Today's Headlines: Nigeria Is In Big Mess, Coupled With Poor Governance – VP, Shettima; President Putin Won’t Attend Wagner Leader, Prigozhin’s Funeral – Russian Govt

Nigeria Is In Big Mess Coupled With Poor Governance – Vice President, Shettima Admits

Vice President, Kashim Shettima, has said that Nigeria’s economic situation is in a big mess, adding that the country is chained by poor governance.

Shettima, who spoke on Monday, when he received in audience members of the Presidential Committee on Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms led by the chairman, Mr. Taiwo Oyedele, at State House, Abuja, expressed optimism that his principal, Bola Tinubu would tackle.

Asking the committee to come up with roadmap that would transform the economy and take the country out of the woods, former governor of Borno State, said fiscal policy and tax reforms were a potent tool for resource mobilisation.

He charged the committee to make recommendations that would be quick deliverables in view of the current economic realities.

President Putin Won’t Attend Wagner Leader, Prigozhin’s Funeral – Russian Government

President Vladimir Putin of Russia will not attend the funeral for Yevgeny Prigozhin, the mercenary chief who launched a failed mutiny against Russia’s military leadership and and died in a plane crash last week, the Kremlin spokesman said on Tuesday, according to Russian state media.

The spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov, added that the Kremlin had no further information on the funeral, according to New York Times report.

Details about the event, including the date and whether the public would be allowed to attend, were unclear.

A private plane carrying Prigozhin and nine other people crashed northwest of Moscow on Wednesday, killing everyone aboard, but his death was not officially confirmed till Sunday, when Russian investigators said that genetic testing showed that the victims of the crash matched the names on the jet’s manifest.

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The confirmation came after days of speculation about whether Prigozhin was really on the plane.

FCT Natives Beg Wike To Carry Them Along In Development Plans

Natives of Abuja have appealed to the minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike to carry them along in his plan to develop the territory so that they will be given a sense of belonging as indigenous people of Abuja.

Secretary of Kpaduma 1 community, Hon Joseph Madaki Shekwolo, who made the call in a press briefing yesterday on behalf of the natives, said the call was necessary because they are aware of the minister’s desire to commence development of most places in the FCT as soon as possible.

“I want to sincerely appeal to the minister concerning the indigenous people of Abuja. When it comes to the time of development, he should please consider us the indigenes of Abuja.

“Because we have been neglected and marginalised for too long by past administrations, while our ancestral lands have been forcefully taken from us without due compensation,” he said.

He explained that since the emergence of the FCT, their farmlands which they survive on as their main source of income as farmers were collected from them while they were not well compensated.

Reps Back Privatisation Of 4 National Refineries

Members of the House of Representatives are planning to ask the federal government to privatise the four petroleum refineries in the country.

Chairman, House Committee on Petroleum Upstream, Hon. Ikenga Imo Ugochinyere who revealed this yesterday, said that they are presenting a proposal for the privatisation of the four national refineries in the next few days.

Ugochinyere who spoke during the committee’s courtesy visit to the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) in Abuja, said the committee is basing the proposal on the fact that the rehabilitation of the refineries has gulped funds that would have been sufficient to build new three ones.

He insisted that privatising the refineries will make them more beneficial to the citizenry since they will provide refined petroleum products domestically.

His words: “Let me also propose to you one of the things our committee is going to be championing in the days ahead which is the privatisation of some of our nation’s refineries.

“You will agree with me that for decades we have been on these refinery issues.

“And we have spent money that if they use it to build new refineries we would have built two or three. And then we keep maintaining them over time.

“It is better that these refineries are privatised to make it efficient so that Nigerians can get the benefits they require in refining our products domestically.”

He commended the NEITI executive secretary, Orji Ogbonnaya Orji for the reforms he has been championing in the extractive industries for the benefit of all Nigerians.

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