Nigeria’s daily petrol consumption hits record high of 93m litres
Nigeria’s daily consumption of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) popularly called petrol was at an unsustainable level at 93 million litres a day in April 2021 from an average of 61 million litres consumed in the previous months. This translates to a daily spend of N7.10 billion on subsidy.
Petrol consumption in West Africa is estimated at 120.80 million litres daily and at 93 million litres daily consumption, this means that Nigeria alone accounts for 77 percent of petrol consumption, even though it has 52 percent of West Africa’s population and accounts for 65 percent of the sub-region’s gross domestic product (GDP).
Major depots including Nigerian Pipelines and Storage Company Ltd (NPSC) in Ejigbo, Mosimi, Emadeb Energy’s depot, Matrix Energy’s depot, AYM Shafa’s depot, Aiteo’s depot among others lifted a total of 43.90 million litres, accounting for 47 percent of Nigeria’s daily evacuation. Smaller depots around the country make up for the difference.
As revenue shrinks, FG plans merger of MDAs
Dwindling revenues is now pushing the government to consider a tough option of merging hundreds of its Ministries, Departments and Agencies and/or slash salaries of its workers to check the burgeoning cost of governance.
Zainab Ahmed Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning said President Buhari has directed her committee to review salaries and payroll of the federal institutions as the government can no longer cope with huge recurrent spending.
She mentioned that the federal government has planned a N13.9 trillion spending for 2021 out of which N5.6 trillion would be spent on recurrent items and N1.060 trillion on capital.
The government has also projected revenue of N7.98 trillion to partly fund the budget. But implementation of the budget appears pretty difficult over funding issues.
MTN revenues jump 18% with contribution from Nigeria, Ghana
Africa’s largest mobile operator MTN Group on Wednesday posted a near 18 percent jump in first-quarter revenue, led by double-digit growth in commercial operations across South Africa, Nigeria and Ghana.
MTN and its peer Vodacom Group which together control over 70 percent of the South African mobile market in terms of subscribers, hugely benefited last year from demand boost for data and digital financial services as people shifted to online modes of functioning due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The company’s revenue from fintech operations, which account for 10 percent of total revenue, expanded by 31 percent on the back of an 87 percent increase in online financial transactions.
Nigerians to miss Hajj as Saudi Arabia to set stringent COVID limits
Saudi Arabia may bar thousands of Nigerians and other overseas pilgrims from the annual hajj for the second year to contain the spread of coronavirus.
The pilgrimage would be restricted to only vaccinated nationals and residents, as well as those who have recovered from the virus at least six months prior to attending, according to Reuters.
Initial plans to allow some vaccinated pilgrims from abroad were suspended given the confusion over types of vaccines, their efficacy and the emergence of variants, Reuters reported.
FG sets June 30 as deadline for NIN-SIM Card Verification
The Federal Government has approved the extension of the deadline for NIN-SIM data verification to June 30, 2021, as 54 million people have, to date, obtained their National Identification Numbers (NIN) according to official numbers.
The shift in the deadline was based on the request by stakeholders to allow all citizens and legal residents to register.
The Federal Government has approved the extension as part of its effort to make it easier for its citizens and residents to obtain the NIN and it is important to take advantage of the extension
