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The worst is over! Uzodimma rouses Imo for New Year *Says 2023 full of good tidings
“Things are looking up and 2023 is likely to be better than 2022,” were the encouraging words with which, Hope Uzodimma, Governor of Imo State, sought to rouse citizens into the 2023, assuring that the state was moving away from the worst days.
Uzodimma, who fingered political foes for most of the crisis the state witnessed in 2023, assured that many policies and projects that would improve the living standard of the people, with more critical road infrastructure coming.
He named such roads as Owerri – Umuahia road, the Orlu – Mgbee – Akokwa-Uga road and the Oguta – Okporo-Orlu road will all be completed this year and with the already completed Owerri – Orlu and Owerri-Okigwe signature roads, saying with them, the state would never be the same again in terms of road network that will catalyse trade and commerce and boost the economy of the State.
The Governor, while conveying his New Year message sentiments to the people, acknowledged that despite the fact that 2022 came with a lot of challenges nationally the state had every reason to thank God for sparing our lives to see this year.
The message, in full, read: “My beloved Ndi Imo, Ndewonu. I wish you all a happy and prosperous new year. To the glory of God, we have seen the end of the year 2022, and we are alive to celebrate the beginning of another year – 2023. As people of faith, we give God all the glory and adoration for the divine privilege of being alive to see this new year of our Lord 2023.
“The last year – 2022 – was a challenging year for the entire country and we have every reason to thank God for sparing our lives to see this year. As we know, many of those who celebrated the beginning of 2022 with us are no longer alive today to see the beginning of 2023.
“Yet, it is neither by our might nor by our righteousness that we have been so favoured to see this new year. It is only by the special grace of God. So, as we celebrate and congratulate ourselves for surviving the new year, we should also pause for a minute to appreciate and praise God for His abundant mercy and grace on our lives.
“Therefore, as I say very happy new year to all of us, let me, on your behalf, express our profound gratitude to God Almighty for keeping us alive to witness yet another year in our pilgrimage on planet Earth. Indeed, for Imo people and Nigerians in general, the preceding year of 2022 was a very challenging one. Yet to the glory of God, through all the trials, we all came out triumphant. May God be praised.
“My beloved NDIMO, as Imo people, looking back into last year it wasn’t all about trials and survival. Many of our prayers were also answered and some of us received some blessings from God, both individually and collectively as a people. For example, I am aware that some families were blessed with new babies, new houses, new jobs, and some got promoted to new positions. Some also started new businesses while others grew their old businesses. Thus, in addition to being alive, we have other reasons to thank God for.
“On the part of government, we are thankful that in spite of the monstrous challenge of insecurity which was deliberately contrived to frustrate and cripple my administration, we were able to accomplish our objectives in governance. For instance, two of our signatures projects – the Owerri – Orlu road and the Owerri – Okigwe road were commissioned by no other person than President Muhammadu Buhari.
“This is in addition to several other roads and infrastructural projects which were completed last year. (I am satisfied and encouraged by the testimonies I received from our citizens who retuned and used these roads during the festive season).
“We were also able to get the Federal Government to upgrade the Federal Medical Centre, Owerri, to a University Teaching Hospital for use by the Federal University of Technology, Owerri. Of course, these developments come with abundant employment opportunities for our people and the additional prospect of value addition to the growth of the economy of the state.
“The same goes for the Alvan Ikoku College of Education, which we got the Federal Government to take over as a Federal University of Education. We also signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Nigerian Navy for the dredging of Oguta Lake/ Orashi River to the Atlantic Ocean. This will grant Imo State, and indeed the South-East, the much needed access to the sea with vast potentials to boost international trade and commerce in the region.
“This also comes with the concomitant opportunities for investment in the oil and gas sector. With the establishment of a Naval base at Oguta, facilitated by my administration, maritime security is assured in the area which will help to combat crude oil theft and pipeline vandalism.
“Equally heart-warming is the fact that in the preceding year, we were able to wrestle the remaining pockets of security challenges and banditry to a standstill. The few remaining kingpins of bandits were rounded up and are now dancing to the music of the law. To the glory of God, security agencies were able to act with greater precision in confronting banditry as witnessed in the foiled attempt to burn the office of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in Owerri. So, on the whole, I can assure you that we are on top of the situation and Imo is relatively safer each year. A clear evidence of this is that no incident of insecurity was reported in the state during the festive season.
“The good news is that things are looking up and 2023 is likely to be better than 2022. We hope to complete the Owerri – Umuahia road and the Orlu – Mgbee – Akokwa and the Oguta to Okporo- Orlu road, this year. Adding these strategic roads to the two already commissioned signature roads will serve to catalyse trade and commerce and would ultimately boost the economy of the state.
“Let me also assure you that the security situation will continue to improve this year. Our security agencies are now better equipped and better trained to confront the security challenges. I can further assure you that this year, the few unrepentant ungodly people and their sponsors, who want to continue to unleash violence and insecurity in the state, will be doing so at their own peril. NDIMO should be assured that we will all be safer this year. Above all, I give you my word that our dear state will do better this year in all ramifications than it did last year.
“It is noteworthy that I have already signed the 2023 budget of N474.4billion into law, and we are set to go this fiscal year. As you know, the budget is tagged “The Budget of Wealth Expansion”. It seeks to improve the state’s economy, with priority on security, agriculture, education and transportation, among the others. With a capital outlay of N373 billion – that is about 72 percent of the entire budget – nothing will stop us from attaining our developmental goals for the year.
“This is a year to watch because it a year that Imo people will look back to and further appreciate this administration for keeping faith with our social contract with the people. Today, even our worst critics will acknowledge the huge difference between the Imo State of today and the Imo State we inherited in 2020.
“I must tell you that this great transformation that has taken place is as a result of hard work, sacrifice, honesty, prudence and tenacious dedication to duty by my team. Needless to add that we could not have done much without your support and prayers which crowned our modest efforts with God’s blessings. To God be the glory.
“I should also remind our people that 2023 is an election year. My appeal is that the good people of Imo State should conduct themselves peacefully before, during and after the elections. I do not want our state to be in the election news for all the bad reasons. Let us go out peacefully and elect the candidates of our choice.
“Ndi Imo nwem, let us collectively resolve that Imo shall not witness any bloodshed in 2023. Let us resolve to work together to ensure that peace, unity and progress shall be our goal and that the interest and welfare of Imo State shall supersede our narrow selfish interests.
“May God keep us safe and bless the works of our hands in 2023. I wish all of us a happy, prosperous and blessed 2023.”
President Bola Tinubu has directed the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) to investigate major technology companies and Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) platforms operating in Nigeria over allegations of anti-competitive practices, unlawful exploitation of news content and other potentially unfair market conduct.
The investigation follows a joint petition submitted to the Presidency by the Nigerian Press Organisation (NPO), comprising the Newspaper Proprietors’ Association of Nigeria (NPAN), the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), the Broadcasting Organisations of Nigeria (BON), and the Guild of Corporate Online Publishers (GOCOP).
Announcing the development in a statement on Monday, the FCCPC said the directive was conveyed by the Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris.
“The Federal Government’s position was communicated to the FCCPC in a letter signed by the Honourable Minister of Information and National Orientation, Alhaji Mohammed Idris. The investigation promises to open a new vista in Nigeria’s media history.
“In recent years, concerns have been raised by the Nigerian media industry over the growing impact of certain digital platforms on the sustainability of the country’s news ecosystem. Specifically, the NPO is increasingly uncomfortable with major technology companies including Meta, Alphabet, X (formerly Twitter), and certain generative AI platforms, citing practices capable of undermining fair competition, the commercial viability of Nigerian media organisations, and the legitimate rights of content creators and publishers,” the Commission stated.
Reacting to the directive, the Executive Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the FCCPC, Mr. Tunji Bello, said the Commission would conduct an independent, transparent and evidence-based investigation.
“We recognise the strategic importance of the media to Nigeria’s democracy and the equally significant role of technology in driving innovation and economic growth. Our responsibility is to objectively determine the facts and ensure that competition within the digital ecosystem remains fair, transparent, and consistent with Nigerian law,” Bello said.
He stressed that the investigation should not be interpreted as a presumption of wrongdoing against any organisation, but as an opportunity to establish the facts through due process.
“Every party will be accorded a fair opportunity to present relevant information before any conclusions are reached. In specific terms, FCCPC will determine whether the practices in question constitute a breach of the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Act (FCCPA) 2018 or any other applicable law.
“In the past, FCCPC had investigated META and in 2025, won a landmark case against the tech giant for violations of FCCPA, including data breach, for which the tech giant was fined $220m. Meta has, however, appealed the fine,” the statement signed by Director of Corporate Affairs, Ondaje Ijagwu, added.
According to the FCCPC, the investigation will examine allegations of market dominance and potential anti-competitive conduct by the companies involved.
It will also probe claims of unauthorised extraction, scraping, ingestion or commercial use of copyrighted news articles, broadcast materials and other original journalistic content for developing and training Generative AI models.
Another key area of inquiry is the allegation that Nigerian news publishers have been denied meaningful opportunities to negotiate fair compensation or appropriate commercial arrangements for the use of their journalistic content.
The Commission noted that similar concerns had previously been raised in South Africa, where, following an investigation by the South African Competition Commission, it said Google agreed to compensate South African news media with R688 million ($40 million) annually for three to five years.
Nigerians, intent on getting to the root of the current fake agency scandal raving around the Presidency must start by ascertaining the whereabouts of the N27.5billion, said to have triggered off the entire saga.
Babachir Lawal, former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), who weighed in on the scandal surrounding the purported Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC), stressed on Monday night that Nigerians must not forget that the sharing formular regarding the amount, which is said to be the takeoff grant for the body, was the foundation of the dispute.
Recall that Adeniyi Adeyemi, Director General of the agency, after accusing Femi Gbajabiamila, Chief of Staff (CoS) to President Bola Tinubu, of collecting N400 million from him while awaiting a balance of N200million for facilitating his appointment, upped the ante by alleging that disagreement over the sharing formula of the grant triggered off the dispute.
Adeyemi had accused the CoS of demanding 48 per cent of the entire grant for himself, which he refused to part with, leading to the disagreement to the extent that the former Speaker of the House of Representatives now declaring war, which the Presidency relied on to declare the agency non-existence.
Babachir, a guest of Prime Time, a public affairs programme on ARISE NEWS Television, wondered why Nigerians were limiting themselves to the N1.3billion budgeted for the agency by the National Assembly in the 2026 appropriation without talking about the huger amount of N27.5billion.
Hear him: “Nigerians are talking about how 1.3 billion Naira was inserted into the budget. The man himself first said the quarrel came about because he refused to part with 48% of the 27-point-something billion Naira take-off grant. That money has been spent before this budget office was looking for the budget. Who gave him the money? It was not appropriated for; it’s not in any budget, that 27.5 billion Naira for which he says somebody demanded 48%. Who gave him the money? How did the process of generating the request for the release come up? How did it go through?
“We are just talking about the tip of the iceberg here. Down there, before we got to here, 27.5 billion Naira had already been disbursed, according to him, as a take-off grant. How did that money get to him? It was not in the budget. So, this is what should frighten us. If such money can go to a fictitious organisation, we only now begin to see it when we are quarreling about how did it get into the budget. How did that money get to them?
“I think we all know that thieves and armed robbers always fight and they expose themselves during sharing. His complaint was that the Presidency was after him because somebody demanded 48 per cent of the take-off grant of 27.5 billion Naira. And so, somebody was not happy since he refused to part with that money.
“So, you see, that’s how we got to know this to start with. That is the reason why we got to know this on his side of the coin. It’s about the sharing of the 27.5 billion Naira. That’s why the thing came up. So, it didn’t work. It should have worked before that money left the government coffers into the account of the agency.
“It depends on the will of the President. I can use myself as an example. When there was this brouhaha between me and the Senate, remember I was suspended for some time while an investigation was going on. So now, that is best practice.
“It’s already out of their hands. I believe now the thing is on the President’s desk. It is a legislative oversight. This government – this National Assembly – has no interest in scrutinising the budget that comes before them. Most of the legislators just go in there to earn their salaries and collect allowances and go. They don’t scrutinise the budget line by line. We all know how this particular government works. There are some people that when they talk, nobody else has the authority to contravene
“It’s not a one-off thing. The issue of buying appointments is not new. People have been hearing it as rumors, as allegations, all over that. In this government, people buy appointments. We’ve heard it on the streets. And so this is not a new thing. I don’t know in our time. Nobody was buying appointments. No, it’s not to my knowledge. It’s not to my knowledge that people buy appointments. It probably could be, but I wouldn’t know that. It’s not part of our mandate to know such things.
“This government doesn’t take governance seriously. When things like this happen, Nigerians are not surprised. We are only interested in this because we have an opportunity to poke attacks on the government, not because we don’t know that these things happen in this government. It’s so porous.
“There are so many power centers that, you know, nobody does a budget. Nobody implements a budget. Ministers go to the office and sit down and read newspapers. Overheads, maybe if they are lucky, it comes one per quarter, at least paid quarterly. Some governments don’t even get overheads. Everybody’s redundant. But there’s money being appropriated and money being spent, but nobody sees where the money is going to. So that is part of the loopholes.
“Why are you interested in 27.5 billion Naira that had already been collected and spent? We are talking about an agency that we are claiming doesn’t exist. Maybe it exists, but it doesn’t have a legal framework for its existence. But it exists. And there are a lot of powerful people that make sure it exists in that form. Those are the people we need to expose. The Chief of Staff, in particular, is so powerful. The SGF is there, just reneging on his responsibilities. And nothing has happened now.”
Explaining official procedures for documenting new agencies, the former SGF, said: “If an agency is received, processed, and forwarded without somebody asking in the SGF’s office exactly who these people are, it means there’s a dereliction of duty on the side of the SGF.
“The act setting up that agency will sometimes say the position has to be advertised, interviewed, and shortlisted names sent to the president for approval. Some, you just write and he just approves. So, the SGF will go through the file, and in that process of due diligence, will be able to find out whether such an organisation exists. If there is no record for it in the SGF’s office, he will raise a red flag on it.
“What we used to do is if there’s a new agency that either the President or a minister proposes to handle some specific assignments or duties, he will first of all raise a memo to the president, who will approve that such be created. And then a memo will be sent to the Federal Executive Council on that particular agency, and we’ll debate it.
“Now, sometimes it will require some legislation to give that agency a legal mandate to operate. Some will just be within the presidential approval, and then the agency is created. Because really, you cannot appropriate funds to an agency that has not been legislated for.
“There has to be a legal basis for its existence. But first of all, it is the executive that raises such an agency, makes the proposal, debates it, and the Attorney General of the Federation will normally put an opinion on it. Then, if the Federal Executive Council approves, it’s sent to the legislature for legal establishment.
“It should not have arisen in the first place if it is not a legally approved agency. It should not exist. And the SGF would know that if it doesn’t exist on any basis, why is he forwarding a request? If it doesn’t exist, such will not happen in our time.
“I’m sure the President would assume that such an entity has gone through all the checks and balances before it is established, and therefore, not every communication from that agency needs to be verified. But as far as it is coming through the office of the SGF, due diligence must be done first before it is forwarded.
“This SGF has been sidelined in a lot of things from what we hear. He has been sidelined in a lot of things. It’s institutional compromise, because in this, I sense there’s quite a big racket going on somewhere along the line. If the agency was created by maybe one big man alone, and then he wants to go through the budget process, the budget office assigns the budget code according to the chart of accounts in GIFMIS. So, how did they manage to assign the budget code for this agency that does not exist? Who inserted it?
“Because first of all, the budget office issues a budget call circular to MDAs, and everybody starts to prepare his budget according to the budget line. They give you ceilings, and you prepare your budget and forward it to the budget office as an agency or ministry. Now, the Ministry of Budget and Planning would, in our time, call every MDA to come and defend its budget. Now, if you don’t exist, how did they recognise that you are a genuine entity? Who gave out the budget code and allowed their budget to pass?
“That’s what oversight is. The SGF should be able to know, because before it gets to the National Assembly, that budget goes through the SGF. “Unless there’s a dereliction of duty by the SGF’s office, the responsibility to flag that this is a fake agency would have come from them.”
Sepp Blatter is unhappy with a situation where Donald Trump, would pick up his phone and call on the Federation of Internation Football Associations (FIFA) to change its established rules as has now emerged in the case of Folarin Balogun, a strike in the United States squad currently at the World Cup.
Balogun, a Nigerian-US citizen, is supposed to miss a match between his country and Belgium in the Round of 16, on Monday, following a red card he picked in the last encounter of the team between Bosnia and Herzegovina.
However, it has now been revealed that the intervention of the President of the United States, who reportedly called Gianni Infantino, current FIFA President to review Balogun’s automatic one-game suspension, saw to the world’s footballing regulator acquiescing by shifting the implementation of the ban by a year.
Railing on the development, which would now make the 25-year-old eligible to file out against Belgium in the last 16 of the World Cup later on Monday, Blatter, disgraced out of the FIFA Presidency in 2015, wrote on X: “Red cards are not overturned by political phone calls,” scandal-hit Blatter said on X.
“They are overturned by rules, evidence and independent bodies. If a US President intervenes with the FIFA President — and a player is suddenly cleared before a World Cup knockout match — the question is unavoidable: Quo vadis (Where are you going), FIFA?”
The 90-year-old former FIFA boss, a usual critic of Infantino, who once told Bild, German newspaper in February that the new FIFA had become a “dictator,” added: “Football must never become a playground for political power.”
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