maina, the source added: “We are suspecting that he might have worked with the secret service during the administration of the late Gen. Sani Abacha. He knows the game very well. I think he has been in the power corridors, including the Presidential Villa, in the last 19 years.”

But, Maina has given two reasons for going into hiding.

He said the pension cabal, which he exposed as the chairman of the PRTF, might kill him.

One of his aides, who pleaded not to be named, said: “Two reasons make it difficult for the PRTF chairman to make any public appearance and possibly defend himself over allegations by the Senate.

“Maina, who has maintained a low profile since the Senate caused him to be declared ‘wanted’, cannot come out because he fears that the pension cabal is actually after his life and not his mere sack by the President.

“The Task Team leader seems to have ventured where angels fear to tread in an attempt to expose the pension cabal that has been pillaging pension funds for the past 44 years.

“Maina dares not venture out of his hiding, given the fact that the powers that be may have sacrificed him to cover up the 44 years of fraud in Nigeria pension system, and the cabal that has been behind it is bent on eliminating him physically.

“With guards completely withdrawn, and the seeming involvement of the Senate and the police in the alleged plot to get at Maina, it will be suicidal for him to show up or even appear in the public for whatever reasons.

The aide said Maina, who spoke from his hideout said he was “fast losing confidence in the Nigerian state, as he has suddenly become a villain for saving the country billions of naira, being stolen daily by pension thieves.”

Police Chief Mohammed Abubakar yesterday urged Maina to give himself up.

Police spokesman Frank Mba, who spoke on behalf of the Inspector-General said: “We are irrevocably committed to arresting Maina as soon as we lay our hands on him. We will arrest and take him before the Senate.

“He was declared wanted by the police because he went into hiding and that made it difficult for the police to execute the warrant of arrest that was legitimately issued against him.’’

On the allegation that Maina was being guarded by the police, Mba said “he has no police officer in his entourage, to the best of my knowledge.”

“Even in the press release that we gave, we did say that any citizen who has any information that could help us in finding and executing that order should please pass the information to the appropriate authorities,’’ Mba said, adding:

“If anyone has the information on how we can get him, we will be pleased to have it.’’

According to him, the police will not allow themselves to be pulled into unnecessary controversy.

“The only thing is that the Senate has issued a warrant of arrest on Maina and that is where we come in,’’ Mba said.

Mba added: “The media who keep publishing press releases from the chairman of the pension task team should ask him why he is in hiding. If he says police have abused his rights by declaring him wanted, the least he could have done would be to appear at the Force Headquarters where he can query the police for declaring him wanted.”

Source: The NATION

Fire at Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos

On Thursday morning, an electrical fire was reported at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos.

The fire emanated from some cables, which apparently melted under heat.

This led to a blackout in the airport terminal while fire fighters deployed swiftly in the affected area to quench the fire.

Fire at Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos

Security men erected a metal barricade around the site and the fire fighters were able to put the situation under control.

On Wednesday night however, in a separate incident, a cargo plane blew off the roof of a parking lot at the airport, causing damage to some cars.

In that incidence, two people sustained injuries while 12 exotic cars were severely damaged when hot air from a wide-body cargo aircraft blew off the roof of a building at the E-wing of the terminal.

At about 7.39p.m, the entire terminal was thrown into confusion while this happened.

According to a staff of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) who was on duty at the terminal, there was a bang at the diplomatic car park at the time the roof fell on the cars, thus forcing some drivers to flee.

Two people sustained minor injuries, while the debris of shattered windscreens littered the floor.

“We heard a loud bang and everyone initially fled. Later, some security personnel stormed the place. Thank God no life was lost. It is shocking. This sort of thing has never happened before,” he said.

On confirming the incident, the Spokesman of FAAN, Yakubu Dati said “there is no such thing that an airplane ran into cars…I’m still trying to get the real details but I think it has to do with the wind from the aircraft that blew off the roof which later hit some cars”.

Fire at Murtala Muhammed airport Lagos

Alakija, 61, was born into a wealthy, polygamous Nigerian family. She started out her professional career in the mid 70s as a secretary at the now defunct International Merchant Bank of Nigeria, one of the country’s earliest investment banks. In the early 80s, Alakija quit her job and went on to study Fashion design in England, returning to Nigeria shortly afterwards to start Supreme Stitches, a premium Nigerian fashion label which catered exclusively to upscale clientele.

The business thrived, and Alakija quickly made a tidy fortune selling high-end Nigerian clothing to fashionable wives of military bigwigs and society women.

Oil Prospecting License
In May 1993 Alakija applied for an allocation of an Oil Prospecting License (OPL). The license to explore for oil on a 617,000 acre block – (now referred to as OPL 216) was granted to Alakija’s company, Famfa Limited. The block is located approximately 220 miles South East of Lagos and 70 miles offshore Nigeria in the central Niger Delta.

This was in 1993. Many wealthy Nigerian businessmen and military bigwigs who had been allocated oil blocs by the military administration at the time had no clue as to the technicalities in operating an oil block, so many of them typically acquired OPLs, and then flipped them off to international oil companies for substantial profits.

But Alakija was intelligent. She had no expertise or experience in running an oil field, but she decided not to sell off her license. In September 1996, she entered into a joint venture agreement with Star Deep Water Petroleum Limited (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Texaco) and appointed the company as a technical adviser for the exploration of the license, transferring 40 percent of her 100 percent stake to Star Deep. Subsequently, Star Deep sold off 8 percent of its stake in OPL 216 to Petrobas, a Brazilian company. Folorunsho Alakija and her family owned 60 percent.

Nigerian Government Forcefully Acquires Stake In The Block

Star Deep Petroleum carried on with exploitation of the oil field. In 2000, the first appraisal well was confirmed to have recoverable reserves in excess of 1 billion barrels of oil equivalent. When this was discovered, the Nigerian government, led by Olusegun Obasanjo immediately ordered that a 40 percent interest in OPL 216 be allocated to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) under the Back-in-Right Regulation of 2003 which gives the Nigerian government participatory rights in any OPL or OML. You can read more about this back-in-right regulation in detail here.

This would leave Famfa Oil with a 20 percent stake. This was in 2000, and the government did not pay Famfa a dime for the stake. In 2003, Famfa applied for a conversion from an OPL to an OML, and in 2004 the request was granted. OPL 216 became OML 127.
But the Nigerian government was not content with its 40 percent stake in Famfa. In 2005, the government led by General Olusegun Obasanjo forcefully acquired a further 10 percent stake in OML 127.

Folorunsho Alakija immediately went to the courts to challenge the government’s forceful acquisition take a 50% in the license. It was a lengthy court battle which lasted for several years, but in May 2012, the Supreme Court voided the government’s acquisition of a 50 percent stake in OML 127 and subsequently transferred the 50 percent stake back to Famfa Oil. (Read about Famfa’s victory here).

The Nigerian government tried to appeal the Supreme’s court decision, but the case has been dismissed- a victory for Famfa Oil which sees the little-known oil company owning a 60 percent in OML 127, which is one of Nigeria’s most prolific oil blocks.

Valuation Of OML 127

Daily production at OML 127 currently stands at 200,000 barrels per day. When the Nigerian government, through its wholly-owned petroleum company, NNPC, was trying to justify its forceful acquisition of a 50 percent stake in OML 127 at the Supreme court, the Government admitted that if Famfa Oil owned a 60 percent stake in the OML, the company stood to earn $10 million on a daily basis (after taxes and other exploration costs have been settled). The government’s argument at the Supreme Court can be found through this link, (item number 23).

So how much is a 60 percent stake in OML 127 worth?

Comparator: In July 2012, Royal Dutch Shell agreed to sell its 45 percent stake in OML 30 for $850 million to Heritage Oil and Shoreline Energy.

According to Fool.co.uk, OML 30 currently produces 35,000 barrels of oil per day.

So, if 45 percent of a 35,000 bpd-producing oil bloc is $850 million, 100 percent of the same bloc = $1.88 billion i.e 100/45 x $850 million

If a 100 percent stake in a 35,000 bpd-producing oil bloc is $1.88 billion, by the same logic, a 100 percent stake in 200,000 bpd-producing oil bloc is worth $10.74 billion i.e 200,000 bpd/35,000 bpd X $1.88 billion

Folorunsho Alakija’s 60 percent stake in a $10.74 billion oil well is worth $6.44 billion.

Technically, her 60 percent stake in OML 127 is worth $6.44 billion.

Another comparator: In November 2012, French oil group Total announced that it was selling a 20 percent stake in its Nigerian offshore oil field to China’s Sinopec in a $2.5 billion deal. The block in question, OML 138 is a 180,000 bpd facility.

So, if a 20 percent stake in an 180,000 bpd facility offshore block is worth $2.5 billion, the entire block is worth $12.5 billion i.e 100/20 x $2.5 billion. Since a 180,000 bpd-producing facility is worth $12.5 billion, a 200,000 bpd-producing facility is worth $13.8 billion because 200,000/180,000 x $12.5 billion.

Using the Total-Sinopec deal as the yardstick, we could also value OML 127 at $13.8 billion. In that case, her 60 percent stake would be worth $8.3 billion.

But to be conservative, we prefer to go with the lower valuation of $6.44 billion.

On Debt
Ventures Africa reached out to Famfa Limited to comment, but the company declined to divulge any information regarding any long-term or short-term debt. We have no idea on how much debt (if any, the company has), but even if we take the high side, and subtract 50 percent of the value of her stake for debt, that still gives her 60 percent stake in OML 127 a market value of $3.2 billion, which makes her richer than the $2.7 billion Oprah Winfrey is worth according to Forbes Magazine’s last rankings.

Real Estate: $100 million
Folorunsho Alakija also has a real estate portfolio worth over $100 million. Earlier this year, Nigerian and British media announced that Alakija acquired a property at One Hyde Park for $102 million. See media coverage here and here

A source at Famfa Oil who asked for anonymity indeed confirmed that Mrs. Alakija actually acquired the property at One Hyde Park.

Private Jet
Alakija owns a Bombardier Global Express 6000 which she bought earlier this year for a reported $46 million.

PHILANTHROPY
Folorunsho Alakija is the founder of the Rose of Sharon foundation, a Christian-based charity which gives out small grants to widows.

PERSONAL
Alakija is married to Modupe Alakija and they have four grown-up sons together. She also has a grandchild from her first son. Modupe Alakija, her husband is the Chairman of Famfa Oil. Her sons run the company.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg speaks to the TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2012 conference in San Francisco, California. Photo credit: Max Morse/Getty Images

On the first day of trading in November Facebook‘s stock shot up from $21.08 a share to $28 a share at the end of the day Friday, which is its highest price since July. Zuckerberg, who owns about 504 million shares of Facebook stock, has therefore gained about $3.48 billion. Zuckerberg’s shares were worth $19.1 billion when Facebook first went public at $38 a share in May.

November has been one of the best months yet for the stock. This can be attributed to a strong earnings report in late October, which showed that Facebook has been making progress in monetizing mobile. Also, the second and largest lockup period for stocks held by employees finally expired in the middle of November, which was something investors had been concerned about for months and which appears to have held down the stock price. As of Friday, Zuckerberg’s net worth was $14.1 billion and will probably grow more as Facebook continues to meet with success.

Examiner.com

The day after Thanksgiving, which was yesterday is known as Black Friday, and it is the biggest sales in all of America. On this day, Millions battle for bargains as the biggest shopping day of the year has got off to a flying start despite bad weather, giant crowds and fights in the supermarket aisles.

The first giant scrum started at a Walmart where families elbowed each other to get their hands on a pair of $5 headphones, while paramedics rushed to help a Dick’s store cashier who passed out.

With sales on Black Friday expected to soar by 3.8 per cent this year to a staggering $11.4 billion, thousands of shoppers queued around blocks before stores opened. As many as 11,000 lined around Macy’s flagship store in New York City’s Herald Square before it threw open its doors.

And immediately, the chaos began.

black friday craziness

Overwhelmed: A Twitter user from Juneau, Alaska shared this photo of a cashier passed out in a Dick’s store

 

black Friday craziness

Rush: The cashier is taken from the store by paramedics. The Twitter user said shoppers paid no attention

Outburst: A crowd gathers as security guards break up a fight between angered shoppers waiting in line before the doors open at Target in Bowling Green, Kentucky

In the most shocking outburst of violence, a man and woman were shot after a confrontation outside a Walmart of Apalachee Parkway in Tallahassee, Florida just before 1pm.

Police have not released details about what led to the shooting, but both victims have non life-threatening injuries.

Trouble also escalated at a San Antonio mall after a shopper allegedly pulled a gun on another man who had tried to cut to the front of the line at a Sears, the San Antonio Express-News reported.

The man had rushed into the store when it opened Thursday night to get to the front of a line and started arguing with people as he tried cutting in front of them.

A man who was punched in the face during the scuffle pulled a gun and shoppers scattered. But the man had a gun permit and has not been charged with a crime.

One potential source of chaos was a series of protests planned by Walmart employees, but the proposed strike seems to have been a bust, with no more than a few dozen workers taking part.

In one Walmart, fights were underway within minutes of opening – as captured on a video posted to YouTube by a father who brought his two children along to the sales.

The youngsters are filmed sitting in a shopping trolley as the person with the camera asks them if they’re ‘here for the craziness’ adding that they are about to watch people fight over a $5 deal for a pair of headphones.

A large crowd are standing in a circle around the box of headphones waiting for the go-ahead from the Walmart staff.

The cameraman, posting on YouTube as David Quigley, struggles to keep his camera steady as the deal drops and the crowd goes wild, throwing themselves over the box.

Men, women and children are seen mercilessly elbowing each other as they shove to grab a pair.

There was also drama elsewhere. One shopper from Juneau, Alaska tweeted a picture of a woman being carried from a Dick’s store on a stretcher as crowds focused on the shelves.

Busted: Samantha Chavez, 28, is arrested in a Walmart in Altamonte Springs, Florida after causing a scene

 

Battle: Shoppers fought for deals in the shoe department at the Columbiana Centre Belk in South Carolina

Ready: Shoppers position themselves for midnight openings at the Clackamas Town Center, Oregon

‘Cashier passed out at Dick’s,’ Stevie Hendrix tweeted. ‘Black Friday was too much… No one cared, it was kind of sad, they just wanted their stuff.’

In Woodland Mall in Kentwood, Michigan, two teenagers were arrested after a brawl broke out between 15 men outside a JC Penney at 1.30am. Witnesses said pepper spray was used.

Arrest: Samantha Chavez, who was filmed as she was arrested in a Walmart in Florida, allegedly threw merchandise on the floor

At a Walmart in Altamonte Springs, Florida, 28-year-old Samantha Chavez was arrested after being disruptive in the traffic line, and allegedly bullying the officer directing vehicles.

Once inside the store, she allegedly threw merchandise on the floor.

Witnesses, who caught the arrest on video, claimed she only made a scene after losing her sister in the store and becoming scared, CFNews13 reported.

Police also responded to reports of shooting at 1am in In Westroads Mall in Omaha, Nebraska, where nine people were killed five years ago.

Authorities later learned that while a fight had broken out, witnesses had heard trash cans being knocked over, rather than gunshots. There were no arrests.

An hour later at nearby Oak View Mall, police got into a scuffle with a shoplifter who allegedly tried to spray mace at store security guards.

Another video from Black Friday shows hundreds of girls and women storming the entrance of a Victoria’s Secret Pink store at Oak Park Mall, Kansas as it opened at midnight.

And as crowds swarmed the parking lot of a Covington, Washington Walmart, two people were ploughed down by a driver police believe was drunk.

A woman was pinned beneath the car, driven by a 71-year-old, and flown to hospital, where she was listed in serious condition. A man was also hit but is in good condition.

In another incident in Springfield, Massachusetts, Anthony Perry, 34, was arrested after he allegedly left his girlfriend’s two-year-old in his car so he could by a 51 inch television from Kmart.

Mindboggling: Thousands of bargain-hungry shoppers queue at dawn before a Best Buy opens

Excitement: Girls enter through the doors of a Forever 21 clothing store in Oregon on Friday

Getting comfortable: A young child hides from the crowds at a branch of Target in Atlanta, Georgia

Stocking up: A customer shops for toys at a Walmart Store in Chicago on Black Friday

Stocking up: This customer appeared to have purchased several pricey electronic goods at a Walmart in Dallas

Security notified police about the boy sleeping in the Nissan Venza, broke into the vehicle and took him to hospital for a check up.

Police found Perry at his home in Springfield with his new television, but do not know how he got there without his car. He claimed the youngster was in the store with him and became lost but will be charged for reckless endangerment of a child.

In a parking lot in Maryland, a 14-year-old boy was robbed of his Thanksgiving night purchases by five men outside a Bed, Bath and Beyond.

The shopping frenzy got off to its earliest ever start as the nation’s customers put down their turkey and headed straight to the malls, with some stores opening as early as 6am on Thanksgiving.

Shops typically open in the small hours of the morning on the day after the national holiday – named Black Friday because it is traditionally when they turn a profit for the year.

But openings have crept earlier and earlier over the past few years and this year, stores such as Target and Toys R Us opened on Thanksgiving evening, while retailers from Macy’s to Best Buy opened their doors at midnight on Black Friday.

Despite the YouTube videos, many shoppers claimed the crowds were largely peaceful, avoiding the riots seen in previous years.

Many stores had an unusually heavy police presence, and there were some reports of scuffles between customers in packed-out shopping aisles.

And amid the shopping frenzy, two customers – a husband and a wife – were hit by a car in the parking lot of a Walmart on the edge of Seattle on Thursday evening, with the wife being airlifted to hospital after the accident which saw her pinned under the vehicle.

Stores from Target to Toys R Us opened their doors on Thanksgiving evening, hoping Americans will be willing to shop soon after they finish their pumpkin pie.

Target opened its doors at 9pm on the holiday, three hours earlier than last year. Sears, which didn’t open on Thanksgiving last year, opened at 8pm on Thursday through 10pm on Black Friday.

Toys R Us opened at 8pm, an hour earlier than last year. And others such as Macy’s are opening at midnight on Black Friday.

Swamped: A Walmart is bursting with customers with carts full of cut-down gifts and gadgets

 

Quick! This shopper in Marion, Illinois was wasting no time joining the Black Friday mob

Excitement: Target manager Jay Fitzgerald exuberantly greeted Black Friday shoppers

Hot item: Shoppers grab electric griddles on sale for $8 after doors opened at JC Penney in Las Vegas

 

 

When Macy’s flagship Herald Square store in New York opened its doors at midnight, about 11,000 shoppers showed up.

Overall, about 17 percent of shoppers plan to take advantage of Thanksgiving hours, according to a International Council of Shopping Centers-Goldman Sachs survey of 1,000 consumers.

It is estimated that sales on Black Friday will be up 3.8 percent on last year, to a total of $11.4billion.

Michael Prothero, 19, and Kenny Fullenlove, 20, were even willing to miss Thanksgiving dinner altogether for deals. They started camping out on Monday night outside a Best Buy store in Toledo, Ohio, which was slated to open at midnight.

Finally! The first group of shoppers enter Target after it opened in Burbank, California

 

Bargains: Shoppers wait in line at Target on Thanksgiving after scrambling for the best deals

Mob: The world-famous department store was so full shoppers could barely move

The friends, who were waiting to get 40-inch televisions, videogames and a tablet computer, came early to make sure they got the deals advertised by Best Buy, even though the next person in line didn’t arrive until almost 24 hours later.

‘Better safe than sorry,’ Prothero said.

‘I ate my turkey dinner and came right here,’ said Rasheed Ali, a 23-year-old student in New York City who bought a 50-inch Westinghouse TV for $349 and a Singer sewing machine for $50. ‘Then I’m going home and eating more.’

Retailers are trying everything they can to lure consumers into stores by making shopping as easy as possible.

In addition to expanding their hours into Thanksgiving, many are offering free layaways and shipping, matching the cheaper prices of online rivals and updating their mobile shopping apps with more information.’Every retailer wants to beat everyone else,’ said C. Britt Beemer, chairman of America’s Research Group, a research firm based in Charleston, South Carolina. ‘Shoppers love it.’

There were 11 shoppers in a four-tent encampment outside a Best Buy store near Ann Arbor, Michigan. The purpose of their wait? A $179 40-inch Toshiba LCD television is worth missing Thanksgiving dinner at home.

Jackie Berg, 26, of Ann Arbor, arrived first with her stepson and a friend Wednesday afternoon, seeking three of the televisions. The deal makes the TVs $240 less than their normal price, so Berg says that she’ll save more than $700.

It’s her first time camping out for the specials, and she’s not sure she will do it again. Relatives will bring her some holiday dinner, but she’ll miss eating her dad’s stuffing right as he cooks it.

‘We’ll miss the actual being there with family, but we’ll have the rest of the weekend for that,’ she said.

Anticipation: 11,000 people were thought to have lined up outside Macy’s in New York

Cold wait: Freezing temperatures and snow did not stop shoppers Jocelyn Polansky, left, and Jill Yde who wrapped up as they waited for a Target store in Baxter, Minnesota to open on Thursday night

Popular: Even trendy Manhattanites were keen to grab some savings on Black Friday

 

Job done: People carry shopping bags as they walk through Herald Square in New York

Success! Simon Carraro of Italy sits with his purchases at the Lenox Square Mall in Atlanta, Georgia

Carey Maguire, 33, and her sister Caitlyn Maguire, 21, showed up at Target in East Harlem neighborhood of New York City at 7pm.

Their goal was to buy several Nooks, which were on sale for $49. But while waiting in line they were also using their iPhone to do some online buying at rival stores.

‘If you’re going to spend, I want to make it worth it,’ said Caitlyn Maguire, a college student, who spent a total of $175 on Amazon, Best Buy and Radio Shack during her two-hour wait.

With 41million people predicted to have shopped on what has been dubbed ‘Gray Thursday’, police responded to fights and threats between bargain-hungry customers, some of whom have camped outside stores for days.

The spats added to the discontent surrounding the stores, with employees frustrated about working on Thanksgiving, and Walmart workers threatening to protest over their pay, schedules and benefits.

Family outing: A father and his two daughters celebrate being let in to Best Buy in Mesquite, Texas

Organisation: Staff ensure that customers are limited to one super-discounted television per person at Target in Burbank, California

Anger: Walmart warehouse worker Ben Lorber (L) and striking Walmart store employee Tyrone Robinson protest outside a Walmart store in Chicago over pay, schedules and benefits

Outrage: Walmart told shoppers earlier this week that the protests will not affect Black Friday openings

 

March: Protesters demonstrate outside a Walmart store in Chicago on Black Friday as shoppers arrive

Outside a Kmart in Indianapolis, which opened at 6am on Thursday, officers responded to a brawl between shoppers as some attempted to sell vouchers the store had handed out for limited items.

‘Everybody started going crazy about it, and then the cops got called in and it just became a madhouse,’ one shopper told News 8.

And at a Kmart on Stockton Boulevard in South Sacremento, one shopper threatened to stab people while waiting in line for K-Mart’s doors to open and told people he ‘wasn’t joking’.

Police arrived at the scene shortly after the threat – made after shop staff came outside to hand out ‘doorbuster deal’ vouchers to the first in the line – to help control the crowds.

In a bid to minimize trouble, the Los Angeles Police Department deployed helicopters over some malls, while a cavalry of police officers on bikes and horses monitored from streets below.

Stocking up: This boy was intent on grabbing as much as he could at Toys R Us in Manchester, New Hampshire

 

Scramble: Bargain hunters rummage through stacks of DVDs and video games at Walmart in Fairfax, Virginia

Success! Jovel Cetoute feels it was all worth it after queuing for hours in Pembroke Pines, Florida

Tiring work: A shopper takes a nap with her purchases at the Lenox Square Mall in Atlanta, Georgia

Read more: dailymail

CBN plans to introduce coins dispensing ATMs in Nigeria

Astana city, Kazakhstan

Astana, Kazakhstan

Underground Train, Algeria

Qatar

Qatar pearl

Saudi-Arabia

AC Bus Shelter, Saudi Arabia

The Giant Of Africa – Nigeria, Niger-Delta

Nigeria

7Up says this is its way of encouraging young Nigerians to pursue business skills and leadership training at one of the top business schools in the world. William agreed with this, he said,

“Harvard style of teaching is fantastic, (It’s) a school where students sit together to discuss academic issues and seek solution to them. An institution of global presence where chief executive officers believe no one knows everything. It is a diverse school of study where you find almost all courses of study, even the military come for military training. Learning continues even after the classroom.”

Every year, a Nigerian is awarded the scholarship to enjoy high quality education at the prestigious university. The scholarship was initiated in 2011 as part of the 50th anniversary celebration of the company in accordance with its vision of a “greener future.”

Last year, the award was given to Misan Rewane, a Nigerian who has completed her first year at the school and who is currently interning at The Bridge International Academies, a franchise-like network of ultra low-cost, for-profit private schools, delivering high-quality education for less than $4 a month.

How to Apply for the 7up Nigeria Harvard Business School Scholarship

• Be a Nigerian based in Nigeria
• Apply for admission to the Full Time Harvard MBA Programme (September 2012 Entry) – Visit the Harvard MBA Programme website for admission criteria - http://www.hbs.edu/mba/
• Receive admission letter from Harvard Business School for Full Time Harvard MBA Programme (September 2012 Entry)
• Send a copy of your admission letter to HBSSCHOLARSHIP@SEVENUP.ORG

For further information and to learn specific requirements of the 7UP Harvard Business School scholarship, interested applicants are advised to email a copy of their Harvard Business School admissions letter before the start of the next academic year to hbsscholarship@sevenup.org

Reported by CultureShockNigerians.com

There’s no money like young money. While African millionaires and billionaires like Onsi Sawiris, Raymond Ackerman, and Aliko Dangote may have more money than most of us can ever dream of, there’s one thing they can never buy: Youth. Even money has its limits.

But there are a handful of young Africans in their 20s and 30s who have built businesses and amassed enviable million-dollar fortunes. Call them million-dollar babies.

While some are corporate animals; others are empire builders- like Ladi Delano, the restless 30 year-old Nigerian entrepreneur who founded Solid XS, a hugely successful premium Vodka business in China when he was barely 23 years old. He subsequently flipped his vodka company for millions of dollars. Today, he is a co-founder and CEO of Bakrie Delano Africa, a $1 billion investment vehicle committed to making acquisitions in Nigeria’s mining, energy and agriculture sectors.

There are thousands of young and immensely successful entrepreneurs across the African continent. There’s a growing number of Africans aged 40 and under who are legitimately amassing multi-million dollar fortunes. They don’t inherit stuff; they build it themselves.

Jason Njoku, Nigerian
Age: 31
Founder & CEO Iroko TV
The maverick Nigerian Internet entrepreneur is founder of Iroko TV, the world’s largest digital distributor of African movies. Iroko TV has been dubbed the ‘Netflix of Africa’. Earlier this year, Iroko TV raised $8 million in venture capital from Tiger Global Management, a New York-based private equity and hedge fund run by billionaire Chase Coleman. IrokoTV enjoys lucrative content distribution deals with Dailymotion, iTunes, Amazon and Vimeo. Njoku is unwilling to divulge figures, but analysts believe IrokoTV could be worth as much as $30 million. Njoku is the company’s largest individual shareholder.

Ladi Delano, Nigerian
Age: 30
Founder and CEO, Bakrie Delano Africa
The jet-setting Nigerian serial entrepreneur made his first millions as a liquor entrepreneur while living in China. In 2004, at age 22, he founded Solidarnosc Asia, a Chinese alcoholic beverage company that made Solid XS, a premium brand of vodka. Solid XS went on to achieve over 50% market share in China and was distributed across over 30 cities in China, and pulled in $20 million in annual revenue. Delano subsequently sold the company to a rival liquor company for over $15 million and ploughed his funds into his next venture-The Delano Reid Group, a real estate investment holding company focused on mainland China. Today, Delano is the co-founder
and Chief Executive Officer of Bakrie Delano Africa(BDA) – a $1 billion joint venture with the $15 billion (market cap) Bakrie Group of Indonesia. Bakrie Delano Africa serves as the investment partner of the Bakrie Group in Nigeria. The Indonesian conglomerate has provided over $900 million worth of funds to invest in Nigeria and Bakrie Delano Africa is responsible for identifying investment opportunities in mining, agriculture and oil & gas and executing them.

Mark Shuttleworth, South African
Age: 38
Founder, Knife Capital
When Shuttleworth was 22, he founded Thawte, a digital certificate and internet security company which he sold to VeriSign for $575 million in 1999, when he was 26. Shuttleworth used a fraction of his proceeds to start HBD Capital (now called Knife Capital), a Cape Town-based emerging markets investment fund. HBD has made a series of successful exits including Fundamo, a mobile financial services company which was acquired byVisa for $110 million in 2011; and csense, which was acquired by GE Intelligent Platforms the same year. Shuttleworth also founded and funds Ubuntu, a computer operating system which he distributes as free open source software. Shuttleworth has a net worth north of $500 million.

Ashish Thakkar, Ugandan
Age: 29

Co-Founder and CEO, Mara Group
Thakkar, 29 is a co-founder and CEO of Mara Group – a Ugandan conglomerate with tentacles in financial services, hotels, renewable energy, technology and manufacturing. Annual revenues are approximately $100 million and the group has an active presence in 16 countries on four continents. Devoted philanthropist: Through his Mara Foundation, Thakkar provides mentorship and seed funding to young East African entrepreneurs. Also funds Next Generation Schools, an independent charity focused on improving education quality in disadvantaged secondary schools in Uganda. The Mara Group recently signed a $300 million deal with the Tanzanian government to develop a 3.5 million square foot state of the art mini-city.

Justin Stanford, South African
Age: 28
Founder & CEO, 4Di Group
South African-born Stanford is a software entrepreneur and venture capitalist. After dropping out off high school, Stanford set out to launch an internet security company which flopped. When he came across ESET, a Slovakian anti-virus software package, he negotiated with its manufacturers and cornered the exclusive, lucrative Southern African distribution for the product. Today, Stanford’s ESET Southern Africa operates the ESET brand in the region and sells ESET’s range of internet security products in about 20 sub-Saharan countries, leveraging on an extremely successful internet business platform and digital distribution model for online software sales and service. Today, Stanford’s ESET brand records over $10 million in annual turnover and controls 5% of the anti-virus market in Southern Africa. Stanford is also the founding partner of 4Di Capital, a Cape Town-based venture capital fund. Stanford is also a co-founder of the Silicon Cape Initiative, a non-profit movement that aims to turn the Cape into Africa’s own Silicon Valley.

Magatte Wade, Senegalese
Age: 36
Founder, Adina World Beat Beverages & Tiossan
In 2004 Magatte Wade founded Adina World Beat Beverages, a San Francisco beverage company that manufactures coffee, tea and fruit juices using traditional beverage recipes across Africa and organic ingredients sourced from smallholder farmers in Africa and Asia. Within five years of launching, Adina raised over $30 million in venture capital from institutional investors and the products began being sold by Whole Foods and United Natural Foods. Magatte stepped down from her position as CEO to grow her second company,Tiossan, a manufacturer of luxury skin care products based on indigenous Senegalese recipes.

Mike Macharia, Kenyan
Age: 36
Founder & CEO, Seven Seas Technologies
When he was 25, Macharia, a Kenyan national, founded Seven Seas Technology, now easily East Africa’s most reputable IT services firm. The $50 million (annual sales) company is a leading provider of integrated business and technology solutions across Africa in the telecom, financial, Real Estate, service industry and government. Seven Seas is gearing up to get listed on the Nairobi Stock Exchange next year.

Vinny Lingham, South African
Age: 33
Founder, Yola Inc
Lingham, a South African national, is the founder ofYola Inc, a San Francisco-based Web 2.0 outfit that provides free website building, publishing and hosting services to over 3 million active users across the globe. Yola has attracted over $30 million in venture capital financing from institutional investors such as Columbus Venture Capital, a subsidiary of South African billionaire Johann Rupert’s Richemont Group. Prior to Yola, Lingham founded Click2Customers, a hugely successful search engine marketing company with offices in London, Cape Town, and Los Angeles. Click2Customers rakes in about $100 million in annual revenues. Lingham is a co-founder of the Silicon Cape Initiative along with fellow South African entrepreneur Justin Stanford.

Kamal Budhabatti, Kenyan
Age: 36
CEO, Craft Silicon
Kamal is the founder and CEO of Craft Silicon, a $50 million (market value) Kenyan software company which provides software in core banking, microfinance, mobile, switch solutions and electronic payments for over 200 institutional clients in 40 countries spread across four continents.

Yolanda Cuba, South African
Age: 35
Executive Director, South African Breweries
When Yolanda Cuba was 29 she was appointed CEO of Mvelaphanda Holdings, a Johannesburg Stock Exchange-listed investment holding company. She was awarded stock options worth over $10 million which she exercised before stepping down as CEO last year. She subsequently took up a job as an Executive Director at South African Breweries. Cuba still serves on the boards of South African blue chips such as Steinhoff International Holdings and Absa Group.

Of the humans roaming this planet with at least $1 billion in their bank accounts, just 8.5% are female, according to Forbes.

There’s Christy Walton, the Walmart heiress; Jacqueline Mars, the candy empire heiress; Anne Cox Chambers, the Cox media empire heiress; Dorothea Steinbruch, the Brazilian steel heiress; Liliane Bettencourt, the L’Oreal heiress; Iris Fontbona, the widow of a mining magnate, Birgit Rausing, the widow of a packaging magnate; and Rosalia Mera, the ex-wife of the founder of clothing chain Zara.

Rinehart may have inherited some handsome seed money, but she now earns her own $75 million every day and a half. And she’s done it by riding the soaring demand for Australia’s resources, reports ABC News.

“If the demand for natural resources remains strong, additional multi-billion mines are almost inevitable,” writes BRW. “There is a real possibility that Rinehart will become not just the richest woman in the world, but the richest person in the world.”

To do that, Rinehart would have to more than double her fortune. Mexican telecommunications giant Carlos Slim Helu now holds the top spot, with $69 billion.

Over the last decade, more women have been busting through the billionaire glass ceiling at a fair rate. In that period, the number of female billionaires has ballooned from 32 to 104, reports Forbes.

Of course it’s hard to make millions every day and still be the perfect mom. Three of Rinehart’s four children are currently suing her in order to knock her off her late father’s multibillion-dollar family trust. Rinehart’s own bitter legal fight with her stepmother, over the circumstances of her father’s death, lasted 14 years. But she seems to have ended on good terms with her dad. In 1999, she managed to get a mountain range named after him.

Source: DailyFinance

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that an administrative bail is a sum of money in exchange for the release of an arrested person as a guarantee of that person’s appearance for trial.

The EFCC usually grants such bail before an accused is arraigned before a competent court of law.

The anti-graft agency, through its counsel, Mr Samuel Ugwuegbulam, informed Justice Abubakar Umar that Gilmaska had jumped bail and could not be properly arraigned.

Ugwuegbulam added that Gilmaska, who was to be arraigned on a four-count charge of obtaining N16.9 million from one Tayo Olugbemi under false pretence, had “disappeared.”

Gilmaska, the Executive Officer of Icon Media and Marketing Agency Ltd, would also be charged with issuing a dud cheque of N16.9 million.

Ugwuegbulam requested for adjournment as the EFCC operatives had launched an “operation” to arrest her.

“My Lord, we are sorry to say that the accused jumped the administrative bail temporarily given to her by the EFCC.

“We are making an undertaken that by the next adjourned date, we shall apprehend and arraign her before the court,” he said.

Justice Umar, after checking his records, reminded the EFCC counsel that the commission failed to arraign the accused on Nov. 25, 2011.

Umar adjourned the case to June 14 to enable EFCC to arraign the accused. (NAN)

Last year, public transportation was temporarily disrupted in Sieraa Leonean capital Freetown after protest by staff of the Sierra Leone Road Transport Authority (SLRTA), who were angered by the decision to contract the Lagos based company to handle vehicle and drivers licensing in Sierra Leone.
The then management of SLRTA at the time cited mordernisation of its systems.

A new team of administration, however, recently terminated the contract, citing lack of performance on the part of the Nigerian contractor. Courteville is demanding over $700, 000 it claims it is owed as per the agreement. The government said the company failed to perform satisfactorily.

The legal suit has reignited public anger over an issue that vexed Sierra Leonean motorists leading to confrontations with the authorities.

Under the controversial agreement, Courteville Investment was to provide an automated vehicle and drivers` licences. Opponents expressed concern of the security implications of an agreement that would see data collected stored in the company`s servers somewhere in Nigeria.

Courteville operates from Nigeria`s commercial capital, Lagos, and some Sierra Leoneans, motorists in particular, said their personal information could be misused.

Counting losses

After an apparent change of plan, SLRTA now accused Courteville Investment of not abiding by its contract agreement causing “great embarrassment, inconvenience, and loss of confidence,” by its [SLRTA] customers.

Sources at the SLRTA revealed that the government has lost over $7 million as a result of the contract reached last year, amounting to over $30M, which was allegedly “imposed” on a reluctant management at the time by some government ministers.

There have been calls for President Ernest bail Koroma to act against one of his ministers, who has been linked to the deal.

SLRTA has meanwhile reverted to its old system of handling vehicle and drivers` licenses registration.

Culled: Africa Review

A damning audit report of the money it provided to the country up to 2010 is categorical that various government departments and individuals involved in the misuse or direct theft of some $3,253,161 (Sh270 million) should return the cash.

Unlike with similar reports in the past, a draft of the current one was first given to the Kenyan Government to ascertain whether it was a true reflection of corruption within the fund’s programmes in the country.

In February, Public Health and Sanitation permanent secretary Mark Bor, in a letter to Mr John Parsons of the Global Fund, said the country agreed with the contents of the report and was in the process of implementing some of the recommendations.

A section in the audit report explaining how far Kenya had gone in implementing the recommendations says some individuals, especially in the Division of Malaria Control, had already returned some of the money they had stolen.

In one instance, the government says it has recovered the bulk of about Sh4.5 million withdrawn from a Global Fund grant using fake documents, with the staff member in question having been asked to pay back some Sh2.5 million.

However, sources privy to the original report say the final report has been diluted. Following media reports about corruption in its programmes, last year, the fund said in future it would prepare different reports — a detailed one for the recipient country and a general version for the public.

The report indicates endemic levels of theft and corruption in all the programmes at all levels, from the Ministerial Procurement Committees right up to transport officers and drivers.

While the corruption is shown to be widespread in all government agencies handling Global Funds cash, it is indicated as being most frequent at the National Aids and STD Control Programme (NASCOP), the National Aids Control Council (NACC) and the Division of Malaria Control.

NACC is currently conducting a campaign to have Kenyans taxed to sustain a special HIV trust fund which it says should be used to replace declining donor money.

The report accuses NACC of paying millions of shillings to briefcase organisations, unbudgeted for staff and employing unqualified people.

-Africa Review

Pike had two tickets with the same number on them and though she didn’t match all 6 numbers for a giganto-sized mega millions payday, she managed to score 5 out of 6 numbers on the tickets. Doing that pays out $1 million and since she had two tickets, she gets $2 million. How did she manage to get the winning number twice? Well, Pike used a very thoughtful strategy. She told ABC:

“I’m in shock!” Fike said in a news release from the Virginia lottery.

“I picked numbers based on my parents’ anniversary and their ages at that time, divided by the year they were married.

I just love the jackpot games and I play when I can afford it.”

In early April, Fike stopped at an Olde Stone Truck Stop in Virginia with her numbers ready and purchased two tickets.

The jackpot that week was at $80 million. In order to win the jackpot, the ticket holder has to match the five numbers and the sixth Powerball number.

After the drawing, it was announced that no one had won the jackpot, but 14 people nationwide had matched five of the numbers and were entitled to $1 million prizes each. Two of the winning tickets were in Virginia.

Pike was in the hospital keeping her mother company.

“I saw a scroll on TV about there being two $1 million winners. I looked at my mom and said ‘Wouldn’t it be funny if it was us?’” she said.

When she stopped by a convenience store, Pike had the clerk check her tickets and she discovered that she had won both of Virginia’s $1 million prizes.

Per Virginia state lottery rules, winners split the jackpot, regardless of how many there are, but non-jackpot prizes from matching part of the winning sequence are not split and can be won multiple times.

“It’s not that uncommon for people to buy tickets in games with the same number, but this is the biggest prize we’ve ever had in Virginia of two tickets in the same drawing,” Virginia Lottery spokesman John Hagerty told ABCNews.com.

Pike was presented with a check for $2 million on Friday at the truck stop where she purchased the ticket. Winners in Virginia are required to come forward and be identified. She will receive $1.4 million after taxes. The store also received a $200,000 bonus for selling the two winning tickets.

Pike did not respond to a request for comment from ABCNews.com.

For now, Virginia’s newest millionaire is basking in her shocking win.

“I must be dreaming,” Pike said. “I look forward to helping to take care of my parents and paying some bills.”

Also, for those who could not make it to the store, TESCO has pasted the virtual screens at subway stations. There, the buyers scan items of their choice with their smart phones, and the selected items are delivered to their homes upon their arrival.

American TV mogul Oprah Winfrey remains the only black female billionaire in the world.

Of the 1,226 people who made it to the 2012 FORBES list of the world billionaires, only 6 are black. These are 6 who made the cut:

Mohammed Al-Amoudi, $12.5 billion

Saudi Arabia. Oil

Born to a Saudi father and Ethiopian mother, Mohammed Al-Amoudi immigrated to Saudi Arabia as a child where he made a fortune handling lucrative construction contracts for the Saudi Royal family. He subsequently invested in Sweden, Morocco and Ethiopia. His most prominent assets include oil companies Svenska Petroleum Exploration, which produces crude oil in Africa, and refinery operator Preem. Al-Amoudi stays committed to the country of his birth: Ethiopia. In February, he announced a $3.4 billion investment in Ethiopia via his newly formed Derba conglomerate. The funds will be invested in agriculture, cement production, steel and transport. He also owns gold mines in the country and the very prestigious 5-star Sheraton Hotel, Addis. Passionate soccer fan.

Aliko Dangote, $11.2 billion

Nigeria. Sugar, Cement, Flour

Dangote loses his position as the world’s richest black man, but he remains Africa’s wealthiest individual nevertheless. He shed more than $2.6 billion from his net worth since last year as a consequence of Nigeria’s floundering stock market. His $15 billion (market cap) Dangote Group is Nigeria’s largest industrial conglomerate, with interests in everything from sugar refineries, flour milling, salt processing and cement plants in Nigeria, Zambia, Senegal, Tanzania and South Africa. Passionate philanthropist has given away millions to education, health and social causes.

Mike Adenuga, $4.3 billion

Nigeria. Telecom, banking, oil

Adenuga started off trading lace and Coca-cola before Nigeria’s former military president, Ibrahim Babangida took him under his wing. Adenuga was subsequently rewarded with lucrative oil blocks which changed his fortunes forever and saw him become the first Nigerian to strike oil in commercial quantities in the early 1990s. Today, his Conoil Producing Company is Nigeria’s largest indigenous oil exploration company. Daily production: 100,000 barrels per day. New ambition: Striving to build Africa’s largest mobile telecommunications network. His mobile phone operator, Globacom, already has over 15 million subscribers in Nigeria and over 500,000 in Benin Republic.

Patrice Motsepe, $2.7 billion

South Africa. Mining

South Africa’s first black billionaire trained as a lawyer at the University of Witwatersrand and went on to become the first black partner at storied Johannesburg law firm, Bowman Gilfillan. He later founded a small contracting business doing scut work, then acquired low-producing gold shaft mines in 1994. He turned the shafts profitable using lean management style. Today he is the Executive chairman of African Rainbow Minerals (ARM), a South African mining company with interests in platinum, nickel, chrome, iron, manganese, coal, copper and gold. He owns 41% of the company. Also owns Mamelodi Sundowns, a South African Football Club.

Oprah Winfrey, $2.7 billion

USA. Television

The Queen of all media is having a difficult time working her magic on OWN- the lifestyle-themed cable network she founded in a joint venture with Discovery Communications. The network completed its first full year, marked by ratings disappointments and turnover at the top. Never mind: She’s still the world’s richest black woman. In January, her Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy in South Africa graduated its first set of students.

Mo Ibrahim, $1.1 billion

United Kingdom. Telecoms

The Sudanese-born telecoms magnate conceptualized an unorthodox approach to solving Africa’s leadership problems. Through his Mo Ibrahim Foundation, he awards $5 million annually to democratically-elected African leaders who deliver the dividends of good governance to their people and equally transfer power to their successors in democratic fashion. Mo made his fortune by founding Celtel, a mobile a mobile phone company that serves 23 countries in Africa and the Middle East. He sold it off in 2005 for $3.4 billion. He subsequently founded Satya Capital, a $150 million private equity firm which invests solely in African companies. Enjoys smoking pipe.

Source: Forbes

In addition to the N656.3bn allocation for this year, the Federal Government had also provided N231.8bn in the budget for the payment of the 2011 subsidy arrears, adding up to N888.1bn.

Speaking to the Reuters Africa Investment Summit in Abuja on Thursday, Sanusi said: “With oil prices where they’ve been since the beginning of the year, I’m sure that we will be exposed to that amount long before the year runs out.”

“If I was asked for advice, I’d simply say pay what you have in the budget and simply stop paying. If not, take the money from the Excess Crude Account or you’ve got to borrow money,” he added.

Although the pump price of petrol is currently N97 per litre, the landing cost of a litre of imported petrol is N152.44, leaving the government to pay about N55.44 on every litre of petrol as subsidy.

When the N55.44 per litre is multiplied by a daily consumption of 35 million litres, it amounts to a daily subsidy expenditure of N1.94bn. The figure adds up to N60.14bn monthly.

The country is supposed to save money over a benchmark price, which is $72 a barrel in the 2012 budget, into an excess crude account to cushion the economy against potential oil price shocks.

But the account has been repeatedly raided by politicians, and despite record high oil prices, it contained only $3.5bn earlier this year, down from some $20bn in 2007. It won’t last long if subsidy payments overshoot.

The country’s total debt is about 20 per cent of Gross Domestic Product, which is comfortable compared with other African countries, but, Sanusi argues it is poor for a country pumping as much oil as Nigeria.

Debts are rising despite high oil revenue and economists are concerned that borrowing is increasingly internal, which means from banks and pension funds. If the government fails to pay, then other parts of the economy are at risk

The nation relies on crude exports for more than 80 per cent of government revenues and budgets for this amount based on the benchmark oil price and assumed production, which was set at 2.48 million barrels per day this year.

This is at the top-end of actual production last year and if there are any output shortfalls, which have been common in the past, the government will have to borrow to cover any shortfall.

Sanusi said, “(The output) assumption was too optimistic … based on the most rosy forecasts of operating environment.

“When you’ve got militancy, you’ve got production shortages, you’ve got natural operational failures, a more conservative output figure to begin with would have been better.”

High oil prices have enabled the economy to grow at more than seven per cent a year but poverty is rising.

President Goodluck Jonathan pledged before his election last year to improve the country’s woeful electricity system by privatising the power sector and to reform the oil sector so as to weed out corruption and save the indebted Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation.

The ambitious Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB, which is supposed to change everything from taxes to the structure of the NNPC, has been stuck in parliamentary dispute for years.

Reforms are running months behind schedule and risk being blocked off by politicians who benefit from the status quo.

“Clearly, we should have made much more progress than we’ve made. The PIB is a major disappointment … after several years (it) is about to start again its tortuous path through the National Assembly. In many of these areas, you’ve clearly got vested interests,” Sanusi said.

John Coulter, the head of the bank’s sub-Saharan region made this disclosure to journalists at the Reuter’s Africa Investment Summit.

According to him the demand for Investment Banking services in Africa far outpaces the supply and it is in this category the bank is seeking to profit.

He said: “A strategy that focuses on Africa from a pure investment banking perspective, for JPMorgan, is not the approach to follow. We have got the capital and the capability as a bank to extract more from an African wallet.

“A company in Kenya or a bank in Ghana needs trade finance lines, credit lines to help them grow their business, project finance, infrastructure support and the corresponding banking lines.”

Coulter plans to assist African corporations with bespoke investment banking needs as he acknowledges that their needs are in contrast to their multinational counterparts.

JP Morgan Chase & Co is a major provider of financial services, with assets of $2 trillion and according to Forbes magazine is the world’s largest public company based on a composite ranking. The hedge fund unit of JPMorgan Chase is one of the largest hedge funds in the United States. It was formed in 2000, when Chase Manhattan Corporation merged with J.P. Morgan & Co.

Nigerians both at home and in Diaspora are strongly opposing plans to return the money to Delta State where the current governor, Emmanuel Uduaghan, is Ibori’s cousin and “stooge”.
A statement by the UK-based Anioma Diaspora, a Nigerian socio-cultural and good governance campaign group, said that “returning Ibori’s loot to Delta State would be senseless and counter-productive in the light of the fact that the present governor of Delta State, Emmanuel Uduaghan, is a blood relation of Ibori.

“The money would be re-stolen from the poor people of Delta State by the same corrupt officials that Ibori brought in to succeed him or it will be in safe-keeping to be handed over to Ibori by his cousin the moment he walks out of the UK prison”.

Long-suffering people
According to the spokesman of Anioma Diaspora, Mr Clement Ofodu, the money would not be used for the benefit of the long-suffering people of Delta State considering that the new governor has previously been indicted as Ibori’s tag-team partner, having served for several years in Ibori’s cabinet first as Commissioner for Heath; then catapulted to a more strategic position of Secretary to State Government (SSG) and finally imposed on the poor people of Delta State as Ibori’s successor”.

During the botched prosecution of James Ibori by Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC), the Delta State government had shocked Nigerians by issuing a statement saying that no money was missing from its treasury.

Following the sentencing of Ibori to 13 years in prison, the Delta State government said it had no official reaction to a purely private matter. Delta State Commissioner for Information, Mr Chike Ogeah, argued that “Ibori is a private citizen; Delta State Government cannot have an official position on a purely private matter”.

Hours after Ibori was handed the jail sentence for fraud and corruption offences by a Southwark Crown Court in London, British judicial officials said they would soon start confiscation proceedings to ensure that the stolen assets were returned to Delta State.

One of the investigators, Detective Inspector Paul Whitmore, said it was estimated that Ibori stole around $250 million from Delta State.

“The sum can only be described as huge; vast sums of money which were used to fund his lavish lifestyle; the real harm in this case is the potential loss to people in some of the poorest regions in the world,” he said.

Confiscation proceeding

Mr Whitmore added that a confiscation proceeding would be launched to ensure that as much of the money as possible was returned to the Delta state government.

Judge Anthony Pitts who listened to prosecutor Sasha Weils describe Ibori as “a common thief” admitted that the court wasn’t even certain about the exact amount Ibori had stolen but he expressed hope that new light would be shed on his theft during the confiscation proceedings.

Some of the assets that might be confiscated are a house in Hampstead, North London, worth £2.2m; a property in Shaftesbury, Dorset, worth £311,000; a £3.2m mansion in Sandton, near Johannesburg, South Africa; a fleet of armoured Range Rovers valued at £600,000; a £120,000 Bentley; and a Mercedes Maybach worth 407,000 Euros.

London investigators disclosed Ibori had piled up credit card bills of $200,000 per month on a luxury lifestyle while running Delta State like a fiefdom. The jailed politician was about to take delivery of a Bombardier private jet worth £12m when he was arrested.

In his guilty plea Ibori admitted one count of conspiracy to launder money, five of money laundering and one of obtaining a property transfer by deception and theft of more than £25m while he was governor of Delta State.

Pleaded guilty

He also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud, conspiracy to make false documents, and one count of money laundering linked to a $37 million share fraud surrounding the sale of shares in a Nigerian company, V Mobile.

The UK-based Anioma Diaspora has said that the ill-gotten assets mentioned in the trial were only an infinitesimal part of a vast financial empire.

The group said the UK is not the only country Ibori stashed away loots and urged the Nigerian government to start searches in other foreign countries like the US, South Africa, Malta, United Arab Emirates and Ecuador where the former governor is believed to have interests in an oil refinery.

The Cordinator of the Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO) in Lagos State, Mr Ehi Omokhuale, said that Ibori deserved a death sentence for impoverishing citizens of the oil-rich Delta State.

Nigerians in UK believe Ibori will likely serve his term in Wandsworth Prison, a facility currently able to hold 1,665 prisoners. Wandsworth is also where Ibori was held while undergoing trial. His jailed lawyer, Bhadresh Gohil, is serving his term in Wandsworth Prison.

Ibori’s wife, Theresa Nkoyo Ibori is in Holloway Prison in north London serving a five-year sentence for money laundering. Ibori’s sister Christine Ibori-Ibie and his mistress, Udoamaka Okoronkwo-Onuigbo are also in UK jails for their roles in the plunder of Delta State which Ibori governed between 1999 and 2007.

Africa Review