Good morning! Here is today’s summary from Nigerian Newspapers:
1. No fewer than 6,700 traders lost their goods to a fire that gutted the popular Mandilas building on Broad Street, Lagos Island Local Government Area of Lagos State on Sunday. This is just as 450 shops, 30 offices, two hotels, and five restaurants were destroyed by the impact of the fire which affected the 14-storey building.
2. A new report has projected that the Central Bank of Nigeria may ask commercial banks with international banking licences to raise their capital base to over N900bn. This came a few months after the CBN Governor, Olayemi Cardoso, said the apex bank would be asking lenders to raise more capital in order to support the Federal Government’s vision to grow the economy to $1tn.
3. President Bola Tinubu on Monday justified his cabinet of 47 ministers, saying the number reflects the diversity of roles required to run an efficient government. The president expressed doubt about reducing his cabinet, saying no guarantee this would boost performance.
4. As the Plateau State House of Assembly resumes plenary today (Tuesday), the 16 lawmakers elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, said they would resume their legislative duties despite their sack by the Court of Appeal. This came as the All Progressives Congress, APC, said the lawmakers remained sacked and their plan to resume was an ‘invitation to anarchy and a threat to democracy’.
5. Fifty-eight lawmakers under the aegis of the Northern Senators Forum have alleged that projections and provisions of the N28.7tn 2024 budget are unfair to the North. They also alleged that some federal agencies were being relocated to Lagos.
6. The Rivers State Police Command has said three of its officers who abducted and extorted the sum of $3,000 from two travellers will face an orderly room trial and query respectively. The spokesperson for the command, Grace Iringe-Koko, who disclosed this while parading the suspects in Port Harcourt on Monday, said the action was part of the internal disciplinary measures taken against operatives involved in unlawful activities.
7. The Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, NSCDC, says its men destroyed four illegal oil refining sites in Cawthome Channel One in Degema Local Government Area of Rivers State. The corps said suspected oil thieves had vandalised facilities, including pipes belonging to Sahara Oil, thereby siphoning the crude, with the intent to establish an illegal refining site.
8. President Bola Tinubu has directed an expansion of the focus of the Nigeria Education Loan Fund, NELFUND, to include students interested in skill-development programmes. Tinubu gave the directive to the management of the Fund after receiving briefing on the build-up to the launch of the programme later in the month from the Executive Secretary of NELFUND, Dr Akintunde Sawyerr, at the State House, Abuja.
9. The Super Eagles have progressed to the next round of the African Cup of Nations, AFCON, after defeating Guinea-Bissau 1-0 on Monday. The Eagles took the lead in the 36th minute after Guinea-Bissau’s Sangante kicked the ball into the net.
10. The presentation and passage of the Rivers State 2024 Budget by the four-member Ehie Edison-led House of Assembly was on Monday described as an aberration by a Federal High Court in Abuja, which voided and set aside the budget on grounds of illegality and unconstitutionality. In a judgment, the court restored the leadership of Martin Amaewhule, leader of the 25 legislators loyal to the former governor of the state, Nyesom Wike.
Nigerian Newspapers: 10 things you need to know Tuesday morning
