Economy

SON seeks jail term for importers, smugglers of fake , substandard products.

The eyewitness reporter

The Standard Organization of Nigeria (SON) has initiated a move to prosecute and jail importers and smugglers who profiteer in fake and substandard products.

According to the immediate past Director General, Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON), Mallam Farouk Salim, the action will serve as a deterrent to what he called illicit activities and also protect the indigenous manufacturers and the Nigerian economy.

He said that the agency is committed to defending and protecting indigenous companies and the Nigerian public from economic sabotage.

Speaking with journalists at the destruction site of some seized items in Lagos Thursday, October 12th, 2021, Salim stated that the seized items which include electrical cables, aluminum sheets, motor tyres and motor oil were fake and their quality had been compromised and if used could lead to loss of lives and properties.

He stressed that while the agency is keen on ensuring local industries thrive by providing standards in tandem with best practices across the world, he lamented that smugglers and imposters work to subvert the process by importing expired and substandard products and erroneously copying established Indigenous brands.

“This is affecting our economy, especially with our government policy on homegrown economy.

“We have to make sure our successful homegrown economy is protected. All these products you are seeing here are a danger to the society.

“That is why we are destroying them. We want to make sure nobody else uses these products.

“Our Nigerian lubricant manufacturers, when successful, unfortunately, have to contend with individuals trying to copy them.

” Nobody copies a product that is not successful. So, the product you are seeing behind does not belong to that popular company.

” It’s somebody trying to fake their product and we took the person to court, he was convicted and then the court gave us permission to confiscate these products and destroy them.

“The same thing with the cables. Our cable industry is one of the most successful industries in Nigeria.

” And like I said, success breeds copying. The only problem is this copying is bad copying.

” All our Nigerian-based cable industries know that people are copying their products.

”The Cable Manufacturing Association of Nigeria keeps a vigilant eye on these fake people. Sometimes they inform us about them, sometimes our intelligence as a group finds those people before even the companies report them.”

The erstwhile SON DG explained that many cases of motor accidents and house fires are caused by substandard tyres and cable which are smuggled into the economy.

Salim said that the agency will continue to clamp down on smugglers and fake producers of products to ensure a robustly improved standard across all sections of the economy.

He further reiterated that the agency would employ transparency to ensure that it gains public trust and cooperation.

“Sometimes,when we confiscate items, the owners will go to court because they will not let us have permission to destroy them.

” And because of that, some of these items have been sitting here for a while. And once in a while, when everything is done and we have permission from the courts, we have to come here and we invite the owners to come and witness too.

” Because we don’t want them to think we are confiscating their goods and then selling it to somebody else.”

He also added that the agency is looking to receive the necessary approval to prosecute and sentence offenders in this regard to serve as a deterrent to other Nigerians who may be looking to venture into this evil trade.

“We went to the National Assembly to review our act to make sure peddlers of life-threatening materials are actually jailed and not just fined.”

Economy

Ojulari, new NNPCL MD, hits the ground running, assembles new management team as he takes over from Kyari

Funso OLOJO

The new Group Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC Ltd), Bayo Ojulari, has assembled new management team that will drive the vision of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu in the petroleum sector shortly after he took over the mantle of leadership from his predecessor, Mr Mele Kyari.

It could be recalled that the appointment of the erswhile NNPCL boss, Kyari was terminated and Ojulari was appointed in his stead with immediate effect.

However, in a brief handover ceremony held at the NNPC Towers, Ojulari commended Kyari for his contributions to the growth of NNPC Ltd and his sterling service to the nation.

He disclosed that the objective of his management was to consolidate on the successes of his predecessor and take the company to the next level.

He said though the targets set for his management were quite enormous, he would be relying on the co-operation of the Management and staff of the company, as well as the counsel of his predecessor to achieve set targets.

“I will be counting on your support. I will need it. I will be coming around to seek your counsel,” Ojulari told Kyari.

Earlier in his remarks, Kyari congratulated Ojulari and thanked the Management and staff of the company for their support while in office.

He pledged to do everything within his power to support the new Management to succeed, stressing that he was only a call away.

Soon after the official handing over ceremony, the new new NNPCL, Mr Ojulari announced the appointment of a new 8-man Senior Management Team .

The team which will be headed by the GCEO, Mr Bashir Bayo Ojulari, has Roland Ewubare as Group Chief Operating Officer; Adedapo Segun as Group Chief Financial Officer; and Olalekan Ogunleye as Executive Vice President Gas, Power & New Energy.

Other members of the team are: Udy Ntia as Executive Vice President Upstream; Mumuni Dagazau as Executive Vice President Downstream; Sophia Mbakwe as Executive Vice President Business Services; and Adesua Dozie, as Company Secretary & Chief Legal Officer.

All appointments are with immediate effect.

Economy

Tinubu sacks Kyari, NNPCL GMD, appoints Ojulari as new CEO, reconstitutes board

Funso OLOJO

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has approved sweeping changes on the board of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited (NNPCL) as he removed the Board Chairman, Chief Pius Akinyelire and the Chief Executive Officer, Mallam Meke Kolo Kyari.

Their removal took immediate effect.

The President also removed all other board members appointed with Akinyelure and Kyari in November 2023.

Tinubu’s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, revealed the development in a statement he signed in the early hours of Wednesday titled, ‘President Tinubu reconstitutes NNPC limited board, appoints new Chairman, Group CEO.’

“President Tinubu removed all other board members appointed with Akinyelure and Kyari in November 2023.

The new 11-man board has Engineer Bashir Bayo Ojulari as the Group CEO and Ahmadu Musa Kida as non-executive chairman,” the statement reads.

Adedapo Segun, who replaced Umaru Isa Ajiya as the chief financial officer last November, has been appointed to the new board by President Tinubu.

Six board members, non-executive directors, represent the country’s geopolitical zones.

They are Bello Rabiu, North West, Yusuf Usman, North East, and Babs Omotowa, a former Managing Director of the Nigerian Liquified Natural Gas( NLNG), who represents North Central.

President Tinubu appointed Austin Avuru as a non-executive director from the South-South, David Ige as a Non-Executive Director from the South West, and Henry Obih as a non-executive director from the South East.

Ahmad Musa Kida, NNPC new chairman,
Bayo Bashir Ojulari new NNPC GCEO,
Mrs Lydia Shehu Jafiya, Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Finance, will represent the ministry on the new board, while Aminu Said Ahmed will represent the Ministry of Petroleum Resources.

All the appointments are effective immediately ,April 2nd, 2025.

President Tinubu, invoking the powers granted under Section 59, subsection 2 of the Petroleum Industry Act, 2021, emphasised that the board’s restructuring is crucial for enhancing operational efficiency, restoring investor confidence, boosting local content, driving economic growth, and advancing gas commercialisation and diversification.

President Tinubu also handed out an immediate action plan to the new board which include to conduct a strategic portfolio review of NNPC-operated and Joint Venture Assets to ensure alignment with value maximisation objectives.

Since 2023, the Tinubu administration has implemented oil sector reforms to attract investment.

Last year, NNPC reported $17 billion in new investments within the sector. The administration now envisions increasing the investment to $30 billion by 2027 and $60 billion by 2030.

The Tinubu administration targets raising oil production to two million barrels daily by 2027 and three million daily by 2030.

Concurrently, the government wants gas production jacked to 8 billion cubic feet daily by 2027 and 10 billion cubic feet by 2030.

Furthermore, President Tinubu expects the new board to elevate NNPC’s share of crude oil refining output to 200,000 barrels by 2027 and reach 500,000 by 2030.

The new board chairman, Ahmadu Musa Kida, is from Borno State.

He is an alumnus of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, where he received a degree in civil engineering in 1984.

He also obtained a Postgraduate Diploma in petroleum engineering from the Institut Francaise du Petrol (IFP) in Paris.

He started his career in the oil industry at Elf Petroleum Nigeria and later joined Total Exploration and Production as a trainee engineer in 1985.

Musa became Total Nigeria’s Deputy Managing Director of Deep Water Services in 2015.

Last year, he became an Independent Non-Executive Director at Pan Ocean-Newcross Group.

Apart from his oil industry career, Ahmadu Musa Kida is a former basketballer and the President of the Nigerian Basketball Federation(NBBF) board.

Ojulari, the new NNPC Limited Group CEO, hails from Kwara State.

Until his new appointment, he was Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Renaissance Africa Energy Company.

His Renaissance recently led a consortium of indigenous energy firms in the landmark acquisition of the entire equity holding in the Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria (SPDC), worth $2.4 billion.

Like Kida, Ojulari is also an alumnus of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria.

He graduated with a degree in Mechanical Engineering.

He worked for Elf Aquitaine as the first Nigerian process engineer to begin a stellar career in the oil sector.

From Elf, he joined Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Ltd in 1991 as an associate production technologist.

Apart from working in Nigeria, he worked in Europe and the Middle East in different capacities as a petroleum process and production engineer, strategic planner, field developer, and asset manager.

In 2015, he became the managing director of Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company (SNEPCO).
During his career, he was chairman and member of the board of trustees of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE Nigerian Council) and a fellow of the Nigerian Society of Engineers.

Economy

Dangote group remits N402.3 billion tax to government coffers in 2024

Gloria Odion

The Pan African Conglomerate, Dangote Industries Limited and its subsidiaries, have disclosed that it paid over N402 billion in taxes in 2024, making it the highest taxpayer in the country.

Dangote’s Chief Branding and Communication Officer, Anthony Chiejina, declared during a meeting with some senior media executives who visited him in his Lagos Office.

He said Dangote Industries Limited (DIL) and its subsidiaries, namely, Dangote Cement, NASCON, Dangote Packaging Limited among others, remitted a total of N402.319billion for the out-gone year as taxes as responsible business enterprises.

Recall that Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) had in late 2024 recognised Dangote group and its subsidiary, Bluestar Shipping as the most tax compliant organizations in the country during its Special Day at the 2024 Lagos International Trade Fair organised by the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI).

The Federal Inland Revenue Service is Nigeria’s agency responsible for assessing, collecting and accounting for tax and other revenues accruing to the Federal Government of Nigeria.

Chiejina told his visitors that as a responsible business organisation, DIL and its subsidiaries have never shieded away from its obligations either to the government in the form of tax payment at all levels or to host communities in the form of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).

According to him, the Group’s corporate strategy has evolved just as its businesses have grown, matured and diversified into new sectors and regions over the last four decades.

He noted that Dangote Group has almost single-handedly taken Nigeria to self-sufficiency in cement and refined petroleum products and is expanding rapidly across Africa.

Dangote Group and its subsidiaries were recognised as number one most compliant in tax payment in the country, just as its subsidiary Dangote Cement, the country’s leading cement manufacturer, at another occasion won three awards at the FMDQ Gold Awards in Lagos as the most active business in the Foreign Exchange market.

Dangote Cement Plc was adjudged as the Largest Commercial Paper Quotation on FMDQ and Single Largest Corporate Debt Issue on FMDQ.

Also, Dangote Industries Ltd also emerged as the “Most active corporate in the foreign exchange market”.