By Ezinwanne Onwuka
● Nigerian President signs 2023 supplementary budget of N2.17tr
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu of Nigeria signed the luxury N2.17 trillion Supplementary Appropriation Act on Wednesday following the passage of the bill by the Senate and the House of Representatives last week.
The supplementary budget augments expenditures in the 2023 N21.83 trillion budget signed by Muhammadu Buhari who left office on May 29. “The budget seeks to strengthen Nigeria’s security architecture and address Nigeria’s critical infrastructure deficit, amongst other considerations,” presidential spokesperson Ajuri Ngelale said via a press statement.
The supplementary budget has been a subject of controversy over certain provisions, including fleets of SUVs for the First Lady, Oluremi Tinubu and the President and Vice-President Kashim Shettima; renovation of already lavishly furnished presidential and vice-presidential residential quarters in Lagos and Abuja; and the construction of a multibillion naira office complex at the Presidential Villa in Abuja. The sum of N5 billion was initially allocated for the procurement of a presidential yacht but the amount was subsequently moved to the students loan program provision.
Read more: https://gazettengr.com/president-tinubu-signs-n2-1-trillion-supplementary-2023-budget/
● Court orders release of ex-CBN boss Emefiele from prolonged detention
Respite came to the embattled former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria [CBN], Godwin Emefiele as the High Court at the Federal Capital (FCT), granted him bail on Wednesday. Emefiele has been in detention since June 10, 2023, a day after he was suspended as the CBN governor without trial.
From the custody of secret police Department of State Services [DSS], he was transferred to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission [EFCC] on October 26. The presiding judge, Justice Olukayode Adeniyi ordered the EFCC to release Emefiele to his attorneys who must accompany him to court.
“There must be an end to detention without trial,” the judge ruled. In Nigeria, the general rule is that you cannot be held for more than 48 hours without being formally charged and arraigned for a specific crime. The bail condition requires Emefiele to surrender his international passport and other traveling documents to the court.
Read more: https://guardian.ng/news/court-grants-ex-cbn-governor-emefiele-bail/
● Canadian high commission suspends operations in Nigeria
Canada on Tuesday suspended operations in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja, amid an investigation into a fatal explosion at its embassy in Abuja’s CBD area that killed two persons on Monday.
The fire incident also caused damage to a section of the building. Details regarding the exact cause of the explosion remain scarce but Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Melanie Joly assured that “we are working to shed light on what caused this situation” via a social media post.
Commenting on the development, the High Commission of Canada in Nigeria said the Abuja office is closed “until further notice.” This is as Ottawa joined Washington and London in issuing a warning to Canadians against nonessential travel to Nigeria due to the “unpredictable security situation throughout the country and the significant risk of terrorism, crime, inter-communal clashes, armed attacks and kidnappings.”
● Benue Gov. Alia pleads with bandits to ‘calm down’: Official
Joseph Har, the special adviser on security and internal affairs to the Governor of Benue State, Hyacinth Alia, has
said the government is extending an olive branch to bandits who have been massacring innocent residents across the state.
To the surprise of former officials, the new Governor’s spokesman is asking the bandits for patience and forgiveness. “What we are doing now is to build back the confidence in these guys (bandits). We are asking them to come out. We are talking to them; we are engaging them,” Har told reporters.
“We have told them that what they are doing is destroying their community; it’s destroying our economy, it’s making society look ugly and it’s giving the state a bad image,” Har said. Speaking on behalf of the recently elected Hyacinth Alia, who prior to running for office was a popular but controversial parish priest in majority Catholic Benue State, Har expressed regret that a notorious bandit leader named Gana had been killed after surrendering to authorities. A former governor of the state, Aminu Masari, who headed an effort to grant amnesty to the bandits, pushed back against the strategy of Gov. Alia, calling the bandits unrepentant “criminals and thieves.”
Read more at: https://gazettengr.com/benue-extending-olive-branch-to-bandits-for-them-to-calm-down-official/
Ezinwanne Onwuka reports for TruthNigeria from Abuja.
