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BREAKING: Tinubu Appoints Olukoyede As EFCC Chairman

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President Bola Tinubu on Thursday approved the appointment of Mr. Ola Olukoyede to serve as the Executive Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission for a renewable term of four years in the first instance, pending Senate confirmation.

This comes nearly four months after he suspended the erstwhile anti-graft agency chief, Mr Abdulrasheed Bawa.

“Mr. Olukayode’s appointment follows the resignation of the suspended Executive Chairman of the EFCC, Mr. Abdulrasheed Bawa,” a statement signed by the President’s Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Ajuri Ngelale, read on Thursday.

The statement is titled ‘President Tinubu appoints new EFCC. Chairman and Secretary of the Commission.’

Olukoyede is a lawyer with over 22 years of experience as a regulatory compliance consultant and specialist in fraud management and corporate intelligence.

He has extensive experience in the operations of the EFCC, having previously served as Chief of Staff to the Executive Chairman (2016-2018) and Secretary to the Commission (2018-2023). As such, he fulfills the statutory requirement for appointment as Chairman of the EFCC.

President Tinubu also approved the appointment of Mr. Muhammad Hammajoda to serve as the Secretary of the EFCC for a renewable term of five years in the first instance, pending Senate confirmation.

Hammajoda is a public administrator with extensive experience in public finance management who holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting from the University of Maiduguri and a Masters in Business Administration from the same university.

He began his career as a lecturer at the Federal Polytechnic, Mubi. From there, he went into banking, including successful stints at the defunct Allied Bank and Standard Trust Bank.

The president tasked the new leadership of the commission to justify the confidence given to them in this important national assignment as a newly invigorated war on corruption undertaken through a reformed institutional architecture in the anti-corruption sector remains a central pillar of the President’s Renewed Hope agenda.

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Naira Abuse: CBN Proposes N500,000 As Minimum Fine In New Bill — NASS

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A bill to modify the Central Bank of Nigeria Act 2007 has been submitted in the Nigerian Senate, which would increase the minimum fine for abusing naira by 900%, from N50,000 to N500,000.

Senator Mukhail Adetokunbo Abiru (Lagos East) is the sponsor of the proposed legislation, which aims to severely enhance the punishment for abusing naira.

Prior to his removal from office by a Lagos Appeal Court, Senator Darlington Nwokocha was the bill’s original sponsor.

The goal of the bill, “A Bill for an Act to Amend the Central Bank of Nigeria Act No. 7 of 2007,” is to provide the CBN more authority to carry out its main goals.

The bill proposes a minimum fine of N500,000 or six months imprisonment for anyone who refuses to accept naira as a means of payment in Nigeria. 

The amendment bill read: “A person who refuses to accept the Naira as a means of payment or who prices or denominates the cost of any product or service or consummates any non-export business in Nigeria other than in Naira is guilty of an offence (unless the Bank has by written circular published in the National Gazette permitted such transaction) and liable on conviction to a fine of N500, 000 or 6 months imprisonment.”

The Senate also proposes a new minimum fine of N500,000 for anyone who engages in the buying and selling of naira notes. 

The amendment bill read: “A person who buys/sells Naira notes at a mark-up is guilty of an offence and shall on conviction be liable to imprisonment for a term not less than six months or to a fine not less than N500,000 or Ten per cent of the transaction value (whichever is higher), or six (6) months imprisonment.”

These proposed changes are designed to deter the misuse and abuse of the national currency, ensuring that the naira remains the principal means of transaction within the country.

By imposing stiffer penalties, the Senate aims to reinforce the sanctity of the naira and uphold its value in the face of economic challenges.

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JUST IN: After 23 Months Of Suspending Operations In Nigeria, Emirate Airlines To Resume In October

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Emirates Airlines has stated that it is prepared to resume direct flight service from its base in Dubai to Nigeria twenty-three months after it halted operations there.

The airline made this announcement on Thursday through its official X account.

The service will be operated using a Boeing 777-300ER. EK783 will depart Dubai at 0945hrs, arriving in Lagos at 1520hrs; the return flight EK784 will leave Lagos at 1730hrs and arrive in Dubai at 0510hrs the next day.

“We’re back, Nigeria! We’ll be resuming services to Lagos from 1 October 2024, and we can’t wait to offer unrivalled connectivity to Dubai and beyond to over 140 cities,” the tweet read.

Adnan Kazim, Emirates’ Deputy President and Chief Commercial Officer said, “We are excited to resume our services to Nigeria. The Lagos-Dubai service has traditionally been popular with customers in Nigeria and we hope to reconnect leisure and business travellers to Dubai and onwards to our network of over 140 destinations. We thank the Nigerian government for their partnership and support in re-establishing this route and we look forward to welcoming passengers back onboard.

“With the resumption of operations to Nigeria, Emirates operates to 19 gateways in Africa with 157 flights per week from Dubai, with further reach to an additional 130 regional points in Africa through its codeshare and interline partnerships with South African Airways, Airlink, Royal Air Maroc, Tunis Air, among others.

“As a major economic hub in Africa, Nigeria and the UAE have built strong bilateral trade relations over the years, headlined by Lagos as the nation’s commercial centre. With the resumption of daily passenger flights, the airline’s cargo arm, Emirates SkyCargo, will further bolster the trade relationship by offering more than 300 tonnes of bellyhold cargo capacity, in and out of Lagos every week.”

Nigeria’s Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, SAN, hinted at the development earlier.

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Corrupt Politicians Should Not Get Any Serious Punishment, They “Steal And Share With The People” — Ndume

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Ali Ndume, the Chief Whip of the Senate, has explained the difference between corruption by politicians and other people.

Ndume said corruption by Nigerian politicians should not warrant any serious punishment, noting that it is People-Driven.

The senator admitted that politicians “steal and share with the people”.

He stated this on Tuesday when he featured on Channels TV Politics Today while speaking on the death penalty as the deterrent for those caught with drugs.

He said when politicians’ corruption is compared to others, it is a “small one’

He stated, “If you compare us, politicians, to all the corruption, it is very small. Our corruption is people-driven. If you steal it, you will go and share it with the people. If you don’t, you are not coming back for four years. There is no reason for stealing.

“I have been to the National Assembly, I can’t say because we are on TV now and not tell the truth. If the death penalty is supposed to be included in corruption, I will support it but you don’t go and kill someone that stole one million or one billion, no. But someone who steals one trillion of government money should be killed.

The senator said he supports death punishment for drug dealers.

“The death penalty is the best deterrent for those being caught for drugs. If you do drugs, you are killing people.

“In fact, that means you have destroyed the lives of so many people and killed so many people,” he said.

Recently, the Senate passed a bill, the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency Act (Amendment Bill) 2024 passed by the Senate.

The bill prescribed death penalty for persons found guilty of trading in hard drugs and narcotics.

This has, however, been debated and faulted by many stakeholders on whether or not President Bola Tinubu should accent the bill.

On Saturday, some legal practitioners expressed different opinions on the debate over the bill. Some of them urged President Bola Tinubu not to assent to the bill passed by the Senate while others pressed for it to be signed into law.

Some of the lawyers stressed that the death penalty was not a solution to drug trafficking and other drug-related offences in the country.

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